Historia numorum : a manual of Greek numismatics / by Barclay V. Head.

  • Barclay Vincent Head
Date:
1887
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Historia numorum : a manual of Greek numismatics / by Barclay V. Head. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    60/908 page 56
    Gallia. Religious character of early coin-types (B.M. Cat. Gr. C. Italy, p. 109) which are perhaps the nummi alluded to by Aristotle (see p. 55). Mommsen, however (Hist. Mon. Rom., i. p. 141), is of opinion that the Tarentine v6p.os is the didrachm of circ. 127 grs., and it must be confessed that the type of Taras on the dolphin is far more frequent on the didrachm than on the smaller coins1. Proceeding from Populonia in a north-westerly direction along the Ligurian coast we reach the shores of Gaul without coming upon a single town which was in the most ancient period (of which alone we are now speaking) acquainted with the use of money, or perhaps we should say which struck coins of its own, until we reach the Phocaean colony of Massalia or Massilia. In the neighbourhood of this town there was found at Auriol in 1867 2 a hoard consisting of 2130 small Greek silver coins of archaic style, comprising in all about twenty-five different types. Smaller finds of similar coins have subsequently come to light at Volterra3 in Tuscany and on the eastern coast of Spain. These little coins are all uninscribed and cannot therefore be attributed with absolute certainty. One point, however, seems clear, viz. that from the great variety of their types they can hardly be the coinage of any single town. They are probably the currency of a loose kind of monetary confederacy of which the Phocaean towns of Yelia in Italy, Massilia in Gaul, and perhaps Emporiae in Spain were members. The weight standard to which these interesting little coins belong is the Phoenician, of 'which the stater weighed about 220 grs. or somewhat less. They are for the most part 12ths or obols (wt. 18 grs.). The coast of Catalonia appears to be the limit towards the West beyond which the use of coins did not penetrate until a considerably later period than that for which I have hitherto spoken. § 10. Greek Coin-tyj)es. The stamp, device, or, as it is conveniently termed, the type, placed by authority on metal intended to circulate as money, was not originally, or indeed at any time primarily, an indication of a given quantity or value, as Aristotle imagined it to have been—6 yap xaPaKThp iredr] rovnoirov oTyinov (Polit. i. 3. 14). It was simply the signet or guarantee of the issuer, a solemn affirmation on the part of the State that the coin was of just weight and good metal, a calling of the gods to witness against fraud. Such being its object it was of course necessary that the coin-type should consist of a generally intelligible device, which might appeal to the eyes of all as the sacred emblem of the god whose dreaded name was thus invoked to vouch for the good faith of the issuer. Hence the religious character of all early coin-types. Just as the word OEOI frequently stands at the head of treaties engraved on stone, so the em- blems of the gods stand conspicuous on the face of the coins. 1 See Num. Chron., 1881, p. 296. 3 Rev. Num., N. S. xiv. pp. 348-360. 3 Periodico di Numismatica, 1872, p. 208.
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3