Debasement Butcher, Kevin
2020, 20200430, 2020-04-30
eBook
The debasement of coinage, particularly of silver, was a common feature of pre-modern monetary systems. Most coinages were issued by state authorities and the condition of a coinage is often seen ...(rightly or wrongly) as an indicator of the broader fiscal health of the state that produced it. While in some cases the motives behind the debasements or reductions in standards are clear, in many cases the intentions of the issuing authorities are uncertain. Various explanations have been advanced: fiscal motives (such as a desire to profit or a to cover a deficit caused by the failure to balance expenditure and revenues); monetary motives (such as changing demand for coined money or a desire to maintain monetary stability in the face of changing values of raw materials or labour costs); pressure from groups within society that would profit from debasement; misconduct at the mint; or the decline of existing monetary standards due to circulation and wear of the coinage in circulation. Certain explanations have tended to gain favour with monetary historians of specific periods, partly reflecting the compartmentalization of scholarship. Thus the study of Roman debasements emphasizes fiscal deficits, whereas medievalists are often more prepared to consider monetary factors as contributing to debasements. To some extent these different approaches are a reflection of discrepancies in the amount of documentary evidence available for the respective periods, but the divide also underlines fundamentally different approaches to the function of coinage: Romanists have preferred to see coins as a medium for state payments; whereas medievalists have often emphasized exchange as an important function of currency. The volume is inter-disciplinary in scope. Apart from bringing together monetary historians of different periods, it also contains contributions from archaeometallurgists who have experience with the chemical and physical composition of coins and technical aspects of production of base alloys
The debasement of coinage, particularly of silver, was a common feature of pre-modern monetary systems. Most coinages were issued by state authorities and the condition of a coinage is often seen ...(rightly or wrongly) as an indicator of the broader fiscal health of the state that produced it. While in some cases the motives behind the debasements or reductions in standards are clear, in many cases the intentions of the issuing authorities are uncertain. Various explanations have been advanced: fiscal motives (such as a desire to profit or a to cover a deficit caused by the failure to balance expenditure and revenues); monetary motives (such as changing demand for coined money or a desire to maintain monetary stability in the face of changing values of raw materials or labour costs); pressure from groups within society that would profit from debasement; misconduct at the mint; or the decline of existing monetary standards due to circulation and wear of the coinage in circulation. Certain explanations have tended to gain favour with monetary historians of specific periods, partly reflecting the compartmentalization of scholarship. Thus the study of Roman debasements emphasizes fiscal deficits, whereas medievalists are often more prepared to consider monetary factors as contributing to debasements. To some extent these different approaches are a reflection of discrepancies in the amount of documentary evidence available for the respective periods, but the divide also underlines fundamentally different approaches to the function of coinage: Romanists have preferred to see coins as a medium for state payments; whereas medievalists have often emphasized exchange as an important function of currency. The volume is inter- disciplinary in scope. Apart from bringing together monetary historians of different periods, it also contains contributions from archaeometallurgists who have experience with the chemical and physical composition of coins and technical aspects of production of base alloys
Although silver coins have been investigated through the lens of geological provenance to locate argentiferous ore deposits exploited in their production, we consider that this avenue of research may ...be a cul-de-sac, especially for studies that rely heavily on deciphering lead and silver isotope signatures that may have been altered by the addition of lead and copper (and their associated impurities) during silver refining and debasement, and by ancient recycling of coinage. Instead, we focus our attention on mints, by analysing the compositions of over 1000 silver coins from the early 1st century BC to AD 100. We propose that lead from the west Mediterranean was used exclusively to refine silver at mints in the West, and that an unknown lead supply (possibly from Macedonia), used in the East by the Late Seleucid ruler Philip I Philadelphus and later Mark Antony, was mixed with western lead. Extensive mixing of lead and/or silver coins is particularly evident under Nero and Vespasian, aligning with historically attested periods of recycling following currency reform. We further propose that coins minted in the kingdom of Mauretania used different lead and silver sources from the majority of coins minted in the western Mediterranean, and that silver coins minted at Tyre are derived from silver refined in the west Mediterranean. Coinage minted at Alexandria is consistent with debasement of recycled Roman denarii, thereby suggesting that denarii were deliberately removed from circulation to mint tetradrachms during the early Imperial Roman period.
Our purpose is to better understand the actions and behaviours of people in the past, often with a focus on ancient economies, and we are willing to use tools from any discipline that allow us to ...explore these issues. This is why it is so important that the limitations of techniques applied to archaeology are presented as explicitly as their utility.
The fineness of Roman imperial and provincial coinage has been regarded as an indicator of the broader fiscal health of the Roman Empire, with the apparent gradual decline of the silver content being ...treated as evidence for worsening deficits and the contraction of the supply of natural resources from which the coins were made. This book explores the composition of Roman silver coinage of the first century AD, re-examining traditional interpretations in the light of an entirely new programme of analyses of the coins, which illustrates the inadequacy of many earlier analytical projects. It provides new evidence for the supply of materials and refining and minting technology. It can even pinpoint likely episodes of recycling old coins and, when combined with the study of hoards, hints at possible strategies of stockpiling of metal. The creation of reserves bears directly on the question of the adequacy of revenues and fiscal health.
Debasement of silver Roman coins is a well-known phenomenon and understanding the quality of ancient silver coinages can provide an idea about the underlying fiscal condition of the issuing states. ...These coins are made from a silver-copper alloy, the surfaces of which were deliberately enhanced at the mints by a process of surface-enrichment to give them the appearance of being made of pure silver. Therefore, any surface analysis would provide a composition of the silver-copper alloy that would not be representative of the original alloy from which the coin blank was made; the result would be too high in silver. However, the bulk of the sample, the interior, should provide a composition that is true to the original alloy. Elemental analysis using negative muons has been used to provide a depth dependent compositional, completely non-destructive analysis of a silver-copper alloy denarius of the empress Julia Domna datable to 211–217 CE. The composition of the coin, beyond the surface enrichment layer, is 51 ± 1.8 % copper and 49 ± 1.9% silver, taken at a muon depth of 402 ± 61 µm. The surface enrichment layer is approximately 190 µm thick.
HELIOPOLIS: COINS, TEMPLES, AND SIGHT LINES BUTCHER, KEVIN
Bulletin - Institute of Classical Studies,
June 2019, 2019-06-01, 20190601, Letnik:
62, Številka:
1
Journal Article
:
Recent research on the temples at Roman Heliopolis (Baalbek in modern Lebanon) has emphasized visual links between architectural elements within and between the sanctuaries. This paper explores the ...ways in which the representations of the temples and sanctuaries on the civic coinage of Heliopolis can contribute to this debate. The civic coins are here understood as objects which helped to construct identity and communal memory in the city that issued them.
Dated measurements of lead pollution in deep Greenland ice have become a useful proxy to monitor historical events because interruptions in lead-silver production result in fluctuations in lead ...emissions. However, the application of the lead emission record has not perhaps received the attention it deserves because of the difficulty in connecting macroscale events, such as wars and plagues, to their economic repercussions. For instance, although debasement of silver coinage with copper has been proposed as a reasonable response to interruptions in silver production, reductions in fineness of the silver denarius, the backbone of Roman coinage from the late third century BC, are not always coincident with decreases in lead deposited in Greenland. We propose that extensive recycling of silver that is evident in the numismatic record can better explain drops in lead emissions and, thereby, the responses to major historical events, such as warfare in the silver-producing areas of the Iberian Peninsula and southern France during the middle and late Roman Republic.
Understanding Roman Gold Coinage Inside Out Green, George Alexander; Ishida, Katsu; Hampshire, Bethany V. ...
Journal of archaeological science,
October 2021, 2021-10-00, Letnik:
134
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
The true purity of Roman silver coinage was hidden by enriching the surfaces of the coins. The question investigated here is whether Roman gold coins were also surfaced enriched. Two non-destructive ...techniques were employed to do this: X-ray fluorescence (XRF) and a ‘newer’ technique, muonic X-ray emission spectroscopy (μXES). For the latter, the momentum of the muons is controlled, allowing for the composition of the coin to be determined at various depths. Here we show that there is no surface enrichment of the Roman gold coins analysed. Furthermore, we show that XRF and μXES return congruent results at the near surface. This all supports the integrity of surface level analyses of Roman gold coins. We then discuss the broader applicability of our muon technique to the further study of Roman gold coinage, to the cultural heritage sector and to archaeological scientists more generally.
•Three Roman gold coins are analysed with muonic X-ray emission spectroscopy.•The muons penetrated 0.4 mm into the coins totally non-destructively.•The compositional results were congruent with those by X-ray fluorescence.•The surfaces and cores of the coins had congruent results – no surface enrichment.•This technique has great potential for the analysis of high-value museum objects.
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