According to the account given in the Bible's Gospel of John, Judas Iscariot carried the disciples' money bag. During the Roman era, the Legio IV Scythica was camped in Zeugma, a city of Commagene. Excavations carried out in the city have revealed 65,000 seal imprints in clay, known as bullae, found in a place which is believed to have served as the archives for the customs of Zeugma. The seal imprints used in sealing papyrus, parchment, moneybags, and customs bales are good indications of the volume of trade and the density of transportation and communication networks once established in the region. Charon's obols, a death custom originating in ancient Greece whereby a coin is placed with a corpse, from the 3rd and 4th centuries AD in Western Europe, were often found in pouches, making them money pouches. From the Middle Ages to around 1900, Rottweiler dogs were used by travelling butchers at markets to guard money pouches tied around their necks. Beginning in the 14th century, purses of money were awarded to scholars during the Revathi Pattathanam, an annual assembly of scholars held in Kerala, India. In 16th century feudal Japan, samurai wore uchi-bukuro around the waist or neck. In 1620, pediatric tracheotomy was unheard of until a boy tried to hide a bag of gold by swallowing it. It became lodged in his esophagus and blocked his trachea. The tracheotomy allowed the surgeon to manipulate the bag, and it passed through his system. In September 1864, Rose O'Neal Greenhow, a Confederate agent, drowned with a bag of gold around her neck after leaving the Condor in a boat.
Nickname
A wealthy person can have the nickname "moneybag". Marcus Licinius Crassus, a leading Roman politician in his day, was known in Rome as Dives, meaning "The Rich" or "Moneybags". Ivan I of Moscow was a Russian Grand Duke of Moscow from 1328-1341 who was famous for being generous with his wealth. American Cardinal Francis Spellman was sometimes called "Cardinal Moneybags" in his later life, while Chicago mobster and racketeer Murray Humphreys was referred to as "Mr. Moneybags" by his friends. Miss Moneybags is a fictional character in the 1915 Charlie Chaplin silent comedy filmThe Count. James Edward "Baron of Edgerton" Hanson's billion-dollar empire earned him the nickname "Lord Moneybags". Another fictional character, Victor Newman of The Young and the Restless soap opera, has also been called "Moneybags".
In popular culture
Money bags have been represented in art and culture throughout human history, including paintings, literature, film, television, games, and even food.
Jainism sculpture shows various Jain gods and/or their attendants/servants, holding money bags, purses, or "purse-like objects" Buddhist and Hindu deities/gods/goddesses have money bags as part of their iconography. Lugus, another god worshipped by Celtic people and identified with Mercury, the Roman god of commerce, is depicted carrying a money bag.
Around 1130, Hugh of St. Victor's Chronica's preface refers to a money bag, with its compartments, as a memory training analogy.
The Conjurer, a c. 1502 painting by Hieronymus Bosch, features a child stealing a money purse from a bespectacled character.
caricatured King George III and Queen Charlotte awash with treasury funds to cover royal debts, with William Pitt handing him another moneybag.|alt=Centre: George III, drawn as a paunchy man with pockets bulging with gold coins, receives a wheel-barrow filled with money-bags from William Pitt, whose pockets also overflow with coin. To the left, a quadriplegic veteran begs on the street. To the right, George, Prince of Wales, is depicted dressed in rags.
The obverse 1896 US Educational Series $2 bill shows an allegorical figure of Commerce who has a bag of money next to her, making it a picture of a bag of money on real money.
In 1974, Herb Block produced Herblock Special Report, a book of political cartoons and text about Richard Nixon with some cartoons featuring money bags.
Money for Nothing, comedy/crime film about Joey Coyle who finds $1.2 million dollars in a bag in the middle of the street after it falls out of the back of an armored car
The Black Book, crime novel by Ian Rankin about "Operation Moneybags", a police investigation aimed at putting a money-lender out of business
29 Palms, direct-to-video film about a bag of money that affects the characters who possess it
Thai money bag, a small, crispy, deep-fried pastry purse with various filling
In the South Park in episode "Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow", a typically-antisemitic Cartman tries to stop Kyle at gunpoint, demanding the latter give up his bag of "Jew gold". It turns out that Kyle not only has a bag of gold, but a decoy bag as well.
Dean Accessories makes a handbag from recycled decommissioned US mint money bags.
In games
In various games, money bags tend to be used to represent treasure or points. In board games like Dungeon! a money bag is a treasure card, in Talisman as a card, and in Monopoly as a pawn/piece introduced in 1999. The 1976 television game showBreak the Bank had a money bag as a space and The Price Is Right has a pricing game called "Balance Game". Video games such as Lock 'n' Chase, Bagman, Pitfall!, Moneybags, Bank Panic, Circus Charlie, Gunfright, Roller Coaster, Arm Wrestling, the Castlevania series, and have money bags in them. As video game characters, Moneybags is a character in the Spyro the Dragon series and a boss named Moneybags in Dual Hearts.
