Marchuwa

Marchuwa (Geʽez: ማርጯ, Wolaytta: Mariccuwaa) was a currency used by the Kingdom of Wolaita. Marchuwa was a bundle of thin metal strips one cubit long, used as trading currency. Marchuwa was equal to 18 Maria Theresa Thalers or 0.50 US dollars.[2][3][4]

Marchuwa
Marchuwa, a model.
Unit
SymbolMarchuwa‎ (Latin Script)
ማርጯ (Ge'ez)
Demographics
User(s)Kingdom of Wolaita, Hadiya, Kambatta, Sidama, Dawuro, Gamo, and Gofa [1]
Issuance
Central bankKingdom of Wolaita
Valuation
Value0.50 USD
This infobox shows the latest status before this currency was rendered obsolete.

History

As Chauncey Hugh Stigand states, the Welayta people had developed the art of weaving and wearing cloths made up of cotton prior to any other Ethiopian communities. The importance of cotton to the Welayta was more than clothing.[2] Shalluwa, a kind of thread spun by women, and cotton products like Karretta Sinna, a black colored thread made of cotton, were used as a currency. When different parts of Africa used the barter system (exchanging of goods), the state of Wolaita spread this form of currency throughout its region.[2][4] As Remo Chiatti highlighed in 1903, one Marchuwa was equal to 18 Maria Theresa Thalers or 0.50 USA dollars.[5][2]

Oral tradition claim that there was the storehouse of Marchuwa at Dalbo palace established by one of the kings of the Wolaita Tigre dynasty. Thus, the state of Wolaita had developed the banking system prior to other states of Ethiopia. Sources proved that until the Menelik II's conquest of the south Hadiya, Kambatta, Sidama, Dawuro, Gamo, and Gofa had used this Marchuwa as currency.[5][2][3]

By the time Welayta people incorporate to the Ethiopian Empire by Menelik II, Marchuwa was replaced by the Maria Theresa thaler and blocks of salt called "Amole tchew", which are assumed to be the first currency of the Ethiopia.[6]

See also

References
  1. Argaw Yimam, Ass. Professor Wondu. "Power Consolidation, Modernization and Commercial Splendor in Pre-Colonial Africa: The Case of Wolaita Kingdom (1500's 1894)" (PDF). Global Scientific Journal. p. 12. Retrieved 20 October 2020.
  2. Stigand, C. H. (Chauncey Hugh). (1910). To Abyssinia through an unknown land: an account of a journey through unexplored regions of British East Africa by Lake Rudolf to the kingdom of Menelek.
  3. Argaw Yimam, Ass. Professor Wondu. "Power Consolidation, Modernization and Commercial Splendor in Pre-Colonial Africa: The Case of Wolaita Kingdom (1500's 1894)" (PDF). Global Scientific Journal. p. 12. Retrieved 20 October 2020.
  4. Vanderheym, J.-Gaston Auteur du texte (1896). Une expédition avec le négous Ménélik : vingt mois en Abyssinie... / J.-G. Vanderheym ; [préface de Jules Claretie].
  5. Vanderheym, J.-G. 1897. Une expédition avec le négous Ménélik: vingt mois en Abyssinie. Paris: Librairie Hachette.
  6. PANKHURST, RICHARD, et al. "The Trade of Central Ethiopia in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries." Journal of Ethiopian Studies, vol. 2, no. 2, 1964, pp. 41–91. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41965712. Accessed 20 Oct. 2020.
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