Aldarion
Archmage
What are the writing tropes you had come across that seem silly at first, but turn out to be very logical and/or justified, even if they are in the end wrong?
For example, "piles of gold" trope... it is unlikely that anyone, even a king, will have had actual piles of gold coins lying around. After all, a single chest can hold 500 kilograms of gold. Using Diocletian's price edict, and 5 grams per coin to simplify matters*, 500 kg of gold is 500 000 gold coins, which is enough to buy 50 000 horses, or, at 5 solidi per soldier per year, pay an army of 100 000 men. Well, more like 10 000 men once you account for all the other expenses of waging a military campaign, but the point it, it is an enormous quantity of wealth.
So on the face of it, piles of gold don't make sense. Unless, that is, they are piles of bronze.
1 aureus is 1 000 denarii. Golden aureus of Diocletian weighted 5,46 grams, while radiate was a pure bronze coin of some 3 grams of bronze. It was valued at 4 denarii or some 1/200 of aureus. Issue with Diocletian's edict however was that it assigned somewhat arbitrary values to various products.
Now, fantasy kings - and especially dragons - tend to be extremely rich. And for a real-life filthy rich medieval monarch there is little better example than Basil II, who had amassed 14,4 million gold nomismata, or 90 tons of gold, in treasury before his death. 90 tons of gold would be equivalent to 180 chests. In volume however it would be only 4,66 m3 solid, or maybe some 10 - 15 cubic meters if you allow for coins and other golden treasure not being a single solid cube. This however will have been only a smaller portion of money available: many gold coins were still in circulation even during the that period, and of course the 90 ton figure does not include silver.
Smaug's book dimensions are estimated at 18 meters long. By Tolkien's original artwork, Smaug has at least two distinct piles of treasure, both in the shape of relatively flat mounds. Nearer pile appears to be about as wide as Smaug is long, and quarter of that in height, giving it a volume of 381,7 cubic meters. Farther pile is at least twice as large and likely larger (although why Smaug would nap on a smaller pile I cannot explain), giving it a volume of perhaps 1200 cubic meters.
From the book description, it seems the hoard was half gold and half silver - Bilbo after all had been given one chest of gold and one chest of silver. This however is the absolute upper limit of its value, since dwarves had wanted to be even more generous towards him, but Bilbo himself had refused it. Lowest limit would assume most coins were bronze, but that too is unlikely: medieval kingdoms were not ancient Rome, and bronze was IIRC rarely used for currency there; basis was silver, while gold coins were rare and bronze coins nearly nonexistent.
So this means that we are dealing with 1200 cubic meters of silver at least, and at most some 600 cubic meters of silver and gold each (of course, there were the gems there, but I am simplifying). Assuming the actual volume of material is half that, we have either 600 cubic meters of pure silver, or 300 cubic meters of silver and gold each. Former value results in 6 294 metric tons of silver, while latter assumes 3 147 metric tons of silver and 5 790 metric tons of gold. This would translate into 1,3 billion gold coins and 1,05 billion silver coins. Which is to say, Smaug is still more than 1000 times richer than Basil II... who would likely very suddenly gain an interest in becoming a dragonslayer.
But if most of that hoard was bronze, say 90%, then we have 130 million gold coins (60 cubic meters or 1 159 200 kg), 105 million silver coins (same, for 629 400 kg), and the remaining value (1,17 billion gold and 0,945 billion silver coins) translated into bronze - resulting in 1 080 cubic meters of bronze coins, which would give 4 752 tons, or value of 1 584 000 000 bronze coins.
And with total volume of 1200 cubic meters, Smaug still has space for napping while being obscenely rich (in modern day, 1 159 200 kg of gold, 629 400 kg of silver and 4 481 000 kg of bronze would be worth $147 460 675 000).
* (real values would be 4,45 g for aureus and 3 g for argentus which was 1/25 the value of aureus; bronze radiate was ~3 g in weight and 1/200 the value of aureus)
For example, "piles of gold" trope... it is unlikely that anyone, even a king, will have had actual piles of gold coins lying around. After all, a single chest can hold 500 kilograms of gold. Using Diocletian's price edict, and 5 grams per coin to simplify matters*, 500 kg of gold is 500 000 gold coins, which is enough to buy 50 000 horses, or, at 5 solidi per soldier per year, pay an army of 100 000 men. Well, more like 10 000 men once you account for all the other expenses of waging a military campaign, but the point it, it is an enormous quantity of wealth.
So on the face of it, piles of gold don't make sense. Unless, that is, they are piles of bronze.
1 aureus is 1 000 denarii. Golden aureus of Diocletian weighted 5,46 grams, while radiate was a pure bronze coin of some 3 grams of bronze. It was valued at 4 denarii or some 1/200 of aureus. Issue with Diocletian's edict however was that it assigned somewhat arbitrary values to various products.
Now, fantasy kings - and especially dragons - tend to be extremely rich. And for a real-life filthy rich medieval monarch there is little better example than Basil II, who had amassed 14,4 million gold nomismata, or 90 tons of gold, in treasury before his death. 90 tons of gold would be equivalent to 180 chests. In volume however it would be only 4,66 m3 solid, or maybe some 10 - 15 cubic meters if you allow for coins and other golden treasure not being a single solid cube. This however will have been only a smaller portion of money available: many gold coins were still in circulation even during the that period, and of course the 90 ton figure does not include silver.
Smaug's book dimensions are estimated at 18 meters long. By Tolkien's original artwork, Smaug has at least two distinct piles of treasure, both in the shape of relatively flat mounds. Nearer pile appears to be about as wide as Smaug is long, and quarter of that in height, giving it a volume of 381,7 cubic meters. Farther pile is at least twice as large and likely larger (although why Smaug would nap on a smaller pile I cannot explain), giving it a volume of perhaps 1200 cubic meters.
From the book description, it seems the hoard was half gold and half silver - Bilbo after all had been given one chest of gold and one chest of silver. This however is the absolute upper limit of its value, since dwarves had wanted to be even more generous towards him, but Bilbo himself had refused it. Lowest limit would assume most coins were bronze, but that too is unlikely: medieval kingdoms were not ancient Rome, and bronze was IIRC rarely used for currency there; basis was silver, while gold coins were rare and bronze coins nearly nonexistent.
So this means that we are dealing with 1200 cubic meters of silver at least, and at most some 600 cubic meters of silver and gold each (of course, there were the gems there, but I am simplifying). Assuming the actual volume of material is half that, we have either 600 cubic meters of pure silver, or 300 cubic meters of silver and gold each. Former value results in 6 294 metric tons of silver, while latter assumes 3 147 metric tons of silver and 5 790 metric tons of gold. This would translate into 1,3 billion gold coins and 1,05 billion silver coins. Which is to say, Smaug is still more than 1000 times richer than Basil II... who would likely very suddenly gain an interest in becoming a dragonslayer.
But if most of that hoard was bronze, say 90%, then we have 130 million gold coins (60 cubic meters or 1 159 200 kg), 105 million silver coins (same, for 629 400 kg), and the remaining value (1,17 billion gold and 0,945 billion silver coins) translated into bronze - resulting in 1 080 cubic meters of bronze coins, which would give 4 752 tons, or value of 1 584 000 000 bronze coins.
And with total volume of 1200 cubic meters, Smaug still has space for napping while being obscenely rich (in modern day, 1 159 200 kg of gold, 629 400 kg of silver and 4 481 000 kg of bronze would be worth $147 460 675 000).
* (real values would be 4,45 g for aureus and 3 g for argentus which was 1/25 the value of aureus; bronze radiate was ~3 g in weight and 1/200 the value of aureus)
Myth Weaver
