Lydia Coin

In this podcast, Rashad discusses the Lydian coin and why trade increased during the Iron Age. The Lydian coin was a form of currency issued by Creases in 550 BCE. It featured a lion facing a bear on the front and thumb prints on the back. Creases ruled the kingdom of Lydia and captured towns along the west coast of Asia, allowing for efficient trading by sea. The kingdom of Lydia also invented coinage, where all coins had the same weight and value. Trade increased during the Iron Age because countries like Lydia utilized the sea to maximize their goods and build connections with other countries. The Lydia coins became popular and widely accepted. Welcome, welcome, my name is Rashad and today I have a podcast for you. Today I'm going to be talking about the Lydian coin and I'm going to touch on a topic, why did trade increase during the iron age, I'm going to talk about creases and the kingdom of Lydia as well. So first I'm just going to start off with, I'm just going to define what a Lydian coin was. A Lydian coin is a form of currency that was issued by Creases around 550 BCE and on the face of this coin, gold coin, that is, is a lion facing a bear and on the back of it there is like two kind of like thumb prints that kind of pushed out, it pushed out and so like the lion and the bear kind of was like more like prominent. But Creases ruled the kingdom of Lydia between 600 and 560 BCE and he actually issued this gold coin and an interesting story about Creases and he had many siblings and his stepmother actually tried to poison him and she was the half brother to Pantaleon and I guess his stepmother was in on his revolt because Creases was crowned king and it wasn't his half brother so as his way of revolting this, he had his stepmother poison Creases but luckily Creases was saved by his baker which is crazy to me actually just reading up on this and everything. But Creases captured all towns along the west coast of Asia so these towns had access to the sea which made trading all types of goods much more efficient and easier using ships and such. So they grew rich through gold mining and trade and the kingdom of Lydia actually invented coinage. So beforehand gold and silver, their value was weighed and like the weight of the gold and or silver determined how much it was worth. But through coinage all the coins are the same weight which like this means that because everything is the same weight they kind of have the same value and this was actually around 650 B.C.E. where all silver and gold were starting to be produced in the same weight. And to touch back on why the trade increased during the iron age, that's such a broad thing to view but I actually think that in this case with the kingdom of Lydia I think that they're a great example of using the sea and traveling as a way to maximize your country's goods. So they're producing all these things and like through trade you build these connections with other countries and I feel like that's a great way to utilize the sea that they were I guess blessed with. And the great thing about coinage and these Lydia coins is that they were used so often and they were kind of like a big hit that everyone kind of started to accept the coins and I think that's just a great thing.