The Denarius

The Denarius was the Roman equivalent to the silver Dollar. It was a silver coin of almost 7 grams. It was equivalent to a day's worth of skilled labor, and this relationship remained fixed until the Roman emperors started to debase their currency by lowering the silver content.

What should be noted, is the fact that 7 grams of silver was for many decades equivalent to a day's salary. A small household could sustain itself on this amount of money. Adding to this that the historic relationship between silver and gold has been 16 to 1, we get that 7 grams of gold should keep a household afloat for 16 days, that's about 1/2 a gram of gold per day.

This is the historic value of gold and silver. This is the norm. Great deviations from this would be the exceptions.

It follows that we live in exceptional times. Only in very poor countries can we still find people willing to work a whole day for a few dollars worth of silver or gold. However, this is bound to change in a not too distant future. Gold will gain greatly in purchasing power, and silver will likely gain even more.

By Classical Numismatic Group, Inc. http://www.cngcoins.com, CC BY-SA 2.5, Link