money is supposed to be a mechanism, that people intuitively grasp, ensures that there is some justice. but when they debase the money, it reverts everything back to barbarism.

the secret sauce is a culture steeped in a philosophy of private, polycentric law. prior to the inception of the jewish monarchy, when they disobeyed God and ignored Samuel's advice against it (which basically was that this would lead to war) i think that dates back like 4000 years and money already existed, but most of the world was not under the jackboot of imperial power. most people lived in villages, cities were rarely not already captured by that time in history. jericho was one rare example, that was extremely long in its history, 9000 years supposedly.

polycentric law basically means no government and a market in jurisprudence. they have a somewhat similar principle operating in a lot of the less urbanised islamic settlements in the middle east and north africa, and also in israel, where conflicts were brought to the imam or the rabbi for a process of adjudication.

the money thing is true, in some sense, that debasement of currency and an arbitrary privilege to define what money is (aka fiat money), but the horse has already bolted by this point because people have started to wave flags and cheer for the king like he's a god and that's really the root of the problem. collectivism and authoritarianism, and the idea that an elite group can make a judgement that will work for everyone's benefit. it never does, and it always eventually decays into corruption.