Ancient Coins: Roman Hyperinflation

The Roman Empire suffered with a long and gruelling process of hyperinflation that slowly but surely eroded away at the foundations of the Empire, with many saying the uncontrolled inflation that plagued the Empire was one of the causes for its downfall.

Today, lets explore how did inflation happen on ancient times, draw some parallels with today´s economic situation around the world, have a look at a lot of coins and their stories, and maybe learn a thing of two about sound money.

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Licensed under Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 License

Licensed under Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 License

Licensed under Creative Commons BY Attribution 4.0 License

[RedBricksTraffic]

This is top-tier youtube content as far as I'm concerned. What a great history lesson!

[jadenephrite]

Regarding 9:59, hoarding good coins and spending instead bad coins is known as Gresham's Law.

[jadenephrite]

Regarding 10:29, An acid solution can also be used to leach silver from high purity silver coins and then be furttively spent back into circulation without arousing too much suspicion as long the adulterated coins are not grossly underweight or overtly obvious that they had been tampered with other than the normal wear as expected from coin to coin contact abrasions. Thereafter the dissolved silver in solution can be recovered by chemical precipitation as follows: If Nitric Acid is used to dissolve the silver, then the silver is converted into silver nitrate. Then by adding salt into the nitric acid solution, silver nitrate is converted into silver chloride. Then by adding Lye (Sodium Hydroxide) and adding sugar, then the silver chloride is reduced to powdered silver. The silver powder is then melted down into bullion. Other acids that can be used to dissolve silver are Hydrochloric Acid, Sulfuric Acid, or Aqua Regia (which is a highly corrosive combination of nitric acid & hydrochloride acid).

[AndrejBk]

that reminded me debasement of denars in early medieval Bohemian kingdom (duchy), when coins at the end were also practically silvered copper, because in that time the only monetary income of a king (or duke at that time) was minting of new coins (monetary tax was still not a thing), it was also problem in other early medieval countries, but Czech dukes took it to the max

[koolaidblack]

I found your channel from Toldinstone's videos on the subject. Interesting stuff. The only problem though is that your microphone volume seems very low compared to most other channels. Good video, thanks.

[MMatiCC]

Im loving this channel, watching every single video. Extremely underrated. Very interesting and well explained, with beautiful footage of every coin and correct information. Looking forward to watching your channel grow a lot

[jaxrussell]

Your channel was recommended by Mario from the Youtube channel Maneco64. What a nice episode! Very informative and I really enjoyed viewing all of the coins as you took us through the different emperors and historical lesson. Thank you!

[colbystearns]

I have a silvered antoninianus from the emperor Aurelian that surprisingly has a pretty well preserved, glossy sheen of silver (especially on the reverse that shows Sol Invictus standing over Palmyrene prisoners) despite the rapid debasement that had occurred throughout the Third Century Crisis. I bet it would've looked even more convincing as a silver coin 1750 years ago when it was new. Even still it's one of my favorite ancient coins that I have in my collection for the design and history behind it.

The debasement of Roman currency is an interesting story, certainly some lessons to be learned there.

[skuul]

Very informative as always! It's also interesting to note that the emperor Postumus (usurper during Gallienus, 260-269) produced higher quality coins than those of Gallienus. Although i don't know the silver purity of Postumus coins, they at least appear high purity silver, whereas those of Gallienus have lost their appearance for some time. Also, Postumus coins are great for starting collections as they are really abundant and affordable.
Small comment: the antoninianus at 09:35 is from emperor Elagabalus, not Caracalla ;) They are easy to mistake, as both emperors used 'Antoninus' on the obverse. Lastly, i hope you'll complete your antoninianus series with Aemilianus and Hostilianus, they are tough to find :-)

[davidcurtis]

More people should see this video . This is inflation 101

[christopherevans]

I really enjoy looking for the mid-late3rd century Roman coins that still have good size and respectable silver. Learning about which Mints had the best to offer on certain Emperor's. And by far it's usually the rich east Mints

[markp]

yo, that first Gallienus you showed is so cool. I love war trophies. This might be your best video so far. I love it.

[godwolf]

Don’t know how you don’t have more subs, but I love this channel and you inspired me to start my numismatic journey. Going to start this week on MA-shops for something Roman republic with decent quality! or Greek if I can’t find something that jumps out at me.

[QuaaludeCharlie]

These would be nice to acquire as a Numismatist, If I could get them reasonably Priced , I Love History so I Like age . These are nice and a real Education for the younger People .

[Reathety]

Hard to say which one led to which. Did the inflation lead to the deterioration of the empire or did the deterioration lead to the inflation. My guess is they went hand in hand. Both feeding into the other.

[philwardle]

Fascinating to watch this video, holding a "silver" Antoninianus of Aurelian in my hand, which was one of a lot of six uncleaned coins I bought as my first foray into collecting ancient Roman coins. There is still a definite sheen of silver on the obverse, while the rougher reverse has XXI as part of the inscription.

[firasazaini]

Thank you so much for this amazing breakdown. The more I learn about ancient roman monetary history, the more I want to get started on collecting. Please don’t stop creating wonderful content!

[isabelcrb]

Very interesting! Keep doing this great videos!!

[brunoa]

Great research and presentation. Thanks!