People in Jonathan Swift’s time were no strangers to monetary debasement, writes Nicholas Curott. It was universally considered to be a great evil, as Swift notes: “Neither is anything reckoned more cruel or oppressive in the French government, than their common practice of calling in all their money after they have sunk it very low, and then coining it anew at a much higher value.” Swift fought a courageous campaign against the imposition of debased coinage in Ireland, when an English ironmonger procured a patent to coin copper coins.
