The Beastly State of Your Campaign
Note: Prices, coinage, and values changes as often then as they do now. The information provided herein is a guideline in case gamers are playing with timelines, using alternative earths or what-have-you. These are estimates and guesses…not clear-cut facts. If the GM or the players are moving along between exchange rates, just go with what a current price would be and not worry about the details. Have fun, right?
Livestock Can Be Money Too
Livestock was constantly used as a trade item and in several places the cow or bull was considered a symbol of wealth. People would pay tributes in cattle and show their respect with gifts of cattle. The Celts used cattle and bars of iron or tin as standards of value for trade with other civilizations. Dowries and bride prices were paid in cattle. Cattle and horses were used as gifts by the elite to clients or as a ransom to free a captured kinsman. The livestock was also used as blood-money to compensate a family for the death of a member. The result of using cattle as a monetary value was the acceptance of cattle-raiding in northwestern Europe.
In 196 CE at Xuxia, Chinese state farm clients did not pay taxes or were summoned to corvée (unpaid) labor, but had to give over a portion of whatever they grew. Those that owned their own ox had to give over 50% of the crops. Those that rented an ox had to give 60%, so a rented ox was worth 10% of the harvest in early China. From the number of oxen an oxcart used, one could tell which class the owner belonged to. The emperors of the North Wei Dynasty, some 1,500 years ago, used oxcarts with twelve oxen.
Europe/Middle East
Start with a Shekel
The shekel was one of the earliest forms of weight, usually of barley, somewhere between 9 and 17 grams (most often 11 grams or 180 grains of barley). It quickly became an equivalent weight of silver and thereby became one of the first coins.
The average worker in Mesopotamia would earn an average of a shekel a week. In the Code of Nesilim c. 1650–1500 BCE, there are descriptions of prices for livestock:
Plow-ox: fifteen half-shekels of silver
Bull: ten half-shekels
Great cow: seven half-shekels
Sheep: one half-shekel
Draft horse: Twenty half-shekels
Horse fourteen half-shekels of silver
These are prices of animals available to the common citizens. If importing a beast trained for combat, the prices tend to go hire. In 1 Kings 10:29 in the Bible, dated during the reign of Solomon (about 971 to 931 BCE), you have “And a chariot came up and went out of Egypt for six hundred shekels of silver, and a horse for a hundred and fifty.” It should be pointed out that this was a war horse, a charger trained for battle, and not likely a horse to be used by common folk.
Between 509 and 494 BCE in Achaemenid Persia, a sheep cost 100 liters of barley and a donkey cost 500 liters of barley or of fruit. As of 492 to 458 BCE in Persia the documents were changed from liters of barley to silver and a sheep cost 3 shekels of silver and a donkey cost 15 shekels.
In Greece, one shekel was considered the equivalent of 2 silver drachm in weight. It was estimated 3600 shekels or 6000 drachm were equal to one talent of silver (27.48 kg). In the time of Demosthenes, a fat ox cost 80 drachms, a lamb 10.
Rome
In the earliest times in Italy, one ox was equal to ten sheep. In the time, Aes/As were small bits of copper or bronze that were used as the cheapest form of currency. A sheep was ten asses, and an ox 100. In 429 BCE, 1 ox was equal to 100 asses librales, or one gold stater. The standards remain the same: 100 coppers to 10 silver pieces to a gold piece, but the gold piece is worth the equivalent of an ox. Later in Rome, 1 sheep is equal to 1 silver drachm is equal to about 1 denarius. In the 2nd century BCE of the Roman Empire, a plough ox cost 60 to 80 denarii, and a laborer earned about 300 denarii a year.
The amount of silver in a denarius dropped from Augustus’ time (3.65 grams in 0 CE) to 0.60 in Trebonianus Gallus’s time (253 CE)
By 400 CE, daily wages were between half to two denarii and a cow could be bought for 100 to 200 denarii. A donkey was 125 denarii.
Therefore….
In game terms right through to the early medieval time in Europe, we can say that 1 gold piece is like $100, each silver piece is more like $10, and a copper bit is a dollar.
A plough ox in a very early type of civilization cost about $75 to $100 and by the first millennium CE cost about $1000… but the average citizen went from making a shekel a week to half to two denarii a day. At the same time the value dropped, leaving the $10 silver piece worth less. When the silver denarius hit the beginnings of the medieval era, it was the equivalent of a modern day English penny.
In the time of feudalism, between 476 and 741 CE, the horse became very valuable for knights and cavalry units, each war horse worth as much as 20 cattle. By 1099 in Spain during the Crusades, one horse was worth 50 cattle. War horses were more expensive than normal riding horses, and destriers the most prized, but figures vary greatly from source to source. Destriers are given a values ranging from seven times the price of an ordinary horse to 700 times. The Bohemian king Wenzel II rode a horse "valued at one thousand marks" in 1298. At the other extreme, a 1265 French ordinance ruled that a squire could not spend more than twenty marks on a rouncey. Knights were expected to have at least one war horse (as well as riding horses and packhorses), with some records from the later Middle Ages showing knights bringing twenty-four horses on campaign. Five horses was perhaps the standard.
Note: According to 19th century sources, a mark was first equivalent to 100 pence, but after the Norman Conquest it was worth 160 pence, or 13 shillings and 4 pence, i.e. ⅔ of a Pound Sterling.
Livestock in the Medieval Era in Europe
We can use an estimate from the later 1300s to establish the basic concepts of monetary exchange. One English Pound was equal to 20 shillings, which was equal to a good carthorse. One English Shilling was equal to 12 English pennies, which was equal to a day’s wages for a knight. One English penny was equal to a day of labor for poorer folk.
In 945 AD Hywel the Good established cats at a penny at birth and four pennies after a successful mouse. Just in case you were wondering.
From several sources we can make up standardized lists of what livestock was worth in the Middle Ages. For example, we have in 1314: Goose: two-pence halfpenny Hen: Penny Ox: Six shillings and eight-pence
In 1336:
Sheep: 6 pennies
Goose: 2 pennies
Pig 1 penny
Here are some prices at various times:
War Horse (12th Century): up to 50 Shillings
War Horse (13th Century): up to 80 pounds
A Knight's 2 horses (1374): 10 pounds
High-grade riding horse (13th Century): 10 pounds
Draught horse (13th Century): 10 to 20 shillings
Good Cow (12th Century): 10 Shillings
Cow (1285 to 1290): 6 Shillings
Cow (mid-14th Century): 9 Shillings, 5 pence
Ox (Mid-14th Century): 13 shillings and one and a quarterpence
Sheep: (Mid-14th Century): 1 Shilling, 5 pence Wether:
Pig (1338): 2 shillings (3 Shillings in London)
2 Chickens (14th century): 1 penny
Goose (1375 in London): 6 pennies legally, 7 to 8 pennies asking price
Other currencies of Europe
1634, In Prussia, a horse cost 20 thalers. A thaler some say is the equivalent of three marks or one pound sterling, so at that time a horse cost 20 pounds sterling.
So how much is that horse in Europe?
These are not destriers or war horses, just decent standard horses.
1200 BCE: 7 silver pieces
300 BCE: 70 silver pieces
400 CE: 100 silver pieces
1300: 1 gold piece (one pound) for an average horse, 10 gold pieces for a good riding horse
How about the Elephant?
Outside of Europe trade and barter were a little different. People usually didn’t buy animals so much as obtain them through trade, barter, or as gifts. The care required for the elephant is likely beyond the means of any adventurer, however. So that elephant? Don’t bother trying to buy it. Either trade to rent it long enough to do what you need to do or go get one as a tribute to your awesomeness.
Alexander the Great got his first fifteen war elephants after defeating the Persian at the Battle of Gaugamela (331 BCE). He was so impressed with the Persian’s elephants, despite their defeat, he added them to his army, and continued to add more as he conquered across Persia to India.
India did have coinage, since the 6th century BCE, but it was only used for trading outside the nation. Often the Indian merchants used the Roman coins instead for trade. By the 1500s, the rūpaya was the equivalent of any other silver coin in weight and eventually became the rupee.
So during the medieval perios, an elephant cost from 100 rupee to 10,000 rupees and a horse could cost from 200 rupee to 2000 rupees or more. So in exchange for silver, one could by an elephant for 10 to 1000 gold pieces and a horse from 20 to 200 gold pieces.
What’s Going on in China?
In early China 1000 of their cash coins was equal to 1 tael (about 40 grams) of pure silver. A horse cost 4500 cash in the Han Dynasty (206 BCE to 220 CE) and 25000 cash during the Tang Dynasty (618 to 907). This would be the equivalent of 18 sp during the Han Dynasty, and 100 gold pieces during the Tang Dynasty to show the mark-up.
During the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644), two geese and wine were worth 3/10s of a tael, for a lamb and wine half a tael, and for a pig and wine a whole tael. Pigs were popular animals in China, kept in cities and on farms. Farmers also raised ducks, chickens, and geese, and oxen and water buffalo were used for labor.
In an old tale, a hunter complains that he cannot replace the inadequate hunting dog he picked up because it would ruin the family. Hunting dogs were apparently expensive, the equivalent of a good riding horse for a poor family.
Over in Japan horses were expensive and in the times of the samurai, they were usually the only ones who were allowed to ride horses; those who had the means used oxen to carry heavy loads or pull carts.
No Coins? In Asia, It’s No Problem.
Other times, the needed animals were “obtained” through other means. During the period of 144–88 BCE, cavalry horses were so important that the emperor launched several campaigns in central Asia to secure an adequate supply.
In China, silk’s value was such that you could buy livestock with it. The Chinese emperors would send silk to Central Asia in return for horses. However, the silk monopoly of the Chinese declined and the Chinese replaced silk with tea. Tea-drinking quickle became a daily occurrence in the Central Asian city of Chang’an, and caravaneers started taking the tea further west. From the Song (960–1279) through Ming dynasties (1368–1644), armies relied on an officially supervised tea-for-horse trading systems Tea and horses were so inextricably related that officials repeatedly requested that the tea laws and the horse administration be supervised by the same man. They believed government control of tea was the first step in the creation of a rational and effective policy aimed at improving the quality of horses in the army.
Got Camel?
Camels are important for those desert days, so as of the 700s BCE, a camel cost 4 and one-half minas of silver. One mina is equal to about 60 shekels (depending on inflation); therefore, a camel was worth 270 shekels at that time, or 27 gold pieces or $2700. However, it is said that Tigleth-Pileser III, ruler of Assyria from 745–727 BCE took 30,000 camels from the Arabs and put them on the Assyrian market, dropping the price of a camel in Assyria down to 1.5 silver shekels to half a shekel.
Cormorant Fishing
Seen in ancient and medieval times in Japan, China, Macedonia (as well as France and England during the 15th and 16th centuries), and Peru. A trained cormorants with a snare around the base of its neck catches fish. Small ones can be eaten but large ones get trapped in the cormorant’s throat and are spit up on the boat. Today, trained cormorants generally start at $30 for untrained birds, and trained birds can go from $150 to $300 apiece.
Modern Day Prices
This is for people paying steampunk or later-era games.
Elephants Went Down and Up
1801: Chunee an Asian elephant, was valued at 1000 Pounds Sterling.
1808: Bailey bought Old Bet from a menagerie in Boston for $1000
1870: The Seige of France: Castor and Pollux were bought from the local Paris zoo for 27,000 francs to be eaten. In 1800, twenty francs were equal to 4 US dollars, so the lady who paid for the meal bought them both for $5400.
1882: Jumbo, a very large well-known elephant, was bought by Barnum from the London Zoo for $10,000
Today: It’s illegal for people to purchase an elephant except for zoos and wildlife habitats; however, in their native habitat an elephant can still be gotten for about 100,000 rupees ($2,217.29)
Horses
1935: a weanling sold for $150, two-year old $325, three-year old $550, five year old $800. In the US today a horse sells for anything from $500 for a standard low-end horse to 10,000 for a pedigreed horse. In Asia a workhorse today goes for around 25,000 rupees ($554.32).
In the 1980s, Arabians became a popular status symbol and were marketed similarly to fine art. Some individuals also used horses as a tax shelter. Prices skyrocketed, especially in the United States, with a record-setting public auction price for a mare named NH Love Potion, who sold for $2.55 million in 1984, and the largest syndication in history for an Arabian stallion, Padron, at $11,000,000.
Camels
At today’s prices a camel in Imbaba, Egypt from Somalia or Sudan will cost anywhere from $500 to $2000, Somali camels are at the top end, Sudan more affordable, and Egyptian camels the smallest. In India, Bactrian camels can go as low as 10,000 rupees, or $221. Camel buyers and sellers almost always use a middleman.
In Other Words…
In modern times, where gold is going for $44 a gram (as of December 22, 2010), a coin made of 11 grams of pure gold (equal to 10 silver coins) is worth $484 dollars and change (in Euros, 363). A horse will maybe cost 2 gold pieces today for a decent horse, 5 gp for an awesome one.
