William Bramley/The Gods of Eden/21/217/0

who laid this foundation were reportedly the goldsmiths. Goldsmiths usually owned the strongest safes and lockboxes in town. For this reason, many people deposited their coin metals with the smiths for safekeeping. The smiths issued receipts to the depositors that promised to pay to the receipt holders on demand those quantities of gold or silver shown on the receipts. Every such receipt was actually a note which could be circulated as money until a holder of the note went back to the goldsmith to redeem it for the specified amount of metal.