Perhaps there are only two reasons why a person can afford to get into debt. The first - nowhere to live, the second - there is nothing to eat. All other problems can be solved without resorting to the usurers. After all, whatever one may say, but you borrow other people's money for a short while, and then give back yours and forever.
A very powerful law
Nobody likes debtors. And most of all they are disliked by those to whom these debtors, in fact, should not pay off on time. And if now the phrase "not sure - don't take it" sounds exclusively as free advice, then, for example, in ancient Rome such a thesis was the law. And as soon as the debtor violated this law - he took out a loan, without really thinking about how he would give it, then he, the debtor, was shackled in stocks for a period of two months. During this time, the debt must be repaid. How - it doesn't matter. Either at the expense of the sold property of the debtor, or relatives will take care of his fate and pay off the creditor.
And the fate of a citizen who was unable to pay off the creditor was oh, how difficult it is. Okay - pads, you can survive it. Another thing is that after a two-month period, if the debt was never paid, the unlucky borrower was simply cut into pieces, so to speak, it was discouraging. So the ancient Romans, before borrowing a new fashionable tunic or a rare wine, thought for a long time: shouldn't it be better to walk in an old tunic and drink ordinary water than to get into debt? A good law, by the way, effective.
Beating out
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It wasn't just in ancient Rome that insolvent borrowers were suspicious. In Medieval Europe, the debtor was tied to a pillory in the central square (in every self-respecting settlement there was a similar structure) and beat him with mortal combat, using sticks, whips or just fists, and sometimes even beaten to death. It is clear that such spectacles served as excellent educational material for other citizens, and from an early age taught them to stay away from usurious offices.
In Russia, as in Europe, it was customary to "knock out" debts. That is, the debtor was again tied to a post and beaten in the calves with sticks until he agreed to return the borrowed money. This was a very effective method, provided, of course, that there was money, but the debtor was simply in no hurry to give it back. Otherwise, punishment, just like in Europe, served exclusively educational purposes.
How do I get my money back?
In Assyria, everything was done a little differently, let's say, more prudently. The debtor was released on all four sides so that he could by hook or by crook get funds to pay off the creditor. But in return, the same creditor quite legally took hostage someone from the debtor's relatives.
You could do whatever you wanted with the hostage. Until the moment when the money returned to its owner, the hostage was outlawed. One could beat him, humiliate him, cut off various parts of his body and even kill him. True, in the event of a lethal outcome, there was no point in repaying the debt, and therefore few of the creditors practiced the death penalty for hostages. But the very idea that a loved one is in such harsh conditions spurred the debtor to get money as soon as possible.
And after he paid off, the one who had been a hostage all this time, gathered friends and relatives and privately "weaned" the poor fellow from the habit of borrowing and not repaying on time. That's right - you have to teach fools, isn't everyone suffering for them?
In ancient Egypt, an insolvent client of a moneylender could easily become his slave - until he paid off the debt along with interest. In Babylon, you could leave your own children as a pledge, which was repeatedly practiced by the good Babylonians. And the Indians not only encouraged usury, but also allowed to collect debts by any means, including violence or theft. That is, if a usurer climbed into the house of his debtor like a thief and got caught there, then he could easily justify his actions by simply trying to get his money back.
Debt pit
In the XVII-XIX centuries, when the pillars of shame were no longer enough for everyone, debt pits entered the practice. In fact, ordinary prisons served as "pits", only there were not murderers and rapists, but debtors unable to pay off.
In fact, the debt hole also served as a punishment rather than a way to repay the debt. After all, the content there was not at the expense of the state, but at the expense of the creditor. That is, the one who lent money, then also paid for the fact that the failed debtor is in prison. And sometimes this payment even exceeded the amount of the debt itself.
Of course, it cannot be argued that the creditor went bankrupt, putting the debtor in a hole in debt. The amount contributed was barely enough to keep him from starving to death. The peculiarities of the debt prison are beautifully described by Charles Dickens in many of his novels, for example, in the "Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club." This is not surprising. After all, the father of young Dickens spent enough time in this gloomy place, and the boy, when he visited his father, saw enough of everyone there.
Lender's Trouble
Debtors, as already mentioned, were not liked. But let's be fair - they loved usurers even less, it’s even right to say - more often they hated them with all their hearts. Suffice it to recall the old woman-usurer, described by FM Dostoevsky - a typical usurer, for which reason she became the target of the student Raskolnikov. And often everything ended in the same way as in the immortal novel of Fyodor Mikhailovich, and sometimes even worse. Suddenly it turned out that the whole city was enmeshed in debts, that there was no man left who would not owe the usurious offices, and even at brutal interest. And then the moneylenders' shops flared up with a bright flame, and the creditors themselves were caught and hanged in front of all the people or drowned in the river, if such flowed nearby and was deep enough.
In Russia, when moneylenders' shops began to burn too often, a law appeared: not to take more than 50 percent for a loan, which undoubtedly benefited both debtors and creditors. In Russia and in other countries, the lending system, in the end, more or less came to equilibrium. But human greed, as it turned out, is ineradicable. And now there are a lot of citizens who are ready to get into crazy debts if only everything is “like people” and, of course, there are usurers who are ready to provide thirsty madmen with a short-term loan at a “modest” 300 or more percent.
Konstantin Fedorov
