Tally Stick
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A tally stick (or simply a tally) was an ancient memory aid used to record and document numbers, quantities, and messages. Tally sticks first appear as animal bones carved with notches during the Upper Palaeolithic; a notable example is the
Ishango Bone The Ishango bone, discovered at the "Fisherman Settlement" of Ishango in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, is a bone tool and possible mathematical device that dates to the Upper Paleolithic era. The curved bone is dark brown in color, about ...
. Historical reference is made by
Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 79), known in English as Pliny the Elder ( ), was a Roman Empire, Roman author, Natural history, naturalist, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the Roman emperor, emperor Vesp ...
(AD 23–79) about the best wood to use for tallies, and by
Marco Polo Marco Polo (; ; ; 8 January 1324) was a Republic of Venice, Venetian merchant, explorer and writer who travelled through Asia along the Silk Road between 1271 and 1295. His travels are recorded in ''The Travels of Marco Polo'' (also known a ...
(1254–1324) who mentions the use of the tally in China. Tallies have been used for numerous purposes such as messaging and scheduling, and especially in financial and legal transactions, to the point of being
currency A currency is a standardization of money in any form, in use or circulation as a medium of exchange, for example banknotes and coins. A more general definition is that a currency is a ''system of money'' in common use within a specific envi ...
.


Kinds of tallies

There are two principal forms of tally sticks: the single tally and the split tally. A comparable example of this primitive counting device can be found in various types of prayer beads.


Possible palaeolithic tally sticks

A number of anthropological artefacts have been conjectured to be tally sticks: *The Lebombo bone, dated between 44,200 and 43,000 years old, is a
baboon Baboons are primates comprising the biology, genus ''Papio'', one of the 23 genera of Old World monkeys, in the family Cercopithecidae. There are six species of baboon: the hamadryas baboon, the Guinea baboon, the olive baboon, the yellow ba ...
's fibula with 29 distinct notches, discovered within the Border Cave in the
Lebombo Mountains The Lebombo Mountains, also called Lubombo Mountains, Rivombo Mountains (), are an , narrow range of mountains in Southern Africa. They stretch from Hluhluwe in KwaZulu-Natal in the south to Punda Maria in the Limpopo Province in South Africa ...
of
Eswatini Eswatini, formally the Kingdom of Eswatini, also known by its former official names Swaziland and the Kingdom of Swaziland, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by South Africa on all sides except the northeast, where i ...
. *The so-called ''Wolf bone'' ( cs) is a prehistoric artefact discovered in 1937 in
Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...
during excavations at Dolní Věstonice,
Moravia Moravia ( ; ) is a historical region in the eastern Czech Republic, roughly encompassing its territory within the Danube River's drainage basin. It is one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia. The medieval and early ...
, led by Karl Absolon. Dated to the
Aurignacian The Aurignacian () is an archaeological industry of the Upper Paleolithic associated with Cro-Magnon, Early European modern humans (EEMH) lasting from 43,000 to 26,000 years ago. The Upper Paleolithic developed in Europe some time after the L ...
, approximately 30,000 years ago, the bone is marked with 55 marks which some believe to be
tally mark Tally marks, also called hash marks, are a form of numeral used for counting. They can be thought of as a unary numeral system. They are most useful in counting or tallying ongoing results, such as the score in a game or sport, as no interm ...
s. The head of an ivory Venus figurine was excavated close to the bone. *The
Ishango bone The Ishango bone, discovered at the "Fisherman Settlement" of Ishango in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, is a bone tool and possible mathematical device that dates to the Upper Paleolithic era. The curved bone is dark brown in color, about ...
is a bone tool, dated to the Upper Palaeolithic era, around 18,000 to 20,000 BC. It is a dark brown length of bone. It has a series of possible
tally mark Tally marks, also called hash marks, are a form of numeral used for counting. They can be thought of as a unary numeral system. They are most useful in counting or tallying ongoing results, such as the score in a game or sport, as no interm ...
s carved in three columns running the length of the tool. It was found in 1950 in Ishango (east
Belgian Congo The Belgian Congo (, ; ) was a Belgian colonial empire, Belgian colony in Central Africa from 1908 until independence in 1960 and became the Republic of the Congo (Léopoldville). The former colony adopted its present name, the Democratic Repu ...
).


Single tally

The single tally stick was an elongated piece of bone, ivory, wood, or stone which is marked with a system of notches (see:
Tally marks Tally marks, also called hash marks, are a form of numeral used for counting. They can be thought of as a unary numeral system. They are most useful in counting or tallying ongoing results, such as the score in a game or sport, as no inter ...
). The single tally stick serves predominantly
mnemonic A mnemonic device ( ), memory trick or memory device is any learning technique that aids information retention or retrieval in the human memory, often by associating the information with something that is easier to remember. It makes use of e ...
purposes. Related to the single tally concept are messenger sticks (used by, e.g., Inuit tribes), the knotted cords, ''khipus'' or '' quipus'', as used by the
Inca The Inca Empire, officially known as the Realm of the Four Parts (, ), was the largest empire in pre-Columbian America. The administrative, political, and military center of the empire was in the city of Cusco. The History of the Incas, Inca ...
. Greek historian
Herodotus Herodotus (; BC) was a Greek historian and geographer from the Greek city of Halicarnassus (now Bodrum, Turkey), under Persian control in the 5th century BC, and a later citizen of Thurii in modern Calabria, Italy. He wrote the '' Histori ...
() reported the use of a knotted cord by Darius I of Persia ().


Split tally

The split tally became a prevalent technique in medieval Europe, a time characterised by a scarcity of coinage and widespread illiteracy, to document bilateral exchanges and debts. Typically fashioned from squared hazelwood, the stick was inscribed with a series of notches before being split lengthwise. Each party in the transaction retained one half of the marked stick, both pieces bearing identical records. Over the years, this method was refined to the point of becoming virtually impervious to tampering. One such refinement was to make the two halves of the stick of different lengths. The longer part was called ''stock'' and was given to the stock holder, which had advanced money (or other items) to the receiver. The shorter portion of the stick was called ''foil'' and was given to the party which had received the funds or goods. Using this technique each of the parties had an identifiable record of the transaction. The natural irregularities in the surfaces of the tallies where they were split would mean that only the original two halves would fit back together perfectly, and so would verify that they were matching halves of the same transaction. If one party tried to unilaterally change the value of his half of the tally stick by adding more notches, the absence of those notches would be apparent on the other party's tally stick. The split tally was accepted as legal proof in medieval courts and the
Napoleonic Code The Napoleonic Code (), officially the Civil Code of the French (; simply referred to as ), is the French civil code established during the French Consulate in 1804 and still in force in France, although heavily and frequently amended since i ...
(1804) still makes reference to the tally stick in Article 1333. Along the
Danube The Danube ( ; see also #Names and etymology, other names) is the List of rivers of Europe#Longest rivers, second-longest river in Europe, after the Volga in Russia. It flows through Central and Southeastern Europe, from the Black Forest sou ...
and in
Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...
the tally was still used in the 20th century in rural economies. The most prominent and best recorded use of the split tally stick or "nick-stick" being used as a form of currency was when Henry I introduced the tally stick system in medieval England in around 1100. The tally sticks recorded a payment of taxes, but soon began to circulate in a secondary discount market, being accepted as payment for goods and services at a discount since they could be later presented to the treasury as proof of taxes paid. Then tally sticks began to be issued in advance, in order to finance war and other royal spending, and circulated as "wooden money". The system of tally marks of the Exchequer is described in '' The Dialogue Concerning the Exchequer'' as follows: The cuts were made the full width of the stick so that, after splitting, the portion kept by the issuer (the ''stock'') exactly matched the piece (the ''foil'') given as a receipt. Each stick had to have the details of the transaction written on it, in ink, to make it a valid record. Royal tallies (debt of the Crown) also played a role in the formation of the
Bank of England The Bank of England is the central bank of the United Kingdom and the model on which most modern central banks have been based. Established in 1694 to act as the Kingdom of England, English Government's banker and debt manager, and still one ...
at the end of the 17th century. In 1697, the bank issued £1 million worth of stock in exchange for £800,000 worth of tallies at par and £200,000 in bank notes. This new stock was said to be "engrafted". The government promised not only to pay the Bank interest on the tallies subscribed but to redeem them over a period of years. The "engrafted" stock was then cancelled simultaneously with the redemption. The split tally of the Exchequer remained in continuous use in England until 1826, when the conditions required for activation of the Receipt of the Exchequer Act 1783 (23 Geo. 3. c. 82), the death of the last Exchequer Chamberlain, came about. In 1834, following the passing of 4 Will. 4. c .15, tally sticks representing six centuries' worth of financial records were ordered to be burned in two furnaces in the Houses of Parliament. The resulting fire set the chimney ablaze and then spread until most of the building was destroyed. This event was described by
Charles Dickens Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English novelist, journalist, short story writer and Social criticism, social critic. He created some of literature's best-known fictional characters, and is regarded by ...
in an 1855 article on administrative reform. Tally sticks feature in the design of the entrance gates to The National Archives at
Kew Kew () is a district in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. Its population at the 2011 census was 11,436. Kew is the location of the Royal Botanic Gardens ("Kew Gardens"), now a World Heritage Site, which includes Kew Palace. Kew is ...
.


See also

*
Bamboo and wooden slips Bamboo and wooden strips ( zh, s=简牍, t=簡牘, first=t, p=jiǎndú) are long, narrow strips of wood or bamboo, each typically holding a single column of several dozen brush-written characters. They were the main media for writing documents ...
* Bamboo tally * Chirograph: a similar system for creating two or more matching copies of a legal document on parchment * Fu (tally) * Measuring rod * Prehistoric numerals


Notes


References

* * * *


Further reading

* * * * *


External links


Photo of Medieval Exchequer TalliesThe Dialogue Concerning the Exchequer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Tally Sticks Mnemonics Mathematical tools Money Currency Bone carvings