Bronze Coin, Frentani. ANS 1957.172.36. SNG ANS 1.129. HN Italy 621.
Check out the legends on each side of this coin. They are both FRENTREI, but with the Rs looking for all the world like Ds and the F like an 8. Oscan isn’t really that far off the Latin or Greek alphabet:
It’s main difference is that its written right to left (like Hebrew and Arabic), rather than left to right (like English and kin). I like the above specimen because it has the same name written in different directions on each side. L>R on the obverse; R>L on the reverse. It’s as if we get a little window into the moment of evolution of the language among the Frentani.
It uses a locative ending like the first coin of Larinum to show a Roman influence. The coins of Larinum during the Hannibalic War period continue to be of influence for the swap between Oscan and Latin and the D/R letter forms (see Rutter in HN Italy, no. 624).
post script. Doesn’t the little beanie hat style of Mercury’s wings remind you a little of how they were rendered on Suessa’s bronzes… or at Teanum ?
Looking again at the coins of Suessa, Cales, and Teanum, especially specimens which have been on the market, it occurred to me how heavily used the obverse dies seem to be, especially at Teanum:
Even after the obverse die break in ways to mar the face of the god portrayed they keep on being used. Such intensity is not consistent with a ‘vanity project’ but instead with a more rushed economically driven agenda. Not a bad die study opportunity here. [The last two are the same obverse die as this Fitzwilliam Specimen; interesting specimen with a prow mint symbol at CNG site].
The other curiosity that might hint at wide circulation (and by extension striking in some significant volume) is the fact that the Boii of the Po river valley (aka Cisalpine/Transpadine Gaul) borrowed the type of Cales’ bronzes for an obol silver issue:
The specimen above is called a ‘drachm’ and the catalogue notes the assignment to the Boii is provisional. (We need a few good hoards or excavation finds…)
This last one is listed as possibly from the Danube region.
Modern critical edition, translation, and commentary available here (p. 41-45).
Relevant bibliography:
Le Bohec, Yann. – La marine romaine et la première guerre punique. Klio 2003 85 (1) : 57-69 carte.
Harris W. V. – The development of the quaestorship, 267-81 B.C. Classical Quarterly1976 XXVI : 92-106. Abstract: There were two new quaestorships in 267, not four, as usually supposed, and they probably shared some of the duties of the quaestores urbani. Two more quaestorships were added for Sicily and Sardinia, and in 197 the total was probably raised to ten, a figure maintained until Sulla. The quaestores classici of 267 probably represented a tightening of Roman control in Italy.
RRC 262/1. I had a little itch in my brain that elephants wearing bells were some how familiar to me when I included the coin below in my previous post.
ETRURIA. Val di Chiana. Ca. 208–207 BC. SNG ANS 36. SNG Morcom 44. HN Italy 69.
I realize it must have been because of the bell on the elephant head on RRC 262/1. The bell must have been a prominent feature on war elephants to make it onto the coin iconography…
addendum. HN Italy 2666 is an AE coin of ~18mm diameter with a bust of Nike on the obverse and an elephant with a bell on the reverse. Trunk curves outwards, not inward. The mint and date is unknown. Two more specimens are in Copenhagen.
Update 6/6/2014: Elephants with Bells also seems to be a Bacrian motif:
8/22/16: and Indo-Greek
Update 4/11/18: So funny to learn while I was observing all this some one else what writing an article on it!
Historia Numorum Italy no. 448 is listed with just one legend PROBOM. (P is actually closer to a Π with a short right leg. Note open form of R. These features consistent throughout). A specimen with clearly this legend is illustrated in the plates. Most of the specimens in trade are from different dies with variant readings:
PROBVM
PRBOVM
PRBOM
The meaning of the legend is unclear. HN Italy suggests it comes from probus, meaning valid. Although the basic meaning ‘honest, good’ seems fine to me too.
It is connected to a similar legend at Beneventum on a type, the imagery of which is a mirror image of RRC 15/1 (HN Italy 440):
SAMNIUM, Beneventum . 265-240 BC. Æ 20mm (7.03 gm). BENVEN-TOD, laureate head of Apollo left / PR-O-P-OM, horse prancing right; pentagram above. SNG ANS -; BMC Italy pg. 68, 1; Sambon 193; SNG Morcom -; Laffaille -. Image from CNG.
The correct resolution of the legend may be aided by consideration of the variant spellings observed.
Beneventum became a Latin colony in 268 and Suessa in 313. These coins are associated with the First Punic War. Hercules wrestling the Nemean Lion is a common enough artistic theme, known especially at the mint of Heraclea Lucaniae and occasionally at Tarentum.
Addendum. I wasn’t really happy with the probum meaning ‘approved’ as it seemed a strange thing to me to write on a coin. Out of keeping with typical legends (ethnics, magistrates, mint marks, the very occasional labeling of the image). I even tried to convince myself Probus could be an epithet or title for Mercury or something. I didn’t manage. Just a red herring. But … then I remembered the inscriptions on the Egadi rams of a roughly contemporary date.
We’ll known more once the inscriptions are published on there own, but for now the use of the probo, probare, probavi on the rams is enough to let me think probum on the coin is more plausible than I first thought.
[Disturbingly, if you google image search, ‘Beneventum Apollo Coin’, the first image that returns of the coin is hosted on some satanic-esque website obsessed with pentagrams. Reminded me of a time a student of mine unwittingly submitted a project full of images from some awful white power website. Appropriation of the past to support modern ideologies is a dangerous thing, especially on the intertubes.]
Communities issuing aes grave with Latin Colonies highlighted (missing Volceii, sorry). Map cannot capture the numerous types not attributed to any specific location or group. Map created using AWMC: à-la-carte Map to which it links. [FYI – runs best for me in firefox rather than other browsers.]Crawford CMRR discusses the cast currencies of Italy in five groups (p. 43-46):
an as of about 300g maybe from 1st Punic War: Tarquinii, Tuder, Reate, Praeneste, Carseoli, and Firmum
a heavier as (350-450g): Ariminum, Hadria, Vestini, another unidentified mint maybe Asculum Picenum
an as of about 300g followed by reductions probably from 2nd Punic War: Luceria and Venusia
reduced as from rebel communities during 2nd Punic War: Volceii and Meles
issues of Etruria and Umbria (including Iguvium on map above) on 200g standard from time of 1st Punic War
He summarizes circulation and weight standard thus:
From L. Ambrosini, ‘Un donario fittile con elefanti e Cerbero dal santuario di Portonaccio a Veio’. Image links to PDF with more images and references.
I ended up at this article by way of this coin type from Etruria:
ETRURIA. Val di Chiana. Æ 18 mm (4.68 gm). Head of an African right / Elephant right with bell hanging from neck, Etruscan letter below. SNG ANS 36. SNG Morcom 44. HN Italy 69. From catalogue: Commentary on this enigmatic issue has focused on the significance of the elephant, which appears to be Indian rather than African. This zoological observation seems to rule out a reference to the Carthaginian elephants and thus poses a challenge to dating this coin to the time of the Second Punic War. Yet E.S.G. Robinson, in NC 1964, pp. 47–48, proposed an interpretation that overcomes these difficulties. He submitted that the association of the elephant with an African head, probably representing the animal’s driver, points to an African origin. Rather than dating the coin issue to the time of Hannibal’s invasion, Robinson drew attention to the disaffection of Rome’s Etruscan allies in 208–207, centered on the town of Arretium, and suggested that the coin types expressed the seditious hope that Hasdrubal would arrive to reinforce his brother. In these historical circumstances, the elephant was a symbol, perhaps copied from earlier coin types, rather than a portrayal from life.
Baglione, M.P. 1976. Su alcune serie parallele di bronzo coniato. In Contributi introduttivi allo studio della monetazione etrusca.Atti Convegno Napoli 1975: 153-180. Roma.
Baglione records 158 known specimens at that time, the vast majority in public collections. Baglione endorses (if I’ve read the Italian right!) Robinson’s dating and notes that W. V Harris, Rome in Etruria and Umbria (Oxford 1971) p. 140 also follows Robinson’s interpretation. I’m wary of dating by type alone and would like some new good hoard or excavation evidence to confirm this hypothesis. I’d also think a little die study might be of use to get an idea of the size of the issue: it seems at first glance that we’re looking at multiple dies for each letter under the elephant (four different Etruscan letters are well attested) and a number of obverse dies. Elephants do appear elsewhere in the Second Punic War on the coinage of rebelling Italic communities. The most impressive example being the aes grave of Meles in Samnium which copy the Barcid silver coinage (Robinson, Essays Mattingly, 1956: 40, fig. 3A; HN Italy 441-42 (but no illustrations)).
I’m more interested in the unusual votive offering. Ambrosini draws the parallel with the famous plate in the Villa Giulia (inv. 23949) with a depiction of a war elephant and her cub. There is a second similar plate from maybe Sardinia that I can’t put my hand on a reference at this moment. from Corsica:
Roma mediorepubblicana; Aspetti culturali di Roma e del Lazio nei secoli IV e III a.C (Rome 1973), no. 33 = Villa Guilia and no. 34 = Corsica.
The votive offering confirms the theme of elephant and cub in a military context. That, of course, made me think of that passage in Dionysius that I quoted in a previous post about how the Roman’s wounded a cub to gain a tactical advantage over Pyrrhus’ use of elephants.
ANS Specimens of Ariminum Cast Bronze. Click image form more details.
It strikes me that that the cast bronze types of Ariminum bear a marked similarity to the types of the Roman currency bars. Ariminum became a Latin colony in 268 BC and the cast bronze dates to sometime after that date. The one type I couldn’t find to illustrate has a shield as the reverse type. Its as seems to be heavier than the Roman (350-400g) and it divides the as into a base-10, instead of base-12 fractions. It shares these characteristics with Hadria and Vestini (Crawford, CMRR, p. 43 & HN Italy p. 17).
Ariminum types above all represent different denominations. [Scale can be so deceptive in online images!] Shield = quincunx, Sword and scabbard = quadrunx, trident = teruncius, dolphin = biunx, rostrum = uncia, shell = semuncia.
This suggests they were created as a series at one moment in time. Perhaps they took their inspiration from the currency bars? With the exception of the shell all of these are well known images on the bars. Below is a collection of images to refresh your memory. And one more specimen of Ariminum, the trident of which better parallels the bars.
There is nothing that comes to mind that would preclude the possibility that the shield and sword currency bars were made at the same time as the naval types…
You may know ancient Ariminum better by its modern name Rimini.
I’m fond of Croatia for many reasons. Great landscape. Great memories. One more reason to love the country is their freely accessible database of scientific publications: Hrcak. Here’s what a simple search for ‘coins’ brings back. Most publications are in Croatian, but with English abstracts, some are bilingual. Particularly interesting are the hoard reports…
ETRURIA. Val di Chiana. Ca. 208–207 BC. SNG ANS 36. SNG Morcom 44. HN Italy 69.
