I think that's been exaggerated somewhat. At least, it didn't stop the Templars charging interest. Of course it also surprises me somewhat that no one seems to have taken account of the fact that Trade (or at least wealth) is necessary for War. You'd think Marc would be Michael's best friend.
Indeed. This brings up the topic of Archangel Marc, who I think is given the shaft by not only canon, but many GMs (me included here). I think the strength and pervasiveness of his Word is often overlooked.
Somewhere along the line it was written that Archangel Marc was rather young, for an Archangel. Historically, this has to be a glaring fallacy. I can easily say, without batting an eye, that Marc came to prominence somewhere in the human Neolithic Age, probably during the Ice Ages. Trade was around whenever there were tribes, competing or not, in the vacinity of one another. They traded news, they traded goods, they traded each other. It's a survival mechanism built into mankind's natural proclivity to build communities.
From early Trade + Stone you can build the basics of Agriculture (to feed the population and a form of cash to trade with nearby Nomes), Pottery ( To keep the goods fresh and a method of trading them), and basic Architecture (housing people and goods). Trade + Destiny gives rise to Alphabet, for keeping inventory, and Mathematics, for inventory, census and architecture. Alphabet later turns into Language, and starts to slide under the umbrella of Destiny.
But from Trade you can get supply lines to help fuel wars and sieges. You get supply routes to help keep your towns alive and your populance fed. An overabundance to supplies can help keep the population happy with luxuries such as music and dance - he works with Creation, too.
His Words include Banking, Currency, Stock Market, Economy, and Taxation. Marc probably has an Angel of Socialism, just to promote some of the concepts of socialized health care and education.
Mammon was probably a Word-Bound Angel of Marc's before the Fall, since you require Trade to be able to have Greed. How can you covet your neighbor's goods if you cannot ever know about those goods in the first place, or they are no better then yours?
Marc was there when Mankind learned to use tools. He was there before the Fall, he was there long afterwards. Marc is not a young Archangel in any way.
I think there is a tendancy to mix trade up with banking. This is incorrect; banking comes from trade, not the other way around. From what I have read, it seems to be natural to associate Marc with the banks that began in the 1000's, which would make him a 'young' Archangel, but this is not true. You needed active Trade to get goods to sell them to make money long before you needed a place to put your money.
So that's my afternoon 2 cents.
- Em
Hate to burst your bubble, Em. Just because he's a new archangel, doesn't mean the word is new (of course, this could also just be an oversight in canon -- the horror!). Some other celestial may have held the word before him, and gotten trashed in some merger deal, or perhaps the word just wasn't considered important enough to protect until recently. Who knows?
I think it was just another canon oversight, actually. It's quite easy to do if you don't spend quality time translating ancient pieces of population census in dimly remembered languages. It would not be the first time. It will probably be fixed when the expanded Marc writeup comes out, whenever that will be.
[I'm brought to mine Thothmosis III, as I usually am when talking about War and Trade, and the siege of the walled city of Megiddo during the Sixteeth Dynasty. I don't think there had ever been a siege of a city of that size before then, or since. Nonetheless, he surrounded it with chariots and then sat on the Levintine's supply lines for a few weeks, choking the city of supplies. Eventually, the people inside resorted to canabalism (no, I can't offhand remember the Egyptian word fo canabalism, ask me when I have a dictionary in hand) and Menkheperre just rode into the city, victorious. This is where the word for Armageddon comes from - The Fall of Megiddo. And this was 1500 B.C.]
- Em
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