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Article: The legacy of a single currency.
- Article from:
- Contemporary Review
- Article date:
- May 1, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 Contemporary Review Company Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In a valley in Western Bohemia, in the Czech Republic, lies the town of Jachymov. It was here that the silver mines owned by the famous Slik (Schlick) family produced a coin in 1519 which was named the Joachimsthaler, the thaler, which the Americans where to transmute into the dollar.
In Europe it remained the thaler, or in its Bohemian dialect form, the tolar. It continued to be coined into the reign of the Empress Maria Theresa, who gave it its most famous name, the Maria Theresa Thaler, destined, in a somewhat bizarre fashion, to be the currency of Saudi Arabia, so great was its credibility. The Schlick dynasty, whose silver mines had produced the original dollar, ...