The Rise of the European Emperor

In fact, the money shortage in Europe is no longer a day or two. From the beginning of large-scale trade between Europe and the Middle East, European coins have been leaving.

For example, Europe purchased a large amount of spices such as pepper from India. But they didn't have enough attractive goods to exchange with the Arab merchants. In desperation, the Venetian merchants had to give the Arab merchants millions of gold coins every year in exchange for expensive spices and other supplies.

Venetian merchants have been involved in trade with Asia since AD ​​687, and have been engaged in it for eight or nine hundred years. Coupled with the participation of commercial republics such as Genoa, gold and silver have been flowing out of Europe.

The main flow of European gold is probably India. Therefore, the Indians have so much gold. Indian women with a little money will wear gold ornaments all over their bodies. Even, there is a gold ring on the nose. Many Indian temples are filled with gold. For example, the Padmanabaswamy Temple in Kerala, India, a temple built in the 16th century, has hidden a lot of gold for hundreds of years. When later generations were discovered, gold jewelry worth 11.2 billion U.S. dollars was hidden in the secret room inside. The gold ornaments alone weighed a ton, and a baby elephant was made of gold...

And most of this gold is bought by Indians selling pepper...

By the way, Kerala, where the temple is located, has a port city called Calicut and a port city called Cochin...

Therefore, Europeans are very hard-pressed. It was very difficult to dig some gold and silver from their own mines, but in the end, all of them were exchanged for spices and other goods. Then, the enemy wanted to use money, but the gold and silver were not enough...

To be honest, the reason why the local silver coins in Europe are so poorly minted is that apart from the black hearts of the monarchs wanting to earn seigniorage, there is also the helplessness of a severe shortage of gold and silver!

Even the great voyages of the Europeans were forced out by the shortage of money. If there is no money, the Indians will not give you spices. So, go find gold and silver mines. Among them, Ah San in India likes gold the most. Therefore, the Venetians minted ducats, and the Florentines minted florins. Moreover, dare not adulterate. Because, the spice trade can use it. If you dare to adulterate, Indian Asan will refuse to accept it. If Ah San rejects it, there will be no more spices...

The current situation is that the European economy is developing, but there is a shortage of coins, which cannot keep up with the economic development...

Although by reducing the silver content of the currency, it is true that a lot of currency can be minted. However, ordinary people are not fools. Did you lower the silver content? Yes, we also give less goods. In short, bad money will not be regarded as good money.

Therefore, if you want to really promote the development of Europe, you still need a sufficient amount of gold and silver. After all, gold and silver are money by nature.

...

Therefore, after Marin flickered, Spain and Portugal jumped into the trap desperately, trying their best to go to Timbuktu and Zimbabwe in the interior of Africa to snatch gold. Up to now, the two countries are still spinning around the coast of Africa. No way, the tropical rainforest climate in the interior of Africa is too harsh. It is not generally difficult to open a road in the tropical rainforest.

Right now, according to intelligence, both Spain and Portugal are vigorously building castles and strongholds along the coasts of West Africa and Mozambique. What's more - I'm trying my best to cut down trees and build roads. When the road is repaired, it will be time for the two countries to attack the two great El Dorado.

...

However, Marin also saw danger in it-the danger of gold depreciation...

He had read the history of West Africa and knew that Mansa Musa, the golden sultan of the Mali Empire, had made a pilgrimage to Mecca with more than 33,000 pounds of gold. As a result, because of the massive purchases in Cairo, Egypt, which was on the way, the price of gold in Cairo fell by 1/5, and it took 12 years to recover...

Therefore, Marin realized that if Spain and Portugal really started to get a lot of gold from West Africa and Zimbabwe, the price of gold in Europe would definitely fall. Then, the entire financial system would be shuffled and thrown into chaos. After all, fluctuations in the value of currencies are bound to cause economic chaos.

The best way to solve this problem is to take out the same amount of silver of equivalent value. In this way, the gold-silver ratio will not fluctuate randomly. And with enough currency, the circulation of European goods will also speed up.

...

Of course, Marin doesn't really care much about the development of the European economy. He only cares about the North Sea country, including England, which he will succeed in the future.

But there is a problem-every year Europeans spend a lot of gold and silver to go to India and the Middle East to purchase all kinds of high-priced goods, and lose a lot of gold and silver. In this way, it will be difficult for Marin to exchange some silver bars for Ming trade in the future.

For a moment, Marin wanted to learn from the Song Dynasty, casting iron money wantonly...

The Song Dynasty is a strange work in history. This dynasty is a small dynasty with a small land and scarce resources. There is not enough copper to mint money. Because the south of Yunnan, which is rich in copper, is not from the Song Dynasty, but a country called Dali.

However, the economy of the Song Dynasty was very developed, and various materials were extremely rich. If there is not enough money, the economy of the Song Dynasty may experience very serious deflation. Then, the great gods of the Song Dynasty thought of various ways-first they made the paper money "Jiaozi". As a result, due to the excessive printing, the value of Jiaozi was greatly depreciated, and it was not recognized. Then, the people of the Song Dynasty put their minds to one side - they don't want banknotes, do they? Well, I use iron to cast money!

Then, the Song Dynasty began the history of wantonly casting iron coins. It is said that seven or eight million catties of iron are used to cast iron coins every year.

Therefore, the consistency of the Song Dynasty is different from the consistency of the Ming Dynasty. The consistent money of the Ming Dynasty is copper coins, while the consistent money of the Song Dynasty is iron coins...

...

However, Marin certainly cannot learn from the cast iron coins of the Song Dynasty. The reason is that the Song Dynasty was a centralized empire, and the common people could only accept the imperial court's use of iron money.

And Marin is just one of the many princes of Germany. Want to promote Iron Money? Maybe it’s okay in Beihai, but outside of Beihai, iron money is rubbish... Don’t talk about iron money, just like what Kohler reported before, people don’t recognize copper coins, only silver coins...

...

Therefore, after all, Marin still has to find Baiyin...

Then, Marin thought of the Rammelsberg silver mine near Goslar in the Duchy of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel that he had just captured...

"Expand the production scale of the Rammelsberg Silver Mine, launch multiple blast furnaces, promote the 'ash blowing method', and expand the silver production of the silver mine!" Marin ordered.

However, the Rammelsberg mine is also a silver mine that has been mined for hundreds of years. At this time, the easy-to-mine parts of the surface have already been mined. Now, if you want to mine, you have to let people go down the deep well to mine.

But deep well mining is not only dangerous, but also inefficient. Moreover, a large amount of drainage is required, which is a mistake.

So, after thinking about it, Marin made a decision——

"It's time to take over Mexico! Then, mine the vast amounts of silver there!"