was a matter of primary
necessity. The invention of bank money, that is, of a money of account
which could be transferred at pleasure from one holder to another, enabled
the trade of the place to be carried on without any of those hindrances to
business which must have followed on the delay and expense attendant on the
verification of various coins differing from each other in weight,
intrinsic value, standard of purity of metal, in every point in fact in
which coins can differ from each other. By supplying a currency of
universal acceptation the Bank of Hamburg greatly contributed to the
prosperity of that city." The regulations being strictly carried out, the
currency was purely metallic; the "Mark Banco" being merely the
representative of an equal value of silver.

For the earliest example of a bank for the receipt of deposits carrying on
a business on modern lines, we must turn, as in the case of the exchange
banks, to a great commercial city of the middle ages. Private banking in
Venice began as an adjunct of the business of the _campsores_ or dealers in
foreign moneys. "As early as 1270 it was deemed necessary to require them
to give security to the government as the condition of carrying on their
business, but it is not shown that they were then receiving deposits. In an
act of the 24th of September 1318, however, entitled _Bancherii scriptae
dent plegiarias consulibus_, the receipt of deposits by the _campsores_ is
recognized as an existing practice, and provision is made for better
security for the depositors." From this act it becomes clear that between
1270 and 1318 the money-changers of Venice were becoming bankers, just as
the same class of men became in Amsterdam a couple of centuries later, and
as later still the goldsmiths in London.

[Sidenote: The first public bank in Europe.]

Of the early banks in Europe, the bank in Venice, the Banco di Rialto, was
established by the acts of the Venetian senate of 1584 and 1587. This
appears to have been the first public bank in that city and in Europe. The
senate by the act of the 3rd of May 1619[1] established by the side of the
Banco di Rialto a second public bank known as the Banco Giro, or Banco del
Giro, which ultimately became the only public bank of the city and was for
generations famous throughout Europe as the Bank of Venice. Earlier than
this the _campsores_ or dealers in foreign moneys had carried on the
business. The Bank of Venice (Banco del Giro) a