It's happened in the ancient Near East as well. Coins were expensive to mint, and sometimes there simply weren't enough of them in circulation. So, counterfeits

It's happened in the ancient Near East as well. Coins were expensive to mint, and sometimes there simply weren't enough of them in circulation. So, counterfeits tended to be accepted as legitimate currency. In fact, it was here on HN just about a month ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39606093 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39606093 (Edit: There's a post farther down-thread that linked this well before I did. Please give that post an upvote instead of this one as I neglected to check first.)