You mean in the sense of a de-facto reserve currency? Well, I expect that, given the dominance of the Iron Bank in Essosi finance, it’s probably the Braavosi currency (which annoyingly we don’t have a name for), at least in the Free Cities. On the other hand, we see golden honors circulating in Volantis, Slaver’s Bay, and Qarth, which suggests competing monetary blocs.
In terms of what the exchange rate is, it’s a bit hard to say. We do know that the golden dragon is much larger than the golden honor or the golden hands that House Gardener minted, due to the consolidation of the entire Westerosi continent and thus the Westerland’s vast gold reserves. On the other hand, Westeros has an undeveloped financial system, so it may be that while dragons are more valuable for their metallic content, Braavosi coins are easier to use in commerce in the east.
We disagree here. It’s clearly established during Arya’s stay in Braavos that Volantene honors are the most widely used of the Free City currencies.
‘The blind girl went to work in the dark, stripping the dead of boots and clothes and other possessions, emptying their purses and counting out their coins. Telling one coin from another by touch alone was one of the first things the waif had taught her, after they took away her eyes. The Braavosi coins were old friends; she need only brush her fingertips across their faces to recognize them. Coins from other lands and cities were harder, especially those from far away. Volantene honors were most common, little coins no bigger than a penny with a crown on one side and a skull on the other. Lysene coins were oval and showed a naked woman. Other coins had ships stamped onto them, or elephants, or goats. The Westerosi coins showed a king’s head on the front and a dragon on the back. (DwD, The Blind Girl)’
Volantis is rich and all Western ships heading east have to stop at the city to resupply while most Eastern traders drop their cargos off there and turn around. If the precious metal content of Volantene coins is stable and reliable then it would be one of the more convenient currencies for anyone engaged in Summer Sea trade, the Iron Bank included.
1. I interpret that sentence differently. Arya’s saying that of the non-Bravaosi coins, Volantene coins are the most common, not that the Volantene coins are the most common in the Free Cities.
2 If that was the case, it’s a major worldbuilding flaw on GRRM’s part. Either the Iron Bank is the largest and most dominant bank in Essos or the Volantene currency is dominant, but it shouldn’t be both. The Bank of Amsterdam did not make loans denominated in Byzantine solidi.
1. This is how we interpret the above quote. Braavosi coins are naturally the most common currency available in Braavos, but of all the other Free City currencies Arya picks out of ordinary Braavosi pockets, Volantene honors are the most common. This is rather significant given how geographically distant Braavos is from Volantis. In closer cities the ratio of Volantene currency is probably higher. When this evidence is considered alongside the appearance of Volantene honors in Slaver’s Bay and Qarth it seems pretty clear that honors are more widely used then titans.*
2. Money is no more than a state created store of value and medium of exchange. With spec currency it’s the precious metal content of the coins and market price of said precious metal that determines their real value. A gold honor is worth as much as the gold that can be retrieved from melting it down (which is why traders and bankers bite and weigh the coins they are paid and why bazaar prices go up whenever the currency is debased). There’s no law that says the Iron Bank’s assets cannot include a considerable amount of foreign coin given that the origin of said coin does not matter, only their composition. The Iron Bank’s assets no doubt include a considerable amount of bonds, stocks, debts, and real and movable property, only some of it Braavosi. If Volantene coins have a reliable precious metal content and are minted along a major commercial artery then it’s not surprising that they would be more widely used then other Narrow Sea currencies.
It does not follow that the country with the largest and most dominant bank must have most dominant currency. This was not the case with the Byzantine Empire, where banks and credit played only a very minor role. The solidus of Justinian was ‘accepted everywhere from end to end of the earth’ (says Cosmas Indicopleuste) and ‘eagerly accepted from England to India as an instrument of payment as good as gold itself’ (see Robert Lopez’s ‘Dollar of the Middle Ages’). The solidi’s wide acceptance as an international medium of exchange for more than seven centuries was founded on the stability and fineness of its gold content. This position was held until the thirteenth century, when Genoa, Florence and other Western states issued pure gold currencies which gradually displaced the devalued bezant in international trade. If the Bank of Amsterdam had existed in the sixth century (or at any time up until and including all of the eleventh century) it undoubtedly would have accepted repayment of its debts in solidi.
Steven has also made the mistake of confusing the Iron Bank with Braavos as a whole. The Iron Bank might be bigger than every other Free City bank combined, but bank vaults do not contain the sole sum of a nation’s wealth. One reason that Braavos has the largest bank is because the city does not directly participate in the slave trade. So liquid capital that in any other Free City would be invested in the acquisition, maintenance, training and terrorizing of slaves is instead available for commercial lending to traders, artisans, speculators and governments.
The fact is that Volantis is a very wealthy city, probably wealthier than Braavos (the Iron Bank and all its assets included). Braavos might have the world’s largest bank, but Volantis has the largest harbor west of Valyria and the world famous Merchant House. Volantis is the world’s leading manufacturer of high quality colored glass and the spices that pass through the city’s warehouses have a high reputation for quality (“cracked pepper from Volantis, nothing finer”). Volantis is closer to the resource exporting, luxury importing harbors of Oldtown and Lannisport then Braavos. Volantis is closer to the Planky Town and the Dornish market then Braavos. Volantis is closer to Qarth and the Summer Islands then Braavos. Braavosi ships have to sail through the pirate and privateer infested Stepstones to trade in the Summer Sea, while Volantene ships do not. Whenever Volantis and Braavos are at war, Braavosi merchantmen would have a very hard time trading east of Valyria while Volantene merchants would be largely unaffected (as Volantis is the principle resupply port for eastern merchant venturers). Volantis controls far more arable land then Braavos, has in a sub-tropical climate and sits astride a major north-south river trade route. Volantis has a larger population then Braavos and controls at least two “towns” that are large cities in their own right. Volantene merchants can directly trade in human flesh, while honest Braavosi merchants cannot (hence Braavosi ships are unknown in Slaver’s Bay and therefore miss out on the trade in olive oil, gems, spices, and wool cloth that accompany the trade in human beings).
So is it really all that surprising that Volantene honors are widely used in international trade?
*titans seems as good a name for Braavosi coins as any. That is the titan’s head on it, no?
1. I fundamentally disagree with how this quote should be interpreted and I don’t think Arya sorting pocket change is good data for continent-wide monetary flows. (That being said, I like “titans” as a name for Braavosi coins.)
2. Here’s the problem for me. While I accept that “it does not follow that the country with the largest and most dominant bank must have most dominant currency,” I think the reverse does follow – dominant currencies tend to lead to dominance in finance. Hence, when the Roman Empire began to expand and Roman currency became dominant in the Mediterranean, Roman moneylenders became hegemonic in regions of the ancient world they never had before, because they had access to the coins everyone wanted and could thus loan them out and because they could get special privileges from the state. Likewise, the decline of the Byzantine bezant has a lot to do with the loss of trade to Genoa and Venice (as well as the loss of provincial territories in the Balkans and the Middle East who were no longer paying taxes), and the transformation of commercial wealth into currency.
So to use your analogy, if people were still using the solidi, you don’t get a Bank of Amsterdam.
2a. Now it’s true that the Iron Bank can have in its assets “a considerable amount of foreign coin” (after all, moneychanging is a key part of their business) as well as “a considerable amount of bonds, stocks, debts, and real and movable property.” But it’s highly unlikely Volantene coins make up the majority, for several reasons. First, it would be ludicrously easy for Volantis to dominate Braavos’ economy and polity by refusing to export honors to Braavos, much as how the EU Central Bank puts the screws on Greece because Greece can’t print Euros on its own. Second, it’s not entirely true that “a gold honor is worth as much as the gold that can be retrieved from melting it down” – yes that’s important for relative value of different currencies, but most things can’t be bought with blank discs of gold, otherwise you wouldn’t have government minting coins in the first place. The Iron Bank and its customers have to pay their taxes with minted coins, and in Braavos that means Braavosi coins. Braavosi manufacturers and shopkeeps and merchants are going to do business primarily in Braavosi coins, because the alternative is having to be your own moneychanger and assayer and most people can’t do that. Given that the Iron Bank’s original core business was business loans to Braavosi artisans and merchants, it can only fulfill that function with a large supply of Braavosi coins. Third, it’s good for business. The wider Braavosi coins circulate, the more that merchants and foreign banks have to do business with the Iron Bank to facilitate trade with Braavos, creating an additional stream of demand for their services.
3. According to the World of Ice and Fire, “The youngest of the Nine Free Cities, Braavos is also the wealthiest, and in all likelihood the most powerful…Despite its humble origins, Braavos has not only become the wealthiest of the Free Cities, but also one of the most impregnable.” Volantis is wealthy, but it is palpably not as rich as Braavos. Moreover, it’s a city in decline both in terms of population and infrastructure, which you can see in almost every chapter set in Volantis. While it probably outranked Braavos when it was at its height, it spent much of its blood and treasure in the attempt to conquer the Free Cities, and has been slowly declining ever since.
So while I could accept Volantene coins being widespread in Essos, especially in the Slave Cities, I don’t accept them being the most widely circulated in Essos.
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