A new co-authored publication. I am incredibly grateful to Dick Schaefer for allowing us to do this work.
Iconography of the Dioscuri (note)
Elena Gagliano, ‘Berreti de Dioscuri’ e campanelle spartane : Rfilessi di rapporti cultu(r)ali sugli episemata monetali. “ Rivista italiana di numismatica e scienze affini v.17, 2018, p.33-62. Must ILL.
Focuses on the pilos and stars. Discusses coin but also Skyphoi including the Odysseus and Circe one.
Data Dumping Blackletter Find List, Vicarello 1854
Of 1366 Cast Coins found at Vicarello:
The chart just visualizes what you already know. If you’re going to make a coin offering you’re most likely to leave a little coin. However, as my joking chart title suggests, this habit could clearly have been a drain on Roman small change supplies.
Does the lower count of semisses and quadrantes as compared to asses and trientes, suggest there were fewer of these denominations in people’s purses? likewise fewer circulating semunciae than uncia?
We might then also deduce a similar reflection of availability of struck bronzes: semisses slightly less common than asses, quadrans less common than triens, uncia less common than sextans. However, all told struck coinage of all denominations looks like it mightbe more readily available in this latter period.
ROMANO Struck Bronzes
By far and away the most common find is RRC 16: 1156 specimens! followed closely by RRC 17 of which 916 were found!
That’s a LOT of small change AND suggests that both struck and cast were used by peoples heavily in the same cultural environment. Roughly speaking a little over 25% of the bronze coin finds are cast, a little under 75% struck and the pattern suggests heavy use of the site in the mid 3rd century by Romans. About 30% of the struck bronze is of the prow series which suggests continuity of practice at the site through late 3rd century at least. I am particularly intrigued by the presence of Teanum, Suessa, and Cales bronzes of the early part of the First Punic War.
Public Domain: Henzen, W. “Alterthümer Von Vicarello.” Rheinisches Museum Für Philologie 9 (1854): 20-36. http://www.jstor.org/stable/41251528.
Maps of Coins Finds in Etruria (From Pulcinelli 2015)
From: Pulcinelli, Luca. “MONETE E CIRCOLAZIONE MONETARIA IN ETRURIA MERIDIONALE NEL III SECOLO A.C.” Archeologia Classica 66 (2015): 481-92. http://www.jstor.org/stable/26364293.
The author kindly made the paper available online, but the open access version does not have legible maps. These below are slightly more readable and are screenshots from Jstor. [Don’t get eye strain!]
Stuff to note: Ceveteri (Caere) missing from maps 1-2. Vulci missing from maps 1 and 4. How Cosa coins hug the coast. Rather frustrating (to my present work) that RRC 21 is lumped in with 14 and 18 on map 4… Ghiaccio Forte Punic coin finds v interesting given high density of aes rude reported at the site. Also that no Punic coins are identified in the HUGE Vicarello find.
Garrucci’s Testimony on Finds
Just some notes…
Bomarzo (CHRR 6)
single find
Haeberlin photo link.
Vulci (CHRR 10)
fragment of RRC 6/1 (not in CHRR, unlless recorded as fragment of ‘non Roman bars’)
Haeberlin photo:
Fragment – RRC 12/1
N. B. Garrucci labels the Paris RRC 12/1 whole bar as from Vulci. This appears to be an error.
“Fragments of Non-Roman Bars” (I’d call this Ramo Secco)
Ariccia Hoard found 1848 (CHRR 13)
fragment – RRC 8/1
Crawford believes Shield Bar is in Berlin [but it is not (yet) in CRRO under RRC 7/1] and remainder of Hoard in Palazzo Massimo (i.e. this one too); he also lists as bibliography Annali 1871, 262[f.] and Haeberlin 1910, 20.
This drawing corresponds to the specimen shown on Haeberlin 1910 pl. 60.4
Vicarello, Aquae Apollinares
Votive deposit at source of thermal spring, +5000 bronze coins found along with a variety of other objects.
fragment – RRC 7/1
~16 – RRC 14/1
“Of this as the waters of Vicarello have sent sixteen specimens, and there were four from the Cerveteri hoard, others from the deposits of Monte Mario, others from that of the Ostia. Mommsen states with P. Marchi (H. de la monn. I, 185) that around Ostia a deposit was found only of these “asses” and more abundant than that of Monte Mario (L ‘aes grave 48): and adds that 1109 of this series together with 13 of Roman series were taken from Vicarello. The truth is that P. Marchi counts only 13 “asses” with the two-faced on the obverse and the head of Mercury covered with winged petasus on the back, which were sent to him, I here and elsewhere I add to his calculations also those pieces then subtracted, which they came in my hand. In the place mentioned we note from Mommsen that in the vicinity of Trent the triens, the quadrans and the uncia of this series was were, per the testimony of Giovanelli (Dei Rezi, p. 81).”
4 – RRC 14/2
see under Genzano for testimony
Genzano (CHRR 14)
2 – RRC 14/2
“It should be noted that four came from Vicarello, and as many others from Corneto. Two were seen jumping into it air at the explosion of a mine lit in a peperino quarry on the way to Genzano towards Civita Lavinia.”
N.B. Garrucci also says RRC 10/1 (BM R1867,0101.1) was found at Genzano. Could it have been at the same time as these two semisses revealed though a mine explosion?!
Corneto (no CHRR #?)
~4 – RRC 14/2
see under Genzano for evidence
Ostia (CHRR 15)
unspecified number – RRC 14/1
See under Vicarello above for testimony
An Aes Grave Hoard from Praeneste
Vecchi 204: no. 276 = HNItaly 357
“…A second example was found in Palestrina together with the as representing the lion’s head with the dagger between the teeth, and on the reverse the horse protome with the sign of the caduceus.”
This is referring to Vecchi 2014: no. 254 = HNItaly 249. I can’t tell from Vecchi’s list of finds if this is one he mentioned or in addition to his list. He mentions none from Palestrina itself but two found ‘near’. One before 1910 (following Haeberlin I’m guessing and should check later) and the other 1884 at Artena.
I also can’t tell if this little hoard is the Praeneste find of this type I mentioned in my previous post, OR ‘new’ fourth find of the type at this locale. (I got my information for that post from Vecchi 2014.) Must sort this out later…
Tracking down Ariminum’s whole unit aes grave
Garrucci says its in Pesaro! But Gorini 2010 clearly consulted the Pesaro collection… The plot thickens.
Source of the “Trident” Red Herring? (RRC 12/1)
I’m guessing the drawings on Carelli’s plates are just plain inaccurate and this fragment doesn’t exist at least not as shown, and thus we’ve all been led astray.
“Dalle tavole del Carelli (XL, 2), non dall’originale che non si sa dove stia. Il Mommsen cita negli Annexes p. 330 questo bronzo fra quei che portano per tipo al dritto due polli e al riverso due creduti tridenti e due delfini, ma sbaglia anche perchè lo strumento che è al riverso è un vero tridente sempre così effigiato sui quadrilateri come lo è uesto.” – Garruccii p. 11
“From the plates of Carelli (XL, 2), not from the original that one does not know where it is. Mommsen cites in the Annexes p. 330 this bronze among those who carry two chickens and two dolphins on the obverse, but also wrong because the instrument that is on its back is a real trident always so portrayed on the quadrilaterals as it is.”
