Money Talks

When payday rolls around how do you prefer to receive your pay? In "bread" or "dough", "bucks" or "clams"? Perhaps "beans" or "bones"? In Latin America you may receive sticks ("palos") whereas in Germany you might find mice ("Mäuse") or coal ("Kohle") in your pocket.

Throughout recorded history and around the world, the words that human beings have chosen to refer to money, financial transactions and states of richness and poorness reveal much about our history and idiosyncrasies.

The word "money" itself, comes from the Old French "monaie", which in turn derives from the Latin "moneta". The Latin makes reference to the temple of Juno Moneta in Rome, where a mint was located in antiquity ("Moneta" comes from "monere" which means warn, watch, give advice, make remember).

When we look at the Latin word for money, "pecunia", which derives from "pecus" ("cattle"), an earlier value system comes into focus. The cow as a core unit of value is revealed in the English word "fee" (from the Old English "feoh" meaning "cattle, property, money"). Interestingly, the word "capital", which appears in many European languages, and word "cattle" itself do not come to us from early words for the cow. Both are from the Latin "capitalis", which means "principal". Meanwhile, in Welsh the word "da", which is generally used as an adjective meaning "good", can be used as a noun to refer to "cattle" and "goods".

The cow is not the only animal to find its way into our monetary lexicon. The root of the Russian word for money, "деньги" ("den'gi"), and the Turkmen equivalent of the penny, "tenge", is the Turkic "tän'gä", which literally meant "a squirrel's fur".

The need for more portable units of exchange with greater value density led to the use of shells and metal coins as forms of money. Naturally, languages evolved to accommodate these new units and their legacy is found in modern words.

Since early in human history, cowry shells haven been used as symbols of status and as a form of money. The earliest evidence of their use as currency was during the Shang Dynasty in China (1765-1122 BC). In fact, so important was their use in China that the shape of the cowry shell was used in creating the pictograph for money, "貝" ("bèi"). This pictograph is retained in the modern character for "wealth" – "財" ("cái"). The cowry, which due to the convenient hole in each shell were organized and transported on strings, even influenced a parallel design convention for early Chinese coins. The importance of the cowry is even alluded to in English when we are "shelling out money".

With the emergence of metallic coins, we see the historical root of many contemporary words that refer to the raw materials and processes used in making coins. The use of the word for "silver" to refer to money in a general sense is common in many languages including Spanish ("plata"), French ("argent"), Indonesian ("perak"). We also see the act of measuring metallic coins by weight reflected in the modern English words "spend", "expenditure" and "pound" (as in "pound sterling"), all of which are descendants of the Latin word "expendere" ("to weigh"). The Chinese currency, the "yuan" ("元"), relates to the shaping of coins, the original meaning of the word being "round". Similarly, the origin of the Indian rupee, the currency and also the Hindi word for "money", can be found in the Sanskrit word "rupah", meaning "shape, likeness, image". Cousins of the rupee include the Russian "rouble", the Indonesian "rupiah" and the Maldivian "rufiyaa".

In the modern world the core concept of coins and bills has been established as an agreed conduit for commercial interaction. But such standardization cannot slow language down. It has merely shifted the focus of linguistic innovation. We see the emergence of money-related words that demonstrate the effects of industrialization, human migration and cultural imperialism. For example, it is hardly coincidental that "Kohle" (coal) should be a slang word for money in Germany, where industrialization has been a critical economic driver for the last 100 years. Hand in hand with industrialization we see tremendous acceleration in the movements of people, The voice of the Spanish Romanies can be found in Latin America's use of the word "luca" to refer to bills. Similarly, in Puerto Rico, the evidence of US political domination and of the Puerto Ricans' resistance to cultural assimilation is reflected in the island's money words. Despite the use of US currency as its official monetary system, Puerto Ricans have retained Spanish names for the "penny" ("chavo"), "nickel" ("vellón), "quarter" ("peseta"), and dollar ("peso"). However, 150 years of US rule does not come without its price. The "dime", a 10-cent coin, is nothing other than the phonetically equivalent "daim".

Regardless of your current state of wealth, whether you are "plein aux as" (French: "full to the aces") or "fauché" (French: "reaped"), "forra'o" (Spanish: "wrapped") or "al verde" (Italian: "in the green"), if you take the time to look you are sure to find words that will link you to the origins of money in human society while revealing what is unique about your language's particular path through history.

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