A money bag (or money sack) is a bag normally used to hold and transport coins and banknotes, often closed with a drawstring. When transported between banks and other institutions, money bags are usually moved in armored cars or money trains. It is a type of currency packaging. Money bags are often portrayed in cartoons and other light popular culture.

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 (modern-day Turkey). 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 (panakizhi) 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 ('money purses') 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 (a British blockade runner ship) in a boat.