cash cache

CASH CACHE

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note: to answer better the question of how long it tales to grind flour in the Victoria ( used to be Corona ), I actually made notes this last time.  Four minutes.  A pint jar fill of grain yielding two and a half cups, or 750 calories.  And I was no more winded/sore that if I had done about a dozen push-ups.  See?  Even running grain through three times, it doesn't take all that much effort.
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For some time it had been less than a surprise when yet another Roman era stash of precious metal coins was unearthed in England during building construction.  Of course, this was during a time of petroleum powered machines doing the digging, and since the normal rebuilding of soil naturally is about one inch a century and if you were in a hurry to bury your wealth because bandits were besieging your village I’d guess you were going down perhaps a foot, my calculations say they would only be about a yard down at the most.  Which is no where near impossible for the most primitive digging implement.

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Why weren’t more caches uncovered?  Yes, of course it would be a foolish activity to dig all day long, using your limited energy given to you by a limited availability of food, and with few hopes of finding anything.  The standard practice of torture to divulge location wasn’t employed if there were so many stashes left for moderners to uncover.  Britain was colonized unlike so many other lands far from the capital city.  It was difficult to garrison ( as Hadrian’s Wall might hint at ) so why was it so important when other areas such as Germany were ignored ( which could be accessed by road rather than ship.  Mediterranean or river maritime shipping was of course cheaper than overland transportation, but getting to the British isles was another thing entirely as far as infrastructure unless it was restricted by season ).

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Britain had tin needed in metal working.  Tin tends to be restricted in availability-few areas offer it, so you go wherever it is.  But she also contained a large pottery industry which was exported all over the empire.  Which says that the whole area was garrisoned and other economic activity was allowed in a tamed colony.  Perhaps the need for the merchant ships for the tin lead to other exports which paid its way.  Britain wasn’t just a company town with only the mines being protected.

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So there was probably a lot of Romans living there, not just the military or mine administrators.  And who would live there unless there was an economic advantage ( akin to the Brits living in India )?  Most likely most Romans apart from slaves or military were comfortably well off merchants.  They all had wealth to bury.  Which means that perhaps the Roman retreat from Britain was not feasible.  Had Rome already fallen?  Either there was no transport back or there was no where to go back to. 

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No matter how pissed the locals were, I have a difficult time assuming they were kill all Romans rather than torturing them to find their gold or silver.  Did the rich bury their wealth and leave for the last safe refuge?  Then were overrun and slaughtered?  That almost seems feasible.  Say, if all the surrounding areas were abandoned and the fort at London was the Saigon embassy of the day.  Although, why not take your wealth with you?   It is of course hard to guess.  And not even a very fun parlor game since we have so little information to go on. 

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But one thing that this hints at, at least to me, is that the Romans were still living in a false monetary wealth paradigm.  They still were worried about saving their money.  Which is just human nature I assume.  Since the Agricultural Age was forced upon us and gold and silver the only was to trade ( and trade was vital for many things your area didn’t have and were necessary for your military which was needed to protect you against other centralized militaries predations ), precious metals in and of themselves were worthless but represented life saving trade. 

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All people in all lands since civilizations were formed all took precious metals.  Even kings who couldn’t trade after decentralization and during a Dark Age still hoarded silver to pass on his wealth to the next generation.  You couldn’t eat gold but you could always buy food, other than in times of pure chaos, famine and banditry ( which were always limited in scope due to mans inherent need to live in tribes ).  And there was always trade, even during Dark Ages which lacked any monopoly on force which trade is predicated on.  It was merely very limited and very expensive.  Each trader needed to protect himself and if overland needed to pay tolls and tariffs for many different governments.  Prices were ruinous as a result.

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So there will always be some limited expensive trade even in troubled times.  But it might be of such a niggardly nature that it is nearly worthless for most needs or wants.  Therefore, for all intents and purposes, trade essentially ceases in such times and gold and silver are little more than long term savings accounts.  Money loses almost all utility.  The fleeing or besieged Romans were still thinking in terms of money saving their lives, because 99% of the time it does exactly that.  But when empires fail, bringing down trade and money utility, defense and famine are the only concerns.  Money is a distant dream.

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You can pretend that soil infertility and irrigation infrastructure failures and lack of military funding isn’t going to cause your empire to collapse, but you would be rather foolish, yes?  And we preparing for the fall of our empire are still busily burying our gold ( insofar as focusing on wealth preservation, if not simply just wealth accumulation ).  Is this the wise course of action, or should we be more worried about defense and famine?  Food enough, not just so that the government takes the six months needed to restore services as is assumed by most, but enough food for a true civilization collapse.  And not just defensive measures against a burglar or looter, but against the whole barbarian hoards surrounding you ( as far as you can, anyway ). 

END ( today's related link http://amzn.to/2zqTEQA )

 

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