gwenynnefydd:

apolesen:

tirlaeyn:

gwenynnefydd:

apolesen:

I’d like to hear people’s thoughts and headcanons on what Cardassian cash looks like. I think that a lot of the time, Cardassian leks are electronic, but I’m writing something where I need there to be cash. In previous fics, I’ve talked about ‘coins’ for making small purchases, but for this, I am using both smaller and bigger denominations. I don’t want to just default to something that feels Western and 20th century, and I’d quite like to hear whether someone else have thought of this. 

Here are some possible angles, to get your gears grinding: 

• What kind of denominations are there? 
  
• What shape is the physical money in? Are there different types for different 
• What material is used? Is the material significant, in terms of value or symbolism? 

doing some off the cuff spitballin here

• cardassia is meant to be a desert planet, so i’d think plant life to make paper or notes would be scarce, or considered quite modern
• very little water, so water heavy crops like cotton would be out
• i think metals or precious stones would be fairly realistic, espec with forced labour mines and camps etc
• some societies used shells as currency but I’m not sure how much coastline Cardassia has?
• bone as a form of currency would be cool. collectable coins made from the kneecaps of your rivals 👀

I may have more thoughts later, but first thought for materials, for maybe the larger denominations, is obsidian.

Another thought, knowing they essentially stripped and sold off their own relics, maybe their coinage is of various metals melted down.

I feel like they would have the Union insignia on one side and? Not sure about the other side. Plants, animals, those stars Garak talks about in ASIT?

Ooooh obsidian! I like that. 

Regarding the thing with melting down various metals: in modern times, cash is symbolic (at least most of the time - I don’t want to make generalisations). While a pound coin is worth one pound, it’s not worth one pound. As an object, its actual material value is lower. It’s the same with paper money (which is not paper anyway). On UK banknotes, there’s a phrase that reoccurs. On the £10 note, it says ‘I promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of Ten Pounds’. Originally, banknotes weren’t the money themselves, but could (theoreticallY) be traded for the actual money. While this is not the case anymore, that same relationship exists. If we go further back in history though, the material of the coin really mattered. A silver coin was worth what that amount of silver was worth. Even in antiquity, the minting mattered, of course, and one reason was that sometimes, you’d dilute the metal. That, in turn, could lead to inflation, because if people found out that a certain coin was not actually the metal it purported to be, they would want more of the coins, as they were worth less. 

Economic history has never been my strong suit, so there are some nuances here that I’m probably brushing over. My point is that depending on when we’re talking, this approach might be more or less likely. If you’re operating under the assumption that the coin’s material value is its monetary value, then creating an alloy would be a bad idea, because you’re messing with the value. Also, I should mention that melting down metal objects was not uncommon. This is why it’s more uncommon to find really old metal objects, because they get melted down. Nowadays, though, melting down metal objects for the material value is less profitable, because if you have an old object and you want to fence it, that’ll give you way more money. If they don’t have that sense of material value = monetary value, then selling coinage to private collectors might be more profitable. 

Apologies for the length of that! What can I say other than I’m a history nerd? 

This does lead to an interesting question though - maybe I’m wrong to assume that the Cardassian economy is centralised? Maybe it’s lots of different coinage, some older, some newer, floating around in a grey market, and some people will pay you electronic currency for physical currency, which could be seen as a type of money laundering. I imagine that the State would like to have as much control over currency as possible, but I imagine people would find a way of also trading without the State getting involved. That might just be because it’s easier, but it could also be for dissident activities, illegal enterprises etc. Perhaps people simply use what’s available - old currency that nonetheless is recognised by people to have value. 

this reminds me of a concept in one of my older fics, where you had the monetary currency of lek, but a secondary favour currency of dharhma. like if you do something for someone else, they could give you dharhma to indicate they owe you a favour.

You could buy your food with lek, but if you wanted something unique or coveted, you could go to the seller and say “I have dharhma from This Higher Up Official, I will exchange it for your item”. and instead of THUO owing you a favour, the THUO now owes the seller a favour

and ofc having dharhma for certain officials is very useful - if you need to get someone out of jail, or want to be approved for new buildings, or if you need to be introduced to someone else, you could cash in your dharhma with the person that issued it and that person would be legally bound (within reason) to comply

gwenynnefydd:

apolesen:

I’d like to hear people’s thoughts and headcanons on what Cardassian cash looks like. I think that a lot of the time, Cardassian leks are electronic, but I’m writing something where I need there to be cash. In previous fics, I’ve talked about ‘coins’ for making small purchases, but for this, I am using both smaller and bigger denominations. I don’t want to just default to something that feels Western and 20th century, and I’d quite like to hear whether someone else have thought of this. 

Here are some possible angles, to get your gears grinding: 

• What kind of denominations are there? 
  
• What shape is the physical money in? Are there different types for different 
• What material is used? Is the material significant, in terms of value or symbolism? 

doing some off the cuff spitballin here

• cardassia is meant to be a desert planet, so i’d think plant life to make paper or notes would be scarce, or considered quite modern
• very little water, so water heavy crops like cotton would be out
• i think metals or precious stones would be fairly realistic, espec with forced labour mines and camps etc
• some societies used shells as currency but I’m not sure how much coastline Cardassia has?
• bone as a form of currency would be cool. collectable coins made from the kneecaps of your rivals 👀

I may have more thoughts later, but first thought for materials, for maybe the larger denominations, is obsidian.

Another thought, knowing they essentially stripped and sold off their own relics, maybe their coinage is of various metals melted down.

I feel like they would have the Union insignia on one side and? Not sure about the other side. Plants, animals, those stars Garak talks about in ASIT?

butchniqabi:

okay but. you know the pre-recorded terok nor “attention bajoran workers” videos, were those filmed in advance or was it like. idk sci fi 3d rendering, because if the cardassians filmed them i can just imagine a director being like “no no no put MORE condescension into it”

gar-trek:

If you enter cardassian space when your not supposed to they will hail you and be like “my dear federation captain, I am sure you have entered cardassian territory in error, unfortunately I am going to have to detain you so we can do a preliminary investigation to make sure you didn’t have any…. Nefarious intentions :)” and then they torture the shit out of you, but if you enter the Nuteral Zone the Romulans are like “this is centurion Gal’tchra. You have entered the Nuteral zone. Kill your self immediately”

the-last-dillpickle:

the-last-dillpickle:

tfw ur plowing ur Cardassian bf and all of a sudden he starts barking like a goddamn velociraptor

ur-cute-so-i:

I have written a chapter of state sanctioned alien erotica. I am a mad woman and have no one to blame but myself and @onetobeamup

So please enjoy Chapter One of Gul of her Choice and excuse any formatting issues, I’m on mobile.

Oloh Lodam was not panicking; because Oloh Lodam did not panic. Panic was a completely useless emotion, if she had given in to panic or self doubt she would not have lasted a day at the University of Culat. Instead, she had not only excelled in her chosen field, linguistics, she had done it as one of the only two women. She was a credit to her nation; and to her father, whose footsteps she had so willingly followed in. 

Willingly and apparently blindly, she thought bitterly. Followed him right into disgrace on Cardassia II, alone with no friends, no connections, and four younger siblings she had to protect from his stupid mistakes. Which brought her to her state of not-panic.

Keep reading

arinaca-st:

yellow-fr3ak:

Finally finished this Cardassian lad for @arinaca-st

My boy, my BOY he’s looking at me ;o; ❤️❤️

kaelio:

women on post-war cardassia trying to entice war hero Garak by pretending to be mannishly bad at math