Coin Weight and coin clipping
This started as a discussion of the first
ancient coins. Then became a dialog about monetary control and exchange
polices. Eventually it morphed into a discussion about the use of coin weights,
speciafically "exagium solidi" and then a discussion on clipping of coins.
================================================================================
Is there any evidence that Archimedes' Principle was used in coin exchanges
i.e., weight in air vs. weight in water, etc.?
Chamiabac
In theory it could have been done. In practice, I doubt
it could have been done in ancient times, with the major obstacle being a set of
scales accurate
enough. Anyone that collects ancient weights, will know that
they tend to vary considerably in weight, at least by todays scientific
standards.
Most ancient coin weights worked on the principly that
anything over a given weight was acceptable, and this is best illustrated by
Exagium solidi weights of the later Roman and early Byzantine
period. The official standard weight of a solidus was about 4.45 grams, and
specimens
were normally between 4.28 and 4.52 grams.
This Exagium solidi is only 3.98 grams, but might be missing
a little weight due to corrosion :
http://www.coinarchives.com/a/lotviewer.php?LotID=57172&AucID=61&Lot=1222
This one is in pretty good shape, and so probably close to
original weight 4.09 grams :
http://www.coinarchives.com/a/lotviewer.php?LotID=21849&AucID=23&Lot=649
This one, at 4.23 grams, is about as heavy as I ever see
them :
http://www.coinarchives.com/a/lotviewer.php?LotID=99047&AucID=105&Lot=663
This principle that if it is heavier than X, it is
probably genuine is actually a very simply version of Archimedes' Principle if
the person using the
weight is familar with the coin and can say to himself before
weighing it "the diameter and thickness feel right", because once he knows the
volume
(diameter and thickness) is right, if the weight is right the
density is right. I buy and sell modern gold coins on a daily basis, and I do
exactly the
same thing nearly every day.
However, while this is good enough to spot a gold plated
bronze fouree solidus, it is not good enough to differentiate a 95% silver coin
from 80% silver
coin. To do that, you need very accurate scales and actually
weight the item in air and water, which simply improves the volume calculation
from an
estimate to something accurate.
Scales good enough to do that for a coin weighing only a few
grams, are easy to come by today, but not so easy in 200 BC.
Robert Kokotailo
Is it established that the exagium
solidus was used as a weight standard? Plugs other than gold might well have
corroded, but why would they have been used?
Chamiabac
There can
really be no doubt as to what exagium solidus were used for because they
are inscribed "exagivm solidi" :
http://www.coinarchives.com/a/lotviewer.php?LotID=125129&AucID=144&Lot=669
which
translates as "to weight solidi".
Fouree solidi
are what they were trying to spot, which are known with cores of
bronze, lead and silver, none of which even come close to the density
of gold. Today you could do it with platinum or tungsen, but in
ancient times those were not available. A fouree solidus made with even a
lead core, will have to be significantly thicker or larger than a
official gold one, if the weight is to be right. Or if the same size
as an official one it has to be considerably underweight.
I would guess
that in the vast majority of cases fouree solidi were spotted by
feel (if you handle gold coins regularly, you get good at it), and the exagium solidi were only used confirm things.
Robert Kokotailo
Hi Robert
You seem to say that the errors found in the exagium solidi were due to inaccuracies in ancient scales?
This seems to me just not credible. Early coins are often far more consistent, and accurate, than early weights. How could this happen if the sole source of error in the weights was the lack of good scales? A more likely reason is that your:
<<exagium solidi were only used confirm things>>
is incorrect - and the weights were in fact rather frequently used to falsify things.
Alternatively, as you also seem to suggest - early weights do sometimes exist to establish a separate lowest legal tender weight limit - but in that case they should well conform to that well defined lowest legal tender limit.
Turning to more general matters - IMO the treatment of weight in the Roman period is poor in all numismatic texts I have looked at. A piece by Crawford seems to be widely favoured - but I think it disappointing - I will cite the ref. if anyone is interested. As I recall he fails to mention the fundamentally important link between Roman coin weight and Attic weight. Nor - in common with all other Roman specialist I have seen - does he cite much in the way of textual support for his conclusions.
Can anyone recommend a well researched piece on the general topic?
best
rob
Hi Robert and Robert,
Excuse me for butting in on this two way discussion.
The weight of a Solidus was supposed to have been 1/72 of a Roman Pound.
That is 4.48g (or 4.55g, depending where you read it). I have two solidi of
the period and both weigh in at 4.5g. My scales only read to one decimal
point, but that figure would just about be spot on. The "exagivm solidi"
that Rob K has pointed out weighs 4.06g, which is approximately 11% light
compared with the correct weight for a solidus. Obviously this object is an
official piece, perhaps used by an official money changer. It would make
sense to me if the weight represents the lower limit that was acceptable.
After all if you weighed coins at the exact weight standard there would
bound to be a few that were light due to wear perhaps (but none heavier!),
and you would then either have to reject them or have to determine how much
they are underweight.
For comparison I have two solidi weights. They are simple rectangular pieces
of bronze with markings scratched on them. One weighs 4.48g and one weighs
4.61g. In other words around about the correct weight for a solidus.
Obviously these weights were used in the market place. I should imagine
traders would use their own judgement for any coins that didn't quite make
the correct weight.
I think we have had a discussion before about the link between the weights
of Roman coins and Attic or other weights. Roman coin weights are anything
but consistent and accurate either between issues or between individual
coins (with the exception of the solidus). And of course there were changes
in weight along the way, not to mention de-basement of the silver. So apart
from the earliest period, any examination of weights will simply reveal..
well not very much really. Interesting from a purely physical
coin-manufacturing point of view, but not evidence of links to other coinage
standards.
Peter D
Hi Peter
Thanks for your thoughts. Off the top of my head I can think of
three medieval (probable) lower weight limits for silver coin. At
Venice it was 10% low on the matapan, at London (briefly) 12.5% low
on the penny, at Baghdad 2.82g/2.92g = 3.4% low on the dirhem. So
11% sounds a big allowance for gold to me. Added to that the three
weights Robert posted all varied considerably in weight. So its
just a guess but I tend to smell a rat here tho' its hard to come
to any firm conclusions on such a small sample. It crosses my mind
that these might even be specimens with the edge filed to cheat the
scale which were thrown away into the mud when the official weight
checker appeared at the end of the street :-)
<<weights of Roman coins and Attic or other weights. Roman coin
weights are >>
I think we have to differentiate between weight standards and the
actual weight of coins here. For instance, the weight of the penny
dropped dramatically in England over the last 900 years, but the
penny weight has not appreciably changed, as far as we can tell.
We have a stone weight from the palace of Darius that fixes his mina
at very close to 500g. Attic weight taken from coins and Greek
weights, seems to be very close to 7/8ths of Persian with a mina of
about 437g and a drachm of about 4.37g less 2% (actual) making
costs for coin thus 4.29g. The Romans seem to have used Attic as a
16oz weight, but figured their money pound as 12 ounces, thus about
327g.
The relationship between Roman and Attic was derived from documents,
as well as weights and coins, by Agricola (1495-1555) but his text
has not been reprinted in recent times nor translated to my
knowledge. Nor is there any full account of the ancient and
medieval sources he consulted. That was the basis of my complaint
in the earlier message
best
rob
>You seem to say that the errors found in the exagium solidi were due
>to inaccuracies in ancient scales?
I never said there were errors on the exagium solidi. I assume they
are exactly the weight they were intended to be. But I did say the
scales they used were not that accurate, which will be addressed further down).
What I did say, was that ancient scales (at least the small ones a
merchant might carry around with him) were not accurate enough to do
specific gravity tests on items weighing less than 5 grams, and so
their methods of forgery detection had to be a little more simplistic.
Let me elaborate a little :
Density of gold is 19.3 g/cc.
Density of lead is 11.4 g/cc
Density of silver is 10.5 g/cc
Density of copper is 9.0 g/cc
What would happen if you made a fouree solidus with even a lead core,
which is by weight 95% lead core, and 5% gold foil on surface. You
end up with a finshed coin with a density of about 11.8 g/cc, or 61%
of the density of a solid gold coin. If that coin is made to the
weight of a solidus at 4.45 grams, the low density means it's volume
will be about 39% larger than a a solidus, being either broader,
thicker, or some combination there of.
I would assume that you handled 1 pound coins fairly often, and would
bet that if you picked up a pound coin of 39% greater volume than a
normal one, you would know instantly it was wrong. I have no doubt
the merchants in 500 AD could do this just as instantly with a solidus.
If the forger made his coin the right volume, the lower density would
mean his coin would only weight 2.77 grams, and again, anyone used to
hefting 4.45 gram solidi would know instantly that the coin was wrong.
The problem for the counterfeiter, was a balancing act where neither
the weight, no the volume, was a dead give away when simply hefting
the coin on one's hand. About as close as they could get, for a gold
covered lead flan, to make coins in the 3.75 to 4 gram range, where
by neither the extra volume nor low weight were enough set off alarm bells.
As a result, a merchant could simply feel a coin which told him it
was about the correct volume, and quickly to check to be certain it
was well over 4 grams, and he could have a good feeling of confidence
in the coin.
The merchant has another problem, in that some official solidii are
only about 4.30 grams, so if his weight he checks the coins against
is of the official standard 4.45 gram standard, many perfectly good
coins will fail.
Thus with an average weight between 4 and 4.3 grams, exergum solidi
are made to a standard that is perfectly suited to the ob for which
there were intended.
As for their scales, ancient pocket scales for weighing coins are
known as Tumbrell scales and are fairly common. I have bought and
sold two of them in recent years, and seen many others. For some
reason I cannot find an illustration of one on the Internet, but if
you have a copy of BENET'S ARTEFACTS OF ENGLAND AND THE UNITED
KINGDOM (SECOND EDITION) a medieval set is illustrated on page 519
(item M18-0303), and ancient are nearly identical. Have a look and
you will how simple of device these are, and how they are certainly
not manufactured to todays scientific accuracies.
Thus I do not believe there is any mistake in the weight of the
exergum solidi, they are made to exactly the weight standard meeded
to accomplish the job for which there were intended.
>This seems to me just not credible. Early coins are often far more
>consistent, and accurate, than early weights. How could this happen
>if the sole source of error in the weights was the lack of good
>scales? A more likely reason is that your:
><<exagium solidi were only used confirm things>>
>is incorrect - and the weights were in fact rather frequently used to
>falsify things.
I have addressed this above.
>Alternatively, as you also seem to suggest - early weights do
>sometimes exist to establish a separate lowest legal tender weight
>limit - but in that case they should well conform to that well defined
>lowest legal tender limit.
Do we actually know what the lowest legal tender weight of a solidus
was. Perhaps that is recorded somewhere, but I have not seen
it. But if there is one, that only established a lowest legal
standard at one point in time, which need not hold true for other
times, as shown by the discussion a couple of months ago about the
cluster of solidi around 3.8 grams during what I believe was the time
of Theodosius II (the coins were clipped to that weight, but there
are so many of them recorded that it suggests they were accepted at
that weight somewhere).
Robert Kokotailo
Hi Robert
I do not think we have enough info to sort out what these exagium
solidi were used for but it seems to me you are being somewhat
selective with the possibilities in front of us, in order to favour
a pet hypothesis that is inherently implausible
<<What I did say, was that ancient scales (at least the small ones a
merchant might carry around with him) were not accurate enough to do
specific gravity tests on items weighing less than 5 grams, and so
their methods of forgery detection had to be a little more
simplistic >>
Why do you suppose that merchants would only use portable scales in
connection with base metal forgery detection? Its true that if the
coins they accepted were made of lead then they would lose all their
money, but if they are gold but short weight they still lose a
significant part of it. Human nature being what it is ancient
merchants surely did not want to lose anything at all?
<< The merchant has another problem, in that some official solidii
are only about 4.30 grams, so if his weight he checks the coins
against is of the official standard 4.45 gram standard, many
perfectly good coins will fail.>>
If the guy was at all competent as a merchant he would be well on
top of all such details
<<As for their scales, ancient pocket scales for weighing coins are
known as Tumbrell scales and are fairly common. I have bought and
sold two of them in recent years, and seen many others. For some
reason I cannot find an illustration of one on the Internet, but if
you have a copy of BENET'S ARTEFACTS OF ENGLAND AND THE UNITED
KINGDOM (SECOND EDITION) a medieval set is illustrated on page 519
(item M18-0303), and ancient are nearly identical. Have a look and
you will how simple of device these are, and how they a re certainly
not manufactured to today's scientific accuracy's>>
Trying to guess the accuracy of an ancient balance by looking at a
picture of it does not seem like a good way forward to me. I think
we need to inject some facts into this discussion here. Skinner at
the London Science Museum did a series of experiments with typical
scales from the Roman period and figured their inaccuracy on 100
grains to be 1 grain. Thus on 4.5g that is less than +/- 0.05g.
This checks out against Arab glass weights (which cannot easily be
tampered with), and with well manufactured ancient and medieval
coins themselves. The Oxford scientist Greaves took a balance to
Egypt in 1640 which he claimed was accurate to 1/80th grain that
is 0.0008g. I see no reason to suppose such accuracy was not
attainable in Roman times.
Secondly the exagium solidi are more appropriate for use with a
two pan balance than with most forms of rocker scales. Being made
by what amounts to a scientific establishment of the day we ought
to expect them to meet at least the easily attainable standards of
the day thus about 1% out. The suggestion that they failed
because it was not necessary, or was not possible to meet these
elementary standards of accuracy seems implausible to me.
best
rob
At 12:14 PM 1/14/2008, ewcabcxyz wrote:
>Hi Robert
>
>I do not think we have enough info to sort out conclusively what these exagium
solidi were used for but it seems to me you are
>being somewhat selective with the possibilities in front of us, in order to
favour a pet hypothesis that is inherently implausible
I don't thing I am doing that. They have the portrait of the Emperors on most
of them,
suggesting some type of official status. They have an inscription that means
"to weight solidi"
on them, which tells us without any questions what so ever what they were
intended
for. Together, I just do see any reason to doubt there were official exagium
solidi weights. The
fact that none of them weight more than 4.28 grams (at least to the best of my
knowledge)
tells is a great deal about how they were used (ie. to say anything heavier than
this is good).
That is not to say some specimens of them were made un-official for purposes to
defraud, but
using those to say that all them were bad, would be the equivalent of saying no
coin is genuine, because counterfeits exist.
><<What I did say, was that ancient scales (at least the small ones a merchant
might carry around with him) were not accurate enough to do
>specific gravity tests on items weighing less than 5 grams, and so their
methods of forgery detection had to be a little more
>simplistic >>
>
>Why do you suppose that merchants would only use portable scales in connection
with base metal forgery detection? Its true that if the
>coins they accepted were made of lead then they would lose all their money, but
if they are gold but short weight they still lose a
>significant part of it. Human nature being what it is ancient merchants
surely did not want to lose anything at all?
In my opinion, about least 10% of the Roman silver denarii that exist to day,
and are accepted today as official, are ancient
counterfeits of reasonably good silver and style, and were just as accepted in
ancient times as they are today. I don't doubt the same is true
for the gold coins, and to put it simply "some counterfeiters got away with it".
Basically I think we agree on many aspects of what was going on, and differ
mostly how much trouble the ancient merchants could, or would, go
through attempting to detect them.
In most cases, these fakes are not as much short of weight, as they are short of
purity. Remember that we are talking about coins that only weight
4.5 grams or less. To do you specific gravity test that could tell a 98% gold
coin, from a 88% gold coin each of slightly different weights, you need three
things.
First, you need a very accurate set of scales. For the measurement to be
meaningful, you will have to be able to be accurate to the second decimal place
in grams, which actually means a scale that can weight to the third decimal
place (ie. to 0.001 grams) because you should never trust the final decimal
place
because it is rounding the one that follows that. For example, if your scale is
rated to 0.001 and you get a reading of 4.446, you only know it is somewhere
between 4.4455 and 4.4465. for exactly the same coin, if you scale is rated
0.01, than if you get a reading of 4.45, but only actually know it is between
4.455 and
4.50. If your scale is rated to 0.1, and you get a reading of 4.5, you actually
only know it is somewhere between 4.45 and 4.55. This will have
meaning below where you discuss ancient scales.
Second, you need a way to measure differences in volume, which was done by
displacement in water. The accuracy for calculating specific
gravity on a coin as small as a solidus, would have to be at least to the ml,
and probably better than that. They might have accomplished that, but I am not
certain.
Third, you need a way to do the calculations quickly. The person trying to
spend the coin is not going to want to hang around for a long time
while you did the calculations. Doing the calculations I am sure was possible,
but doing it quickly using Roman numerals and no calculators
(the jeton and reckoning table were still a few hundred years in the future)
might take a while.
I suspect he real limiting factor that made doing this impossible was the
scales, but the over all package is at best problematical that early and
not a simple as sitting there with a set of scales and beaker of water.
Archemedes did develop these principles long before this, but he was working
with a 5 or 10 pound gold crown on which measuring to a gram is
probably good enough, not a 4.5 gram coin when you need to get down to
milligrams. Also remember that modern specific gravity is based on
Archemedes principle, but has been modified. As I understand it, Archemedes did
his measurements based on the weight of the object, verses the
volume of water is displaced. Modern specific gravity is more likely to be done
by measuring weight in water vs weight in air. They amount
to the same thing, but the measurements are done slightly differently.
><< The merchant has another problem, in that some official solidii are only
about 4.30 grams, so if his weight he checks the coins
>against is of the official standard 4.45 gram standard, many perfectly good
coins will fail.>>
>
>If the guy was at all competent as a merchant he would be well on top of all
such details
I agree that they knew all the details. But that includes knowing his weights
have to be slightly below the lowest acceptable weight, or they were
useless to him. The best preserved of these weight, are never higher than about
4.28 grams, and I think that speaks for itself.
I am also 100% certain, that most merchants could pick up one the worst of the
fakes (as in farthest from the official standards) and know
instantly it was bad with no need for further testing. They could in many cases
know instantly a coin was good, with no need for further
testing, and these weights were only for the small number of coins that seemed
about right, but caused some suspicion. I doubt they would
have tested each and every coin as it came their way.
><<As for their scales, ancient pocket scales for weighing coins are known as
Tumbrell scales and are fairly common. I have bought and
>sold two of them in recent years, and seen many others. For some reason I
cannot find an illustration of one on the Internet, but if
>you have a copy of BENET'S ARTEFACTS OF ENGLAND AND THE UNITED KINGDOM (SECOND
EDITION) a medieval set is illustrated on page 519
>(item M18-0303), and ancient are nearly identical. Have a look and you will how
simple of device these are, and how they a re certainly
>not manufactured to today's scientific accuracy's>>
>
>Trying to guess the accuracy of an ancient balance by looking at a picture of
it does not seem like a good way forward to me. I think
>we need to inject some facts into this discussion here. Skinner at the London
Science Museum did a series of experiments with typical
>scales from the Roman period and figured their inaccuracy on 100 grains to be 1
grain. Thus on 4.5g that is less than +/- 0.05g.
+/- 0.05 grams means that a coin that actually weighs 4.45 grams could read on
the scale anywhere between 4.50 and 4.40 grams. Great for
saying the coin is about the right weight. Useless of calculating specific
gravity.
>This checks out against Arab glass weights (which cannot easily be tampered
with), and with well manufactured ancient and medieval
>coins themselves. The Oxford scientist Greaves took a balance to Egypt in 1640
which he claimed was accurate to 1/80th grain that
>is 0.0008g. I see no reason to suppose such accuracy was not attainable in
Roman times.
I see a problem. Precision metal working in 1640 was an entirely different
thing to precision metal working 500 AD. I do not think the two can
even be compared. On top of that, for a scale to be actually accurate to 0.0008
grams will not be that accurate unless it is on a vibration free
stand. The university where I studied 1st and 2nd year chemistry has scales
that accurate, but mounted in glass enclosures to keep out any air
currents, and sat on columns anchored in bedrock which sat in shafts where by
they did not touch the building. Anything less, and you could not
get an accurate reading with that sensitivity. Maybe you could accomplish that
with 17th century technology, but not 6th century technology.
>Secondly the exagium solidi are more appropriate for use with a two pan
balance than with most forms of rocker scales. Being made
>by what amounts to a scientific establishment of the day we ought to expect
them to meet at least the easily attainable standards of
>the day thus about 1% out. The suggestions that they failed because it was
not necessary, or was not possible, to meet these
>elementary standards of accuracy seems implausible to me.
I agree that they would work best with a balance beam. But what the rocker
scales tell us is that rocker scales were used and so considered good
enough. But I never said the weights failed to work. I said they worked
perfectly for the purpose for which they were designed, which
required them to weight slightly less than the minimum acceptable weight of the
coins they were used with. In the context I used, anything
between about 4 and 4.3 grams would do the job of allowing you to say about a
given solidus "this one seems right".
Robert Kokotailo
Solidi were circulating by weight but surely not as bullion? A merchant
accepting a solidus would need to ensure only that the coin was within the
accepted weight range and was not a counterfeit. He could hardly expect the
purchaser to turn out his purse while he, the merchant, selected the
heaviest one. Even if he did, and he choose a nice heavy coin, the gain would be
shortlived. Ultimately the merchant would use the solidus to buy
something himself, so his nominal gain would be lost.
Peter D
One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is the possibility
that the exagium solidi were really legal minimum weight
standards, below which weight a coin could not be lawfully passed as current
money.
Before coins were struck in collars and given reeded edges, "clipping" was
always a significant problem despite the very severe penalties inflicted on
those detected doing it.
Dave Welsh
www.classicalcoins.com
>One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is the possibility
that the exagium solidi were really legal minimum weight standards, below which
weight a coin could not be lawfully passed as current money.
>
I did actually mention that at some stage in this rather tortuous thread!
>Before coins were struck in collars and given reeded edges, "clipping" was
always a significant problem despite the very severe penalties inflicted on
those detected doing it.
Clipping was mainly a problem with silver siliqua mostly in late Roman Britain.
It just so happens that I have in front of me "The late Roman Gold and Silver
Coins from the Hoxne Treasure" by Peter Guest. Since this treasure is now
effectively the largest corpus of late Roman silver and gold, it makes
interesting reading and and provides a good analysis of the clipping phenomenon.
If you can't get the book there is a very good summary here:
http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/hisar/resources/HoxneSummary.pdf
Peter D
I don't think you really intended to imply that clipping mainly occurred with
silver siliquae mostly in late Roman Britain, however that is what your remarks
below imply. I can assure you that clipping was by no means confined to Britain,
to silver coins or even to Roman coins.
Dave Welsh
www.classicalcoins.com
>One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is the
possibility that the exagium solidi were really legal minimum weight standards,
below which weight a coin could not be lawfully passed as current money.
That is a pretty good theory, and might be correct to a degree. But the
significant weight variation we see on these weights, is in conflict with it.
>
>Before coins were struck in collars and given reeded edges, "clipping" was
always a significant problem despite the very severe penalties inflicted on
those detected doing it.
You can find any number of books that would support you on this. But in my
experience the coins themselves do not support it other than within a very
narrow range of medieval coins.
I have personally physically examined 10's of thousands of ancient coins,
probably on the order of 500,000 over the past 40 years, and have yet to
see anything that would suggest clipping of ancient silver or gold coins
actually occurred on any significant scale. I can think of two exceptions to
this :
1) 4th and 5th century AD silique are often clipped to 1/2 silique standard
during the 5th century, and there is evidence it was done officially in some
regions (mostly Britain, Gaul and Germany).
2) A series of Theodosius II solidi clipped to below 4 grams was discussed on
this list recent, with the possibility it might have been done with official
sanction in some locallized area, but no good evidence to show who might have
sanctioned it.
But aside for those two instances, I do not think there were 20 ANCIENT coins
out of the 10's of thousands I have seen, that showed evidence of clipping. I
do not recall every seeing a clipped denarius or tetradrachm.
As for medieval coins, it is clear that clipping occurred in some instances, but
it was probably not think.
The problem is that many medieval flans are cutting ("clipping") metal from
sheets of silver with shears, so every coin struck on a flan made that way has
clipped edges right out of the mint. The term "clipping" is actually used to
described coins from which metal is removed to steal silver after they
were issued, and we can only be certain that was done when a coin is below the
acceptable weight standard for the coin. It is possible some coins made heavier
than normal were clipped slightly and are now just at the minimum weight
standard, but I don't see how you can prove that happened.
I have weighed a lot of medieval coins, some of which had the appearance of
being clipped (cut edges, and slightly small flans) but which were still well
within acceptable weight standards (just slightly thick flans), and I believe
they were issued that way.
I had a King Offa penny recently that looked like it had been clipped nearly all
the way around the edge and which anyone just looking at the coin would have
said was clipped, but it weighed 1.31 grams which places it easily in the
heaviest 10% of all Offa pennies. I suspect it was struck on a over
weight flan, and was adjusted for weight at the mint, possibly even before the
coin was struck.
As such, I believe "clipping" was not practiced much, if at all, relative to
ancient coins. While I accept it was done to medieval coins, I suspect it was
not nearly as prevalent a practice as most people think.
Robert Kokotailo
We were discussing Roman solidi, which is why I restricted my remarks to Roman
coinage. Naturally there were other examples of clipping, most notably in the
Middle Ages and later.
Of course, clipping or filing of the edges of coins was a danger at any time or
place. However, the only large scale, systematic clipping of coins during the
Roman period, that I am aware of, was that of the siliqua in (mainly, but not
entirely) Roman Britain.
The book on the Hoxne treasure that I mentioned provides evidence of this and
also provides useful information on the weights of solidi. Out of 14,565 siliqua,
only 212 were unclipped. They also showed evidence of progressive clipping over
time. In contrast, only 2 out of 60 Light Miliarenses show signs of clipping.
Of the 580 Solidi found, the vast majority are at, or very close to the correct
weight (4.48g), or even slightly higher. These come from a period of 35 years,
so were not one batch straight from the mint. Only three are seriously
under-weight. The author states that these three are official but that "the
coins show traces of scratching round their edges which may have been produced
by careful filing and hammering".
Perhaps for the benefit of the original thread, it would be of interest to give
the weights of these solidi. The three under-weight ones were 3.87,
4.00 and 4.02g (interesting that the "exagium solidi" quoted by Rob K was
4.01g!). The rest:
4.10-4.19g 0
4.20-4.29g 4
4.30-4.39g 22
4.40-4.49g 415
5.50-4.59g 97
Peter D
Hi Peter
Many thanks for a really fact packed mail
I think we have to distinguish blatant large scale clipping from small scale
tampering with coins.
Blatant large scale clipping is seen in early Islam and at times in medieval and
early modern Europe, but is far less common in the ancient world. I do not
think it ever happened in India. It seems to me likely to be a kind of
political act - a giant tax evasion scheme involving a big part of the
population
Small scale tampering by fraudsters was however likely going on in the ancient
world according to your data - quite possibly much of the time - and it would be
really useful to get more info of this sort
In haste
Robert - thanks - will get back on yours asap
best
rob
Hi Robert
You continue to make good critical points concerning interesting topics but
its my opinion often you do not take the relevant evidence sufficiently into
account
Your write concerning the lowest legal tender theory that
<< the significant weight variation we see on these (exagium solidi)
weights, is in conflict with it.>>
I completely agree with you on this. So we just have two hypotheses on the
table at present. Yours they were very incompetently made, since only to be
used for rooting out debased and/or plated base metal fakes.
But when it is so easy to make the exagium solidi to an accurate weight why
not just do so? Added to this the traditional method of testing for debasement
is the touchstone, and for plated fakes to punch them, or file the edge.
Traditional jewellers etc just do not tend to use the density estimating
procedures you discuss to my knowledge.
I agree my own suggestion is nearly as troubling that at least two of the
three specimens you list were made or tampered with to give fraudulent
readings. But for sure weights always have been tampered with to some extent -
so some statistical quirk is entirely possible due to the small sample. The
only way forward it seems to me is to get access to a bigger sample. It would
be disappointing to believe that Roman specialists have not already done this
so I repeat my request to the group for references to previous academic work in
this area.
Turning now to you comments on clipped Sasanid coins you write
<<There is a strong possibility that they were also officially clipped by HUNNIC
tribes in the later 7th and 8th century AD,>>
Firstly I know of no evidence that once they had left the mint any ancient
or medieval coinage was thereafter officially clipped. And certainly not the
Sasanid issues - which as i recall are commonly found in hoards mixed with Arab-Sas,
Omayyad and even Abbasid dirhems within the borders of Ancient Persia.
So what evidence do you have that these coins were officially clipped? And why
on earth by HUNNIC tribes?
best
rob
>Hi Robert
>
>You continue to make good critical points concerning interesting topics but
its my opinion often you do not take the relevant evidence sufficiently into
account
>Your write concerning the lowest legal tender theory that
><< the significant weight variation we see on these (exagium solidi) weights,
is in conflict with it.>>
>
>I completely agree with you on this. So we just have two hypotheses on the
table at present. Yours they were very incompetently made, since only to be
used for rooting out debased and/or plated base metal fakes.
>
>But when it is so easy to make the exagium solidi to an accurate weight why
not just do so?
I am not certain exactly what you are saying there.
If you are asking, why were they not made to the "official" weight standard of
4.45 grams, I explained in detail why a weight made to that standard would be
useless to weighing solidi to determine if they were official or not, because
many official ones were below that weight.
If you are saying you understand why they have to be below 4.30 grams to be of
use (the minimum weight official ones in good condition usually show up at), but
are asking why they differ in weight so much, if you go back to me original post
where I linked to a number of examples, you will see I commented on at least
one of then that was heavily patinated, and may have lost some of it's
original weight. But I also explained in deal in my later posts, how weights
down to about 4.0 grams would do the job for which I believe they were
used, and so absolute consistency was not necesary.
> Added to this the traditional method of testing for debasement is the
touchstone, and for plated fakes to punch them, or file the edge. Traditional
jewellers etc just do not tend to use the density estimating procedures you
discuss to my knowledge.
I use touchstones often because I sometimes deal in used Jewellery, and there
are at least a couple of list members who have been to my store and watched me
use one. A touchstone works pretty good for telling 24K from 18K, and 18K from
14k, and 14K from 10K (ie. large differences) but not so good for telling 24K
from
22K (ie small differences). I am not saying it cannot be done, but it is not as
easy as you think I even most of the jewellers I now could not do it. But
there is another problem with this theory, which is that when you test something
with a touch stone it leaves a mark. If solidi were being regularly
tested with touch stones, every solidus would have evidence clearly visible on
it's edges to show it was done. You might have to take my word for it if you do
not have a couple of hundreds coins on hand to examine, but I have seen that
many examples, and those types are marks are not seen on them.
With a touchstone you can easily determine if an item is gold plated by
electro-plating, because the plating is so thin you can rub through it. But the
modern equivalent of ancient foil gold fouree making technique is called the
"rolled gold" technique, which was used widely for watch cases and some
jewellery until about the 1930's. Having attempted to do so, I can tell you
that a touch stone cannot be used to tell rolled gold from solid gold, because
the gold foil is too thick. However, it will allow
you to estimate the purity of the gold foil.
As for the idea of merchants filing the and punching solidi to tell solid from
fouree, there is no question the technique was known, because it is the same
technique we as "bankers stamps" on many coins hundreds of years earlier. I
have seen fouree solidi with punch marks and so I am sure this was sometimes
done when they were
already pretty sure the coin was a fouree. But what we do not see, are large
numbers of official solidi, with these types of punch marks on them, which I
believe shows it was not the method used on questionable but possibly official
coins.
If you have evidence to the contrary (ie. images of significant numbers of
official coins with these marks) please present it.
>I agree my own suggestion is nearly as troubling that at least two of the
three specimens you list were made or tampered with to give fraudulent readings.
I find this idea interesting, but do not exactly understand who these 4.28 (or
less) solidi weights would be used to commit fraudulent after the coins left the
mint (and if any of these weights were discovered in a context to suggest they
were only used inside of mints, I would like to see that evidence).
Inside the mints crooked mint officials could have used them to allow fraudulent
solidii to pass inspection, while they stole the extra gold. But this is, as I
said above, contingent on some evidence these weight were official weights for
use inside the mint.
I am assuming that when a weight is used to check the official status of a coin,
the person accepting the coin will supply the weight to be used. If I am right
about this (and I cannot really imagine it being otherwise) how exactly would
you commit fraud using weights consistently too low. I simply cannot see how
it would work
(if the weight were over weight, you could tell the person his coin is too light
and had to be accepted for less, but that is not what they weights would
accomplish).
> But for sure weights always have been tampered with to some extent - so some
statistical quirk is entirely possible due to the small sample.
That does, and has always gone on. But when a merchant is using an under
weight weight to commit fraud, it is always because his is weighting something
he is offering to the other person, not something he is accepting from that
person.
> The only way forward it seems to me is to get access to a bigger sample. It
would be disappointing to believe that Roman specialists have not already done
this so I repeat my request to the group for references to previous academic
work in this area.Turning now to you comments on clipped Sasanid coins you
write
<<There is a strong possibility that they were also officially clipped by HUNNIC
tribes in the later 7th and 8th century AD,>>
>Firstly I know of no evidence that once they had left the mint any ancient
or medieval coinage was thereafter officially clipped.
Evidence is a funny thing. If you mean mint documents showing that it was done
officially, I agree there is no such evidence. But when talking about official
mint records for any part of the medieval period, and especially when dealing
with the dark ages or earlier (the coins that started this discussion of later
4th and 5th
century coins), the survival rate of official documents is to tiny (for most
mints they are non-existent), that we have to look for evidence in other ways.
Peter Dearing wrote earlier :
"The book on the Hoxne treasure that I mentioned provides evidence of this and
also provides useful information on the weights of solidi. Out of 14,565 siliqua,
only 212 were unclipped. They also showed evidence of progressive clipping over
time. In contrast, only 2 out of 60 Light Miliarenses show signs of clipping. ..
Of the 580 Solidi found, the vast majority are at, or very close to the correct
weight (4.48g), or even slightly higher.
I see evidence here as follows :
98.6% of the silique are clipped.
Only 3.3% of miliarense were clipped.
Only 0.17% of solidi were clipped.
98.6% of silique clipped, while only 3.3% of miliarense clipped, is evidence
which suggests there was not endemic clipping of silver coins in general,
because if there was the miliarense should also show clipping in higher numbers
as well.
Less then 0.2% of solidi clipped tells us even more that there was no endemic
clipping of coins in general.
I don't have the exact reference in front of me, but I now that one British
researcher has looked at this in combination with other hoards, and using more
detailed information as to the weights of the coins after clipping, and come to
the conclusion that silique in that region were clipped to bring them in line
with a newer 1/2
silique denomination taking hold as the primary denomination at that time. I
see good reason to dispute that conclusion.
This combined with the above, strongly suggest the clipping of the silique could
have been done officially. In support of this, I will point out that if a full
silique is clipped to a 1/2 silique standard, and then only circulates as a 1/2
silique after that, there is not profit to the person doing the clipping.
This is all circumstantial evidence, which I personally find relatively
convincing, but when it comes to the study of ancient coins where official
records virtually do not exist, circumstantial evidence is what we have to live
with.
>And certainly not the Sasanid issues - which as i recall are commonly found in
hoards mixed with Arab-Sas, Omayyad and even Abbasid dirhems within the borders
of Ancient Persia.
>
>So what evidence do you have that these coins were officially clipped? And why
on earth by HUNNIC tribes?
The average weight of an un-clipped Sasanid drachm is about 4 to 4.15 grams, and
seldom are they below 3.9 grams. Those below that weight are normally clipped.
What we see a lot of are coins like this one :
http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/calgarycoin/store/viewitem.asp?idProduct=2331
At 3.46 grams it is safe to assume this coin has been clipped. The coin bears a
countermark that most authors refer to as of Hephthalite origin (a few people do
dispute this) and since the Hephthalite are a sub group of the Huns, they
represent my evidence that at least clipped Sasanid coins were used by the Huns
(I probaby
should have originally said Hephthalite rather than Hunnic, but I was not
wrong).
Just to show there is a pattern of these coins, here are two more specimens of
3.06 grams and 3.09 grams :
http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/calgarycoin/store/viewItem.asp?idProduct=2569
http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/calgarycoin/store/viewItem.asp?idProduct=401
Now, as for if it was done officially. There are more modern examples of
countermarks being applied to re-valued coins, to state that the revaluation was
done official and so acceptable (nearly always there is a taxation involved in
the revaluation). I see no reason to believe these could not be an early
example of the same
practice, but lets look at the evidence for it being so.
Look at the backs of these coins and on most of them you will see a
feature that is often over looked. It is especially clear on this one between
the 9 and 12 position along the edge of the reverse :
http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/calgarycoin/store/viewItem.asp?idProduct=401
Someone removed some silver by scraping this coin. In my experience, at least
90% of the coins bearing this countermark have this scrap mark. But more
importantly, in 100% of the cases I have seen they are on opposite sides of the
coin, which means it has to be intentional. Since the scrap mark is not there
to steal silver (that would be done by clipping) I can think of two reasons it
might be done officially.
1) It could be there to take a sample of the silver for testing. A common man
stealing a piece of silver would have no need to doing this prior to clipping
the coin (he would just clip it and move on to the next coin).
2) It could have been a way of removing a tiny amount of silver as a tax charged
to allow the coin to continue to circulate at the new value, with the
countermark applied to officially mark the coin as "tax paid" officially.
What I am less certain of is if the countermark is every plied in such as
position as to obliterate the scrap mark, but I do not every recall seeing an
example, and have seen several hundred of these coins (I once bought 50 of them
at the same time, and picked them from a much larger group). But if it were a
"tax paid mark"
the pattern I see of having both marks, and care taken not to obliterate the
scrape while countermarking, would make a lot of sense.
To me, this qualifies as evidence that what ever was done to these coins, was
done officially.
In addition, I do not recall every seeing this type of gouge mark on an
non-countermarked example, which I believe is important evidence.
In summary, we have Sasanid drachms, which have been clipped, and/or tested and
taxed, and countermarked by the Hephthalite subgroup of the Hunns, with a
pattern of how it was done that strongly suggest it was all intentional and
official.
Maybe not proof, but you did not ask for proof. You only asked for my evidence,
and there it is.
I enjoy these exchanges, and find putting these things down in words is both
enjoyable and helpful to me in my own understanding of things I have observed,
but I do make my living from ancient and medieval coins and it is time I went
back to that. I have hundreds (possibly more than 1000) ancient and medieval
coins sitting
here waiting to be catalogued, and who knows what other observation I may make
in the process (beats working for a living).
Robert Kokotailo
>Behalf Of Robert Kokotailo
>I am not sure we are all on the same wave lenth relative to clipping, as I can
see two way to use this term.
>
>1) I believe some people are using the term "clipping" to mean the removal of
metal from the edges of a coin, under any
>circumstances. This is certainly a correct use of the term in general, but
unfortunately it would include flans clipped to adjust
>weight inside the mint prior to them being issued, either before or after
striking. It would also include coins that were clipped
>officially after their issue, to bring them in line with a new weight standard
adopted later.
>
I agree that there was some confusion there. To me "clipping" means literally
the cutting away from the outer rim of a coin with shears or scissors. It is a
method well suited to the thin silver siliqua and I should imagine much quicker
than filing. Since siliquae and solidi were around at the same time it's
interesting to compare them. The Hoxne hoard shows that the weight of unclipped
siliquae declined from an average weight in 348-64 of 1.9g to 1.5g in 395-402.
The average decline in weight of clipped siliquae in the same period was 1.4g to
1.1g. In other words the amount of clipping proportionly remained the same.
Since all these siliquae of varying
weights were circulating at the same time at the end of the period, they must
have been accepted by the population at face value. In contrast the solidus,
which we agree was weighed when a transaction took place, was only rarely
tampered with, at least on the evidence of the 680 gold coins from Hoxne.
>Examples of clipping brought up earlier include the silver silique of the Hoxne
hoard. But there is a strong possibility those coins were clipped
>officially to bring them in line with the 1/2 silique standard adopted about
that time.
Just about any "write-up" on hoards of siliquae, admits that no one yet knows
WHO clipped them. It's interesting that the many irregular siliquae in British
hoards were made from silver of the same chemical composition as the official
coins and that they were themselves clipped.
As to the reasons for clipping, I think that profit has to be first and
foremost. Obviously the clippings were a profit in themselves. But how would
clipping coins to make 1/2 siliquae bring a profit? You would take one silique,
create a 1/2 siliqua plus some clippings that were probably less than the amount
required to make another 1/2 siliqua. It would have been better, if creating 1/2
siliquae was the requirement, to cut them in two.
Likewise I don't see, as has been suggested, that siliquae were clipped to meet
some arbitary weight standard. Why bother, apart from the profit from the
clippings themselves. Actual weights already in circulation were all over the
place. Personally I see clipping of siliquae as a simple profit making excercise
by the provincial government or the population (or both) which relied on the
fact that the coins were accepted at face value.
Peter D
Hi Robert
In order to develop interesting new ideas about coins I think one has to follow
three rules
1) carefully examine the coins that come your way
2) allow yourself to consider any theory, no matter how outlandish it may seem,
to explain the features of the coins that you notice
3) then subject the theory to severe criticism
It seems to me that you are two thirds of the way to making a really excellent
numismatic scholar but you keep falling down at the last fence. This is in no
way a personal criticism, I have made it many times against professional
academics also
Now getting to the nitty gritty - consider this matter of clipped sasanid
drachms. I know you have been in the trade a long time `cause I remember
selling you stuff back in the 1980's. So you must have seen hundreds of sasanid
drachms that were clipped, and you must have noticed that only a small
proportion of them have
Ephthalite c/m's. This should be a serious problem for your theory to any fair
minded scholar.
If you want to take the matter further you need to look at the dates and
locations of specific hoard containing clipped drachms. As I recall there is
data on this in a paper by Stefan Heidemann [The Merger of Two Currency Zones
in Early Islam. The Byzantine and Sasanian Impact on the Circulation in Former
Byzantine Syria and Northern Mesopotamia. Iran, Volume 36, pp. 95-112, 1998]
available on line at
http://www.uni-jena.de/data/unijena_/faculties/phil/iskvo/Heidemann_Texte/Heidemann-Iran1998-Merger-S.pdf
If you want to take the matter further still I think you need to
investigate the social, economic and political background to well documented
episodes of clipping that have taken place in more modern times. Again, there
is much on the web bearing on this take a look at some work on the late 18th
century Yorkshire coiners eg - covering pages 167-171 or so in "Crime and
Punishment in Eighteenth- century England" by Frank McLynn - which you can read
here:
http://books.google.com/books?id=jXe5XQJWqmkC&pg=PA167&lpg=PA167&dq=yorkshire+coiners+clipping&source=web&ots=uWN3w4R8yH&sig=9HiS2zOCgOCd85HymiBVRnYk8-Q#PPA167,M1
I have been a lifelong critic of the standards of scholarship often found
amongst professional numismatic workers, and would like to see a competent body
of independent scholarship arising from amongst collectors and dealers and
taking on the task of fair minded independent criticism. Unfortunately I fear I
see the reverse. As the years go by, it seems to me collectors/dealers appear
to be less able to take on this role, rather than more able. This is sad
given the excellent resource that the internet has become.
best
rob
At 05:57 AM 1/18/2008, you wrote:
>Hi Robert
>
>In order to develop interesting new ideas about coins I think one
>has to follow three rules
>1) carefully examine the coins that come your way
>2) allow yourself to consider any theory, no matter how outlandish
>it may seem, to explain the features of the coins that you notice
>3) then subject the theory to severe criticism
>
>It seems to me that you are two thirds of the way to making a really
>excellent numismatic scholar but you keep falling down at the last
>fence.
A agree with you completely, except that I feel that by posting the theory to
the list, I have subjected it to that severe criticism, although probably not on
the level you are thinking of. There are some pretty advanced collectors and
scholars, such as yourself, who can and often have discussed things I have put
forward. I see debate that the criticism brings as part of the process.
Remember that I live in Calgary, in western Canada. This is not exactly a hot
bed of knowledgeable collectors, and in fact finding someone in this city with
whom I can discuss such things is not really possible, especially once you leave
the subject of Roman and Greek coins. Moneta is my window to that world.
>Now getting to the nitty gritty - consider this matter of clipped sasanid
drachms. I know you have been in the trade a long time `cause I remember
selling you stuff back in the 1980's.
I actually started dealing in the mid 1970's after 10 years of collecting. At
first it was pretty small time, doing private sales to local clients and small
local shows. By the mid 1980's I was running a full time coin store under the
name RDK ANCIENT COINS AND ANQITUITIES and adopted the CALGARY COIN name about
1989 when I took in a business partner to handle the modern coins.
> So you must have seen hundreds of sasanid drachms that were clipped, and you
must have noticed that only a small proportion of them have Ephthalite c/m's.
This should be a serious problem for your theory to any fair minded scholar.
I have not observed the "hundreds" of un-countermarked Sasanid drachms you seem
to have. I admit such things exist, but as a percentage of what I have seen they
are minor. What I have noted is that many of the underweight coins (usually
around 3.8 grams) are Hephthelite imitative drachms struck in the names of Peroz,
Hormazd, and Khusru. Mitchner, in his Ancient and Classical volume, discusses
them.
However, I will take your word for it that you have seen many such coins, and
that it is very possible the hoards I have seen were pre-sorted to remove them,
prior to my seeing them.
But assuming they do exist, the obstacle they present to my theory is if they
are found in the same hoards as the countermarked coins. If not, the fact that
Sassanid coins were being un-officially clipped in some locations (which I do
believe did happen) does not have bearing on what was going on with the
Hephthalites. Since
my discussion was strictly about Hunnic (specifically Hephthalite) coins, that
is an aspect that needs to be looked into more closely for what is in those
specific hoards.
>If you want to take the matter further you need to look at the dates and
locations of specific hoard containing clipped drachms. As I recall there is
data on this in a paper by Stefan Heidemann [The Merger of Two Currency Zones
in Early Islam. The Byzantine and Sasanian Impact on the Circulation in Former
Byzantine Syria and Northern Mesopotamia. Iran, Volume 36, pp. 95-112, 1998]
available on line at
I just glanced through the article, and have printed it off to read in detail
later, but it does not seem to have any bearing on this discussion. It appears
to be discussing clipped Sassanid coins going on in the heart of the Islamic
areas (Syrian and what is now Iraq) and is not discussing region the
Hephthalites lived in. Again, my comments and observations were only with
respect to the Hephthelites.
>Again, there is much on the web bearing on this take a look at some work on
the late 18th century Yorkshire coiners eg - covering pages 167-171 or so in
"Crime and Punishment in Eighteenth->century England" by Frank McLynn - which
you can read here:
I will look at that as well, but do have some familiarity with that.
>I have been a lifelong critic of the standards of scholarship often found
amongst professional numismatic workers, and would like to see a competent body
of independent scholarship arising from amongst collectors and dealers and
taking on the task of fair minded independent criticism.
Not all of us are able to move into those levels. The major obstacle being
having to make a living taking too much of our time. I do not feel my posts to
moneta are designed to move in those levels, and are designed to get others
thinking about the issues as well. And I think they accomplish that.
If I even get to the point where I do not have to make a living, perhaps I can
go into these things to a much greater depth. But for now, I will work at the
level which I can, and continue to post to Moneta.
Robert Kokotailo
Calgary Coin
WEB SITE : http://www.calgarycoin.com
Dear Rob T. and Robert K.:
A few comments on clipped Sasanian drachms:
> The average weight of an un-clipped Sasanid drachm is about 4 to 4.15 grams,
and seldom are they below 3.9 grams. Those below that weight are normally
clipped.
http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/calgarycoin/store/viewitem.asp?idProduct=2331
At 3.46 grams it is safe to assume this coin has been clipped.
Well, probably -- or at least slightly -- but not necessarily. These late
issues (later than Khusro II, but not Kavad IIs -- that's a different story)
have, in general, wider, thinner flans -- but also fluctuate in weight. I've
seen several full-flan (and by this I mean 34 mm.) with weights in the 3.7 gm.
range. Those have not been
clipped. Until someone does a detailed issue x mint x date analysis it's hard
to say which are clipped and which are not. There are also plenty of light,
non-clipped Khusro IIs.
It is easy to figure the area of the flans (a 34 mm. coin = 907 sq. mm.; a 31
mm. = 755 sq. mm., and so on) and from that estimate a percentage of the weight
of say, a 1 mm. clip, or 2 mm., etc. The outer rim design -- the star within
the crescent -- is usually about 2 mm. from the edge (3 mm. at most, I think)
-- here's an example: a 32 mm. flan with the stars still >2 mm. from the edge,
if slightly clipped (1 mm. clip), would have lost only about 6% of its weight
(0.25 gm. of a 4.00 gm. flan). If the clipped weight is, say, 3.5 gm., then the
coin was quite under-weight to begin with.
>> So you must have seen hundreds of sasanid drachms that were clipped, and you
must have noticed that only a small proportion of them have Ephthalite c/m's.
My guess would be there are, at minimum, three or four non-countermarked clipped
drachms for every marked one.
> What I am less certain of is if the countermark is every plied in such as
position as to obliterate the scrap mark...
Almost never. I used to think the scrapes were the result of a device used to
hold the coin during countermarking i.e. some sort of spring-loaded or weighted
"vise" -- but I have found at least two coins with the countermark struck on the
obverse over the footprint of the reverse scrape.
> 2) It could have been a way of removing a tiny amount of silver as a tax
charged to allow the coin to continue to circulate at the new value, with the
countermark applied to officially mark the coin as "tax paid" officially.
I've considered this, but boy, how much silver could you get from the scrapes?
Not much. Could be to check for fouree but, again, hardly any extant Sas/Arab-Sas
fouree drachms.
> To me, this qualifies as evidence that what ever was done to these coins, was
done officially. In addition, I do not recall ever seeing this type of gouge
mark on an non-countermarked example, which I believe is important evidence.
Agree, I've never seen a "scraped" coin without a countermark.
To me, it does look like the countermarking is systematic -- and almost always
placed in a way to prevent clipping or further clipping. I have an example
(also on a Hormazd "V") where an earlier 4th quadrant mark is clipped through --
up to the edge of a later, 2nd quadrant mark. But it is quite unusual to find a
clipped-through
countermark.
http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/islam/arab_sas/cmk_sas/i_asas_hVI_MY_2_o.jpg
Here's another (later?) example of clipped-through and re-marked (2.94 gm.):
http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/islam/arab_sas/cmk_sas/i_asas_khII_AHM_33_cmks.jpg
On the other hand, there are both extremely light clipped countermarked
drachms (2.64 gm.):
http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/islam/arab_sas/aa_asas/i_asas_khIIMY21_aa_o.jpg
-- as well as full-weight countermarked drachms; this one weighs 4.05 gm.:
http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/islam/arab_sas/cmk_sas/i_asas_kIIBN37cmk10_o.jpg
The countermarking may not have anything to do with clipping and/or the
weight. Or maybe there were several stages of marking, lowering of standard,
and re-marking. A mystery.
tom
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Thomas K. Mallon-McCorgray
Coin Clipping
This is a separate string that grew out of the first one.
hi all,
speaking of clipping on coins....,
i have often wondered the story on this coin. i believe it is an AS, but wonder
about the flan.
i have always thought it was a 'remnant flan', i.e. some slave just used an
irregular flan to strike a coin.
being that it is not gold or silver there would be no economic reason for the
coin to be clipped.
the coin can be found in my photos section, it is the last coin.
http://ph.groups.yahoo.com/group/Moneta-L/photos/browse/2559
jim hauck
Hello Jim,
I suspect that someone has taken a punch to this coin, the reverse legend shows
signs of stretching, possibly it was done to make it fit as a decorative
medallion in an item of furniture or somesuch. The fact that the ends of the
spread parts of the flan have been hammered over would also point to this
explanation, as, however the coin was fixed in place, they would bed into wood
and prevent it rotating.
Alistair
www.coinmac.com
As I understand it, milling edges (reeding) was devised to prevent the filing of
edges of coins. Early imperfectly round coins would have been easier to clip, or
shave. Slight weight differences would have been hard to detect.
Had I been a merchant in ancient times, I would have weighed a goodly number of
foreign silver or gold coins offered to me on a simple beam scale against a
local standard weight and proferred local coins or goods to the bullion value of
the coins presented. Probably minus a commission.
Off-color coins could be refused.
Chamiabac
You are most of the way to understanding this, but are missing one important
aspect of it.
In the ancient period, nearly all gold and silver coins were struck on cast
flans with cast edges. Those edges are not in contact with the dies or any flan
flattening process during striking and/or flan production, so when the coin are
issued those cast textures are preserved. There are very few ancient exceptions
to this.
On these coins, any filing or cutting of metal from the edges, will stick out
like a sour thumb and be obvious to anyone looking for them. This makes passing
on a coin you have just clipped, very difficult with a high likely hood of being
caught.
During the medieval period we see many coins struck on flans actually cut from
sheets of silver with shears. This because a wild spread technique, although
not all medieval flans were made that way.
Most coin struck on flans made that way, leave the mint with those shear marks
preserved on the edges. Some series, usually prior to 1100 AD, did hammer the
edges to remove the marks, but that does not totally solve the problem. On a
coin made that way, using a shear and remove a little more metal later does not
at all change the look of the edge, and so passing on a coin you had just
clipped, and getting away with it, was relatively easy.
It is this change in minting technology that I believe is the reason we nearly
never see a clipped ancient coins, but the practice was relatively wide spread
during the medieval period.
Robert Kokotailo
I'd have to disagree a bit from this. Siliquae of the 4th and 5th century were
extensively and widely clipped.
Ken
http://www.coolcoins.com
I think this has to be examined slightly, because of two issues. The first
being when and where they clipped, and the second who did it and why.
As to when and where, everything I see says it was mostly in the frontier
regions (England, Gaul, Germany, etc), after AD 425 (may of the coins were made
earlier, but not necessarily clipped earlier).
As to who did it and why, that is as yet uncertain but the Hoxne hoard has some
clues, which I discussed earlier. Of the vast number of silique in the Hoxne
hoard, over 98% were clipped, but the hoard contained a much lesser but
significant number of miliarense, only 3% of which show evidence of clipping.
This suggests that the practice of clipping in that place and time was not
endemic in silver coins in general as one would expect if the intent was to
defraud, but rather might have been done official to bring the old silique into
line with new weight standards being adopted, with no intent to defraud.
Thus while these coins are seen clipped, but might not necessarily be contrary
to what I have put forward about ILLICIT CLIPPING to defraud (pass as if at full
value). This is something that needs more research.
Robert Kokotailo
An interesting statistic is that 62% of all early 5th century precious metal
treasures hoards and 58% of all hoards containing silver coins from the period
300-500 come from Britain. That's relative to the entire Roman Empire. This
tends to skew the data rather. There was a dramatic decline in the output of
western mints from 402 onwards and virtually no official coinage reaching
Britain after that date. However that means even if a hoard has a "terminus post
quem" of 408, as the Hoxne hoard did, the absence of later coins available to be
hoarded means that the actual deposition date could have been later, perhaps
decades later. So it is possible that
siliquae could have been clipped at that much later date.
However, that seems unlikely, as I explained before, the weight of siliquae
declined (the ones in the Hoxne hoard, anyway) between 355 and 402 and the
clipping was proportional to the weight/size. If clipping were done post-402,
then you would expect that all coins would have been clipped to one size. The
same argument applies to the idea that coins were clipped to meet some lower
weight standard. You would have expected all clipped siliquae to be the same
weight.
Guest in the Hoxne book suggests that the miliarensis were presentation pieces.
He also noted that that this denomination did not suffer the weight reduction
that the siliquae did. Possibly they circulated, like the solidus, by weight.
Peter D
To the best of my knowledge, the burial date of the Hoxne hoard is not known,
beyond some time in the early 5th century AD. It is likely it will never be
determined, as like most ancient treasures, the person that buried it was only
concerned with it's safety from prying eyes, with no consideration for what we
would be interested in 1500 years later, and so it was in a site with no
immediate archeological context (it was excavated archeologically) from which to
date it. There was a Roman Villa nearby, but far enough away that we cannot
100% even tie it to the Villa, but even if we could it would not prove a burial
date.
A treasure this size that was never recovered by the owner has to mean the owner
died or moved way and could not get back. The owner did not just bury his
money, but his dinner utensils as well, which tells us he had to leave the
region on fairly short notice (not enough to arrange to take it with him) and
have a great deal of concern that his property was in danger (how many hoards
contain dinner services).
One historical context which I do not believe fits the bill is the Roman
evacuation of Britain, which various authors put as early as AD 402 and as late
as AD 408 (407 being the most widely accepted date). That certainly fits with
the terminus date of the hoard, but with all the legions being pulled out at
about the same time, that took some planing and time, and would probably have
allowed for arrangements to be made to take it with him. It is also an event
for which he might expect to never come back again to get it, so he would have
wanted to take it with him.
It is more likely that the hoard remained in the hands of a wealthy Britain long
after the Romans pulled out. The next major event that one might tie it to, is
the Anglo-Saxon invasion of AD 446. This is a time when the person might have
had little warning, and little time to make arrangements, and have a significant
expectation of being
back to recover his goods. I see this as having a greater possibility than AD
407.
But the truth is that we know very little of the details of what was happening
in Britain after AD 407. The small details, local tribal wars, and day to day
life of the average man is a complete un-known, and there could be hundreds of
small events that might account for someone burying a hoard of this nature.
But because his carefully packed up all his dinner ware, which tells us he had
at least a little warning trouble was coming, we are not detailing with a minor
event such as being attached by robbers, and the Anglo-Saxon invasion of AD 446
is a possiblity.
>However, that seems unlikely, as I explained before, the weight of siliquae
declined (the ones in the Hoxne hoard, anyway) between 355 and 402 and the
clipping was proportional to the weight/size. If clipping were done post-402,
then you would expect that all coins would have been clipped to one size. The
same argument applies to the idea that coins were clipped to meet some lower
weight standard. You would have expected all clipped siliquae to be the same
weight.
We are talking someone using shears, estimating where to cut by eye, butting by
hand, starting with coins that were not even of uniform thickness to start
with. The concept of anyone doing that and getting them all to come out to some
exact theoretical weight, is not reasonable. Even the official mints, making
the coins from scratch under strictly controlled conditions, never achieved
that.
>Guest in the Hoxne book suggests that the miliarensis were presentation
pieces. He also noted that that this denomination did not suffer the weight
reduction that the siliquae did. Possibly they circulated, like the solidus, by
weight.
Does he present any evidence to support the miliarensis being presentation
pieces, or for solidus circulated by weight.
I have seen this idea of solidi circulating by weight quoted many times, in many
places, but have yet to see any evidence for it. Solidi have a remarkably
consistent weight, or more to say a very narrow weight range, with easily 90% of
them no more than 0.05 grams from the median weight of about 4.41 grams (that is
a variation of about 1.25% off the norm), and only a tiny percentage are more
0.1 grams from it (2.5%). The whole point of making a coin that precise, to
so that they do not have to circulate by weight. We know solidi were weighted
because the exerguam solidi weights exist, but as discussed earlier they appear
to be for use in counterfeit detection, and were not even made to a standard
where by they could even be used to determine the weight of a given coin.
It would be interesting to know if in the burial, the miliarensis were separated
from the siliquae, or just tossed in the same bags with them. Separation would
not prove them were presentation pieces (the till in my store has a compartment
for every denomination we use) but would support the concept. If they were just
tossed into bags with the siliquae with no extra care, it would strongly suggest
they were not presentation pieces of importance to the owner. The hoard was
excavated archeologically, so it is likely this information is known. Perhaps
someone knows where to access it.
Robert Kokotailo
Hi Tom
Good to hear from you. I am curious to get your opinion regarding the clipping
of Sasanid coin in general, and why it was happening. My own is as follows:
My general observations (taken from memory) are that the Sasanid drachm was
probably little clipped prior to the Arab take over, if at all. After that old
Sasanid continued to circulate to some extent for at least a couple of centuries
under the Arabs in an increasingly clipped state. There is no very clear
intended weight that the coins were clipped to but that there is a bit of a
tendency to cut to the outer tips of the horns of the crescents, and this tends
to give approx a 3 gram to 3.2 gram result.
My explanation is largely guess work but based upon the records we have of
actual clipping events in England (c. 1770 and c. 1696) on my understanding
of Islamic weight standards and upon the handling of silver bullion at the
current day.
I think we agree the theoretical weight of the late Sasanid drachm was in the
4.08-4.15g range? And I think it is pretty conclusive that the reformed Omayyad
dirhem aimed at 2.92g to 2.93g. Its also my opinion that the reformed dirhem
weighed 60 grains but was valued at 64 grains thus a 2.92g dirhem was `worth'
about 3.11g of silver
bullion.
Now in modern times its easy to get a newspaper and check `the spot price of
bullion'. But many years back I tried a bit of an experiment with some
hallmarked silver in London. I discovered that the sort of guys who advertise
for silver in high street shops would tend to offer 50% of the price of that
day's spot rate in the Financial Times (and then negotiate when it was
refused). And the best price I got offered was 90% of spot. Clearly the guy
who quoted that still planned to get a better rate himself
I think a similar situation existed throughout history. If, for the sake of
argument, a dirhem was worth 3.11g of silver, that means something like - that
was the `spot' price. And if one tried to settle a bill in dirhems using old
Sasanid drachms, some payees (perhaps tax farmers) were accepting them by count
rather than by weight implying a near 25% profit over bullion. And some
payers balked at this so clipped their coins to the level they found in
practice they could get away with.
This would be my explanation of both why the drachms were clipped but also why
the end product of the clipping varied so much in weight. It is because each
clipped coin tended to be the end point of a particular negotiation at a
particular place and date about what sort of drachms would be acceptable by
count to settle a particular account expressed in dirhems. The 'take it or
leave it offer' that was ultimately accepted (or even rejected so taken
elsewhere)
If I am correct about this sort of thing then this would have important
consequences for some modern research. I am thinking in particular of those
entering numismatics with viewpoints deriving from academic economics, who tend
to assume (incorrectly imo) that all payers have (as an alternative to settling
in bullion) free access to the mint price to convert their bullion to coin.
Such thinking leads to some rather distorted conclusions if I am correct.
best
rob
>>PD
>>An interesting statistic is that 62% of all early 5th century precious metal
treasures hoards and 58% of all hoards containing silver coins from the period
300-500 come from Britain. That's relative to the entire Roman Empire. This
tends to skew the data rather. There was a dramatic decline in the output of
western mints from 402 onwards and virtually no official coinage reaching
Britain after that date. However that means even if a hoard has a "terminus post
quem" of 408, as the Hoxne hoard did, the absence of
later coins available to be hoarded means that the actual deposition date could
have been later, perhaps decades later. So it is possible that siliquae could
have been clipped at that much later date.
>RK
>To the best of my knowledge, the burial date of the Hoxne hoard is not known,
beyond some time in the early 5th century AD. It is likely it will never be
determined, as like most ancient treasures, the person that buried it was only
concerned with it's safety from prying eyes, with no consideration for what we
would be interested in 1500 years later, and so it was in a site with no
immediate archeological context (it was excavated archeologically) from which to
date it. There was a Roman Villa nearby, but far enough away that we cannot
100% even tie it to the Villa, but even if we could it would not prove a burial
date.
>
>A treasure this size that was never recovered by the owner has to mean the
owner died or moved way and could not get back. The owner did not just bury his
money, but his dinner utensils as well, which tells us he had to leave the
region on fairly short notice (not enough to arrange to take it with him) and
have a great deal of concern that his property was in danger (how many hoards
contain dinner services).
>
PD
Abandonment in the face of danger is one possible reason for the survival of
hoards in Britain, but is more and more discounted these days, at least as the
primary reason. In the case of Hoxne and other hoards, such as Mildenhall,
Thetford and Water Newton, the items weren't just 'dinner utensils', as a visit
to the BM will testify. Many items were antique when they were buried and
clearly precious in their own right. Guest, in the Hoxne book, suggests that
late Romano-British high society had an elaborate gift exchange system based on
social standing, encompassing the silverware, gold jewelry and maybe even solidi
and miliarenses. With the withdrawal of the Roman administration, such items no
longer had the same status and maybe were an embarrassment under the new social
conditions and for this reason deliberately buried without any expectation of
digging them up. You need to read the book to understand the various arguments
for these ideas.
>RK
>One historical context which I do not believe fits the bill is the Roman
evacuation of Britain, which various authors put as early as AD 402 and as late
as AD 408 (407 being the most widely accepted date). That certainly fits with
the terminus date of the hoard, but with all the legions being pulled out at
about the same time, that took some planing and time, and would probably have
allowed for arrangements to be made to take it with him. It is also an event
for which he might expect to never come back again to get it, so he would have
wanted to take it with him.
>
>It is more likely that the hoard remained in the hands of a wealthy Britain
long after the Romans pulled out. The next major event that one might tie it
to, is the Anglo-Saxon invasion of AD 446. This is a time when the person might
have had little warning, and little time to make arrangements, and have a
significant expectation of being back to recover his goods. I see this as
having a greater possibility than AD 407.
>
>But the truth is that we know very little of the details of what was happening
in Britain after AD 407. The small details, local tribal wars, and day to day
life of the average man is a complete un-known, and there could be hundreds of
small events that might account for someone burying a hoard of this nature.
But because his carefully packed up all his dinner ware, which tells us he had
at least a little warning trouble was coming, we are not detailing with a minor
event such as being attached by robbers, and the Anglo-Saxon invasion of AD 446
is a possiblity.
>
PD
I'm sure that Roman money persisted for quite a while. The Patching hoard found
in 1997 contained three solidi of Libius Severus (461-465), although that could
have been the result of cross-Channel trade.
Even the idea of one big Anglo-Saxon invasion with wide-scale population
movement is coming under scrutiny. DNA testing has found that Anglo-Saxons have
contributed just 5% to the gene-pool. It is likely that the change was more of a
cultural one, with, of course, a change in the ruling classes.
>>PD
>>However, that seems unlikely, as I explained before, the weight of siliquae
declined (the ones in the Hoxne hoard, anyway) between 355 and 402 and the
clipping was proportional to the weight/size. If clipping were done post-402,
then you would expect that all coins would have been clipped to one size. The
same argument applies to the idea that coins were clipped to meet some lower
weight standard. You would have expected all clipped siliquae to be the same
weight.
>
>RK
>We are talking someone using shears, estimating where to cut by eye, butting by
hand, starting with coins that were not even of uniform thickness to start
with. The concept of anyone doing that and getting them all to come out to some
exact theoretical weight, is not reasonable. Even the official mints, making
the coins from scratch under strictly controlled conditions, never achieved
that.
>
PD
I agree.
>>PD
>>Guest in the Hoxne book suggests that the miliarensis were presentation
pieces. He also noted that that this denomination did not suffer the weight
>>reduction that the siliquae did. Possibly they circulated, like the solidus,
by weight.
>RK
>Does he present any evidence to support the miliarensis being presentation
pieces, or for solidus circulated by weight.
>
PD
Guest doesn't present any evidence. Miliarenses are present in most British
hoards in small quantities. Guest thinks that they may have been part of the
'gift system' mentioned above.
>RK
>I have seen this idea of solidi circulating by weight quoted many times, in
many places, but have yet to see any evidence for it. Solidi have a remarkably
consistent weight, or more to say a very narrow weight range, with easily 90% of
them no more than 0.05 grams from the median weight of about 4.41 grams (that is
a variation of about 1.25% off the norm), and only a tiny percentage are more
0.1 grams from it (2.5%). The whole point of making a coin that precise, to
so that they do not have to circulate by weight. We know solidi were weighted
because the exerguam solidi weights exist, but as discussed earlier they appear
to be for use in counterfeit detection, and were not even made to a standard
where by they could even be used to determine the weight of a given coin.
>
PD
When I said 'circulated by weight' I didn't mean that solidi were treated as
bullion - that would be ridiculous, except for large amounts. I meant that they
were weighed at the 'point of sale', so to speak, which ensured the stability of
the weight standard.
>RK
>It would be interesting to know if in the burial, the miliarensis were
separated from the siliquae, or just tossed in the same bags with them.
Separation would not prove them were presentation pieces (the till in my store
has a compartment for every denomination we use) but would support the concept.
If they were just tossed into bags with the siliquae with no extra care, it
would strongly suggest they were not presentation pieces of importance to the
owner. The hoard was excavated archeologically, so it is likely this information
is known. Perhaps someone knows where to access it.
>
PD
The box that the treasure came in has been re-constructed and is still on
display at the BM along with some of the treasure. Although everything had been
carefully packed in the box, I believe that many of the coins had been dispersed
by ploughing and so it was difficult to know if the denominations
had been separated.
Peter D
