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Trapezitae
(τραπεζιται); in Latin Argentarii; Mensarii; Nummularii. Dealers in money; money-changers; usurers; bankers; so called from the “table” (τράπεζα, mensa) on which they did their business.
Bankers in Greece had their stands in the agora or other public places, and combined in their vocation a number of different pursuits. Thus, they gave change for coins of large denominations, as obols for drachmas; bought foreign money at a discount (καταλλάττω); furnished gold for export, lent money to merchants on the security of ships and cargoes, received money on deposit for which they paid interest, and acted as pawnbrokers, advancing cash on plate, jewels, and other personal property.
The notion of many Greeks that all taking of interest partook of the nature of usury was shared even by Aristotle ( Pol.i. 10 Pol., 4); yet, while not altogether escaping the reproach which attached to their calling as such, the higher class of bankers in many instances acquired much personal respect, and a high reputation for ability combined with honesty ( Pro Phorm. p. 957. 44); their credit enabled them to raise money at a moment's notice in distant cities (id. Contra Polycl. p. 1224. 56). Such confidence was placed in them that sometimes business was transacted with them without witnesses; money and contracts of debt were deposited with them, and agreements were concluded or cancelled in their presence ( Contra Callipp. p. 1242. 24; Contra Dionysod. p. 1287. 15). They thus became a sort of unofficial notaries-public.
Before the rise of a banking system, the place of banks was to some extent supplied by the temples, which played no unimportant part in early Greek commerce. They were used as safe places for the deposit of treasure; and having large funds of their own, derived from the rent of their estates and from votive offerings, they employed productively both these and the sums confided to their care. Thus Clisthenes and the Alcmaeonidae borrowed from the Delphic sanctuary, with the consent of the Amphictyons, the funds with which the Pisistratidae were overthrown (Isocr. Antid. 232); and at the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War the Corinthians proposed to equip a fleet with loans effected at Delphi and Olympia ( Thuc.i. 121). It has been thought that the temples confined themselves to State loans, and did not lend money to individuals: Büchsenschütz, however, has shown from the Delian Marmor Sandvicense (see Amphictyones) and other inscriptions that private persons enjoyed this accommodation. To the undoubted general rule that no banks were either worked or guaranteed by the State, an exception was imagined to exist at Byzantium on the strength of a passage in Aristotle ( Oecon.ii. 4 Oecon., 4); but all that is really stated is that an impoverished government, among other expedients, sold a monopoly of money-changing to a particular bank.
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