Picture two pairs of hands meeting over a table with no wallet anywhere in sight. I put down the rice I grew or the work I can do. You put down the salt you have. Nobody counts coins, and the deal ends the moment each side picks up what it came for. Everything this word covers is that one picture seen from a different angle: the act of swapping, the whole arrangement a market runs on, and the sack of rice itself once it is standing where money would normally stand.
From the word’s history
The evidence packet records only that barter is Late Middle English and comes from Old French barater. It does not say what the French word meant, so nothing further is claimed here.
證據裡只記到：barter 是中古英語晚期的字，來自古法文 barater。來源沒有說那個法文字當時的意思，所以這裡不再往下推。
Wiktionary entry for barter supplied in the evidence packet (source_ref kaikki:3f6f69a190036ae4:6583822).
登入就可以看每一支怎麼連回核心畫面。