unit 24货币的历史The History of Money.docVIP

The History of Money 货币的历史 Money is anything that is commonly accepted by a group of people for the exchange of goods, services, or resources. Every country has its own system of coins and paper money. 钱通常是人们用来交换商品、服务或者是资源的东西。每个国家都有自己的硬币和纸币系统。 Bartering and Commodity Money In the beginning, people bartered. Barter is the exchange of a good or service for another good or service, a bag of rice for a bag of beans. However, what if you couldnt agree what something was worth in exchange or you didnt want what the other person had. To solve that problem humans developed what is called commodity money. A commodity is a basic item used by almost everyone. In the past, salt, tea, tobacco, cattle and seeds were commodities and therefore were once used as money. However, using commodities as money had other problems. Carrying bags of salt and other commodities was hard, and commodities were difficult to store or were perishable. 以物易物与商品货币 起初，人们以货易货。以物易物是用一种商品或服务换取另外一种商品或服务，比如用一袋大米换取一袋大豆。但是，如果你认为那东西不值得或者是你不需要另外一个人的东西，那又怎么办呢。为了解决这个问题，人们便开发出了被称为商品货币的东西。这种商品几乎是大家都使用的东西。 在过去，盐，茶叶，烟草，牲畜和种子都充担过用来交换的商品，曾经起着钱的作用。然而，使用商品作为货币又有其他问题。背着装着食盐等商品袋子去交换是很不方便的，用来交换的商品又很难储存而且容易腐烂。 Coins and Paper Money Metals objects were introduced as money around 5000 B.C. By 700 BC, the Lydians became the first in the Western world to make coins. Countries were soon minting their own series of coins with specific values. Metal was used because it was readily available, easy to work with and could be recycled. Since coins were given a certain value, it became easier to compare the cost of items people wanted. Some of the earliest known paper money dates back to China, where the issue of paper money became common from about AD 960 onwards. 硬币与纸币 金属物体被当做钱用是在大约公元前5000年。到了公元前700年，吕底亚人成为西方最早铸造硬币的人。西方各国很快就铸造了一系列自己的具有特定价值的硬币。人们使用金属是因为金属有其自身的优势，容易加工，能够循环使用。由于硬币被赋予了一定的价值，它更容易成为人们进行价值比较的商品。 最早使用纸币的国家可以追溯到中国，中国普遍发行纸币大约是在公元960年。 Representative Money With the introduction of paper currency and non-precious coinage