Bottomry and respondentia were also later used by European traders. They seem to have died out in the late nineteenth century AD. The word ‘bottomry’ derives from the Dutch. In French, the practice was known as ‘prêt à la grosse aventure’.
ELECTRUM —
Electrum is a naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver, sometimes including small amounts of copper and other metals. In early Classical times it was quite widely used for coinage. The colour is pale gold, though the hue varies according to the proportions of the components of the alloy. Electrum is still mined in various parts of the world. The word was also applied by the Greeks to amber, because of the colour of certain kinds of amber. Hence the modern term ‘electricity’, since amber was already known in ancient times for what today we should call its ‘electrostatic’ properties.
