In todays world currency is king. There are various established currencies of which a few are significant however just shy of 500-600 years ago currency was a very mold-able object that could vary heavily between local communities. For example lets have three towns. Town Alpha, Town Beta and Town Charlie.
Town Alpha is a rather rich town with a port giving it access to traders via the sea and as a result of this rarer and pricier commodities such as pepper and Silk. Town Alpha does very well for itself and it shows in the currency (lets call their currency crowns). Their silver coins are made up of 80% Silver and 20% copper and their Gold coins are 75% gold and 25%. This is a form of a Gold Standard whereby the value of the Crown is backed up by something valuable and stable.
Lets look at Beta. Beta isn’t as well off as Alpha in terms of monetary currency however they do possess more raw materials and as a result often trade with raw goods instead. Items here are also produced and as a result traders from other towns / cities are careful when trading to ensure they get the best possible deal. People from Alpha like to trade with Beta on a monetary level because they believe they can get the better deal by doing so but Beta attempts to maintain a situation where people instead trade via goods - that is they attempt to give themselves an advantage by effectively going tit-for-tat.
The two can co-exist side by side as there is no shortage of merchants or goods coming from both towns, it just so happens that they enjoy trading in other ways.
But what occurs if Charlie has gotten involved with a war of a nation in some distant lands? How does this affect Alpha and Beta? Find out tomorrow in Pt. 2.