the chicken did

A new book on the history of debt?  Yes, please.  I haven't started yet, but apparently it's going to say that debt came before currency, and even before barter, in human history.  (The usual notion is that barter came first, then currency addressed barter's limits, and currency enabled complex movements like debt and credit.)

So I'll wait to see what the book says.  But for now, just the idea is exciting and plausible.  A goat, field or hour of labor can be borrowed even more easily than it may be bartered.  And a pre-existing debt would expand the range of goods a creditor might feel willing to accept.  Indeed, it might expand that range all the way across to a token.

It also addresses the economy of prophesy and religion, which is never a matter of barter, but always of promise (that is, of debt).

Can't wait to start this book! (Graeber, Debt: The First 5,000 Years.)  Hopefully it won't disappoint.