Note 190 — Chapter VI · The Gold Unit everywhere the value of a Cow.

Mr Head (Coinage of Syracuse), Numismat. Chronicle, New Series, Vol. XIV., thinks that under Dionysius the Elder (406-367 B.C.) and his successors gold was to silver as 15:1 at Syracuse, whilst in the time of Agathocles (317-289 B.C.) it was as 12:1. We can however hardly take the evidence of the coin weights as sufficient, when we consider the extraordinary devices to which Dionysius resorted to raise money, causing coins of tin to pass as silver, making the silver coins bear a double value etc. as is related by Aristotle, Oeconomica, II. 21.