On the Minting of Money

Nicolaus Copernicus

Ralph Benko, editor
Gerald Malsbary, translator

This 500th Anniversary edition of On the Minting of Money – Monetae Cudendae Ratio – is a modern translation of Nicolaus Copernicus’s groundbreaking essay which proposed solutions to the effects of currency debasement and inflation. Copernicus’s treatise famously anticipated Sir Thomas Gresham’s 1558 economic principle that “bad money drives out good” and Sir Isaac Newton’s 1717 de facto gold standard which he proposed as Master of the Royal Mint of Great Britain, making this essay a fundamental cornerstone to modern economic theory and a fundamental basis for understanding the current affordability crisis dominating American political discourse.

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On the Minting of Money, serves as a powerful reminder of the scientific provenance of the gold standard. Now, thanks to gold standard expert Ralph Benko and virtuoso Latin scholar Gerald Malsbary, let us hope the insights of Copernicus will inspire our political leaders to once again lift their lamp beside the golden door to bring a new golden age to America and the world.

– Steve Forbes, Chairman and Editor-in-Chief of Forbes Media

Here is the definitive modern translation of an essay by no less than Nicolaus Copernicus – the polymath who moved the sun into the center of our solar system and thus set the clocks and cycles of all human life and history, including the foundations of money. Sincere appreciation of leading gold standard advocate, Ralph Benko, for his work in rescuing this amazingly important essay from undeserved obscurity.

– George Gilder, author of The Scandal of Money and Wealth and Poverty and co-founder of the Discovery Institute.