Ethiopia has used various forms of money through its history. Though it came late to using European style coins, it has used several non-standard items as mediums of exchange. This chapter gives you a quick rundown of some of Ethiopia's and Eritrea's monies ending with the coins we used while in Asmara.
In ancient times a kingdom centered around the modern northern Ethiopian city of Axum ruled all the southern Red Sea and issued many coins between the fourth and seventh century. The legends of earlier coins, like this one, was Greek. Later coins had Ge'ez, Axum's language....
Major parts of this chapter originally appeared in 2001 in Money Meanderings: An Introduction to Numismatics by Mike Metras.
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