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ISAW Papers 7.15 (2014)

Coinage and Numismatic Methods. A Case Study of Linking a Discipline

Andrew Meadows and Ethan Gruber1

1. The Opportunity

As a type of evidence for the ancient world, coinage is unique. Coins are monetary objects, and thus a key element in modern attempts to reconstruct the workings of the ancient economy. For example, through the process of ‘die-study’ it is possible to determine with some degree of accuracy how many dies were used to strike a given coinage. This provides us with a way to quantify ancient monetary production. Since coins can also be attributed to particular rulers or cities with some degree of certainty, this makes it possible to ascertain the monetary output of different cities, kingdoms and empires, and to compare them with one another. There now exists a substantial body of scholarship devoted to the estimation of size of production, but comparatively little as yet to its broad analysis or representation in interactive media such as timelines or maps.2

Coins are also archaeological objects in that they have find spots. Coins within archaeological contexts have much to tell excavators about the contexts they are digging, but also more broadly about the monetary profile of the site they are excavating compared to others of similar or different types; from multiple sites a regional history may emerge (see e.g. Reece, 1982). But find spots also give coins a trajectory. If we know where a coin was made and where it was found, we have evidence for movement, connectivity and economic circulation (see Map 1).

Map 1. Hoard find spots of coins minted at Alabanda in Caria. From http://nomisma.org/id/alabanda.

Few archaeological objects from antiquity can be mapped from source to deposition with such certainty as coins, and yet again we are only beginning to exploit the possibilities of this evidence in analytical and representational tools. Moreover, with the advent of the metal detector, individual coin finds and their recording are no longer confined to excavation material. The Portable Antiquities Scheme in the United Kingdom, for example, now has recorded find spots for some 283,000 coins (Pett this volume; see Map 2). Already it is leading to new works of synthesis (e.g. Leins, 2012; Walton, 2012), but again work is just beginning. Only when it becomes possible to compare data sets across multiple modern source countries will it become possible to write the larger monetary history of ancient imperial spaces. With other coin-finds projects in other countries beginning to come online (see e.g. http://www.ecfn.fundmuenzen.eu/Partners.html), it will not be long before the quantity of such material available enters the realm of Big Data.

Map 2. Coin finds in the UK PAS database (http://finds.org.uk/database/search/map/objecttype/COIN)

Unlike most other forms of archaeological evidence, coins are official objects: their designs and inscriptions can tell us about the intentions of their issuers and, perhaps, the preconceptions of their users (See eg. Fig. 1). The iconographic and epigraphic repertoire of ancient coinage is a huge, and substantially un-mined resource for examining areas from local religion to imperial economic policy; from individual political ambition to communal statements of identity. And there is scope here, as recent work has shown (Kemmers, 2006; von Kaenel and Kemmers, 2009), to marry the evidence from findspots to that of the iconography of the objects, to expose patterns of administration invisible from other sources.

Fig. 1. Reverse of a denarius of Augustus depicting a Cippus inscribed: S(enatus) P(opulus)Q(ue) R(omanus) IMP(eratori) CAE(sari) QVOD V(iae) M(unitae) S(unt) EX EA P(ecunia) Q(uae) I(ussu) S(enatus) AD A(erarium) D(elata) E(st). (American Numismatic Society:http://numismatics.org/collection/1944.100.38334)

Finally, there is the sheer quantity of material that survives. As we have already noted, the United Kingdom PAS scheme after 16 years of recording contains information on 283,000 coins, and the rate of discovery, and thus growth of material is not yet showing signs of abatement. This is just one country. Initiatives exist to record individual finds as well as hoards in numerous other European countries. Moreover, the collections of Museums - both local and national - raise the numbers of coins available for study literally into the millions (Callataÿ 1997b). To these sources we must add also those coins that appear in commerce every year, to a large extent since c. 2000 online (eg. Fig. 2).3

Fig. 2 The first of 101,546 results for a search for ‘denarius’ in the Coinarchives Pro subscription website (http://pro.coinarchives.com/a/results.php?search=denarius&firmid=&s=0&upcoming=0&results=100)

Numismatic material thus presents an exciting set of opportunities to address questions unanswerable through other source material, and to do so with substantial quantities of data, a significant amount of which is already available online in a variety of forms.

2. The problems

However, in the sheer volume of data, and its location in a variety of institutional and non-institutional settings lie two of the the principal barriers to its exploitation. Many, many coins are described online, but they are described in different systems, in different formats, according to different standards, with different aims and in different languages (compare figs. 3.a-d).

Fig. 3a. Tetradrachm in the name of Alexander the Great, mint of Alexandria. Bode Museum, Berlin, online catalogue (IKMK). http://www.smb.museum/ikmk/object.php?id=18202968
Fig. 3b. Tetradrachm in the name of Alexander the Great, mint of Alexandria. ANS, New York, online catalogue (MANTIS). http://numismatics.org/collection/1944.100.35623
Fig. 3c. Tetradrachm in the name of Alexander the Great, mint of Alexandria. Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, online catalogue (Gallica). ark:/12148/btv1b8476481p http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb417462537