• Digital Humanities and Cultural Heritage
• AU close
• CN close
• IE close
• MY close

The Roman emperor Caligula issued the same type of quadrans throughout his reign, where the obverse depicted a pileus, a type of cap given to former slaves upon their manumission, and the reverse the letters RCC. Eckhel suggested that the obverse referred to the restoration of liberty as represented by his return of the elections to the popular assembly from the Senate, and the reverse referred to a remission of the sales-tax. Barrett has recently argued that both sides probably referred to the execution in late 39 of Cornelius Lentulus Gaetulicus, the governor of Upper Germany. This note argues that Caligula chose to depict the pileus on his quadrans in order to celebrate his new policy of strictly enforcing the rules for granting citizenship and that he aimed the design at the urban mob in particular in order to emphasise that he was protecting them against those seeking to encroach upon their privileges

AbstractThe observed weights of ancient coins are usually less than the nominal “ideal” weights of the coin standards to which they belong because state authorities took a fee—“seigniorage”—for minting coins to cover costs and to make a profit. The basis for calculating the amount taken by the state and the way it administered manufacture are not well understood. Here we analyze the weights of 1344 of the earliest coins of Athens (c. 550–479 bce). We reveal a parabolic relationship between the cost of the silver and the weights of the coins whereby a progressively higher proportion was taken as the denomination decreased, meaning that the smaller the coin, the larger was the proportion of silver taken from it. There was tight control of the minting process and mathematical sophistication in precisely adjusting the silver content from the first introduction of coinage. It also made minting a profitable business. Changes in minting practice can be detected with the introduction of the Athenian “owl” coins, when the percentage of silver taken by the state increased and the spread of weights widened to include coins weighing more than the nominal weight. The latter indicates a significant shift toward monetization of the economy.

Three areas in mainland and Aegean Greece are known to have been important sources of silver during antiquity: Laurion in south-east Attica, the Thraco-Macedonian region of northern Greece, and the Cycladic island of Siphnos. The mines of Siphnos are thought to have been a major source of silver for archaic Greece coinage, especially that of Aegina. Lead isotope and elemental analyses have been used in published studies of ores, slag and litharge (lead oxide; PbO) found on Siphnos, and elemental analyses on 12 coins. Here we present elemental analyses of one gold and 29 silver coins from Siphnos. This data leads us to reconsider the claim made by Gale et al. 1980 that the levels of bismuth in Siphnian silver are higher than those recorded levels for Laurion silver. Finally, the evidence of the analyses is considered in relation to the history of minting on Siphnos.

This paper presents fresh interpretations of 160 lead isotope analyses of Archaic Greek coins on the OXALID database based on new data for ore sources in Spain, Sardinia, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece, Turkey and Iran. It demonstrates that the earliest minters used far more diverse metal sources than the literary evidence suggests, and engaged in what could be described as opportunistic minting. Some currently held views on the importance of Siphnian silver, Peisistratid access to Thracian silver, the sources of Aiginetan, Thasian and Chian silver, the use of gold and tin as tracers for Siphnian and Lavrion silver, and the mixing of silver are challenged. Thoughts are offered on how archaic minting drove intensification of mining.

The purpose of this article is to give a brief outline of the events and processes which have taken place over the last twenty five years which have led to the emergence of a new biological discipline - namely that of chemical communication in vertebrates.

The Australian Museum holds over 1,000 cultural objects from New Caledonia. A quarter of the collection was obtained by a Museum zoologist, Charles Hedley, who visited La Grande Terre on his holidays late in 1897. He collected ethnographic and zoological specimens and organized an exchange of objects with the then Colonial Museum of Noumea. This chapter investigates the historical background to this exchange and the circumstances under which heritage and zoology were given equivalent values and objects and specimens literally swapped.

In the period of this report from 2014-2020, there have been four main trends. The first is research into improving methods and methodology for analysing coins in order to tackle different questions and especially provenance of metals. This latter research has seen the intensified use of combined elemental and isotopic analysis. It is driven by general acceptance that geolocating silver ore sources can only be done reliably by isotopic analysis using mainly MC-ICP-MS (Multicollector-Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry). However, elemental analysis can help determine if a set of coins could belong to the same metallic stock and in addition it can contribute useful information about the composition of coins and the technology used to make them. Part of the trend is experimentation with a wide range of analytical techniques and applications investigating the potential information to be derived from specific elements and isotopes, and about manufacturing techniques by metallography or hardness test. The second trend has been the wide application of a suite of analytical methods to individual coinages from their inception through to modern times. The third trend has been the investigation of coin manufacture and detection of forgeries. The fourth trend has been more deliberate aggregation of teams of archaeometallurgists, geologists, geochemists, numismatists, archaeologists and historians for solving numismatic, archaeological and historical problems. This has been made possible through major grants especially from the European Research Commission and the work of university-based institutes and state agencies such as France’s CNRS (Centre national de la recherche scientifique). Other methods in the analytical repertoire used in this report include: CT (Computed Tomography); EPMA (Electron Probe Microanalysis); EDX (Energy Dispersive X-ray spectroscopy); FNAA (Fast Neutron Activation Analysis); GRT (Gamma Ray Transmission); ICP-AES (Inductively Coupled Plasma Atomic Emission Spectrometry); LA-ICP-MS (Laser Ablation Inductively Coupled Plasma-Mass Spectrometry); µXRF (Micro X-ray Fluorescence); negative muons; neutron imaging; PAA (Proton Activation Analysis); PGAA (Prompt Gamma Activation Analysis); PIXE (Particle Induced X-ray Emission); pXRF (portable XRF); RBS (Rutherford Backscattering Spectrometry); SEM (Scanning Electron Microscopy); SG (Specific Gravity); SR-WD-XRF (Synchrotron Radiation Induced WDXRF); TOF-ND (Time-of-Flight Neutron Diffraction); TOF-SIMS (Time-of-Flight Secondary-Ion Mass Spectrometry); WDXRF (Wavelength-Dispersive XRF).

The conventional approach to ore provenance studies of ancient silver coins and artifacts has been to first analyze and then try to match them to published data about mining districts, a difficult task given our incomplete knowledge of these. While literary sources are useful to identify possible provenances, they potentially bias interpretations proper because of a variety of limitations of their time. Archeological evidence in the form of mining shafts, galleries, spoil heaps, and tools also provides a tangible and reliable record of mining, but dating such activity can be problematic and the record is inconsistent. Here we propose a new approach driven by Pb isotopic data rather than numismatic groups. Statistical analysis of Pb isotopic data is used to identify ore-defined isotopic clusters. This new method is based on an algorithm that predicts the number of isotopic clusters necessary to fulfill the simple condition that variance within isotopic clusters is minimized whereas inter-cluster variance is maximized. Since each cluster reflects a discrete geological episode within a particular environment broadly datable to a specific Pb model age, it can be identified as a potential source exploited by ancient miners. We explore the potential of this method in two examples using data from coins and ores respectively. In the first example, Roman Republican silver coins form three 'end-member' clusters sourced in mining districts with Cenozoic, Mesozoic, and Paleozoic Pb model ages. The example demonstrates how sources of silver used to mint coinage of the Roman Republic shifted within 50 years of the end of the Second Punic War in 201 BCE. In the second example using Aegean galena samples, Pb isotopes distinguish components with model ages datable to the Hercynian basement, the recent Aegean tectonic province, and Cyprus, noting that significant silver mining districts may remain unidentified in either Spain or the Aegean world. We further clarify a number of potential analytical issues and advocate that users of Pb isotopes for tracing archeological artifacts measure all four lead isotopes and inspect the 12 proposed isotope combinations in order to select those that provide the best representation of the data. We also emphasize that full advantage should be taken of the geologically informed parameters (model age and Th/U/Pb relationships) to identify the geological context of metal sources. International audience