Mensurantur enim omnia nummismate: The Impact of Money and Monetization on Vital New Directions in Scholastic Philosophy, ca. 1250–1350

In this essay, I narrow my focus on money in the European Middle Ages to the ways in which its rapidly expanding uses, from the twelfth through the fourteenth century, underlay the creation of vital new areas of philosophical speculation. Within this framework, I focus further on money’s remarkable capacity to express qualitative values in quantitative terms, thus rendering it possible to measure and bring into relation the huge variety of goods and services in exchange. There is considerable evidence that this capacity was well recognized and highly valued in scholastic writings from the thirteenth century on. As influential as the model of money-as-measure proved to be in the realm of philosophical speculation, it was only one of money’s major uses and capacities. Others that I consider here in terms of intellectual impact include money-as-instrument of equalization in market exchange; money-as-instrument of relation and commensuration; and money-as-instrument of bureaucratic gradation. Each of these uses and capacities can be analyzed separately to some degree, as can their specific reflections in particular philosophical innovations in this period. They are best understood, however, as intertwined within the dynamic of the larger economy.