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Author Topic: The serrated denarius  (Read 1665 times)

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Offline Kevin M

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The serrated denarius
« on: May 11, 2019, 05:46:11 pm »
We have all seen Roman denarii whose edges are serrated and most collectors of ancient coin probably have a few. I was recently reading a book on the Roman Republic and the author alluded to a denarius of 118 BC issued to celebrate the defeat of a Gallic chieftain, probably Bituitus, by the family of the Roman commander who used the victory to establish a Roman colony in Gallic Narbo. It made me wonder if the practice of issuing serrated silver coins (never, apparently gold or bronze) might have something to do with making a coin more noticeable to the public than the average denarius. A well serrated coin does attract attention by both sight and feel. The notion that they were issued to demonstrate that the coins were not plated does not bear out and there are other reasons given for the practice. Notching all these coins was a labor intensive practice and the moneyers were not going to spend much time doing this unless the practice had some importance. From what I read in that book mentioned above I wonder if it was anything else other than an advertising technique. What can other readers offer as reasons for the serrating process?

Offline TenthGen

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #1 on: May 12, 2019, 12:11:09 pm »
I've often wondered this myself. The reasons I've heard before include:

1. Making the coins harder to forge by plating. I've heard that it was harder to foil plate coins if they had those serrate edges, but since plated serrates definitely exist, this explanation doesn't seem to be very convincing. Maybe if there was more evidence it could become more favored. For example, statistically, perhaps a serratus is less likely to be found plated or as a copper core than a standard denarius.

2. Proof of Roman integrity. A related theory is that Rome would issue serrates when expanding into a new area or founding a new colony. The coinage would be released into the wild at the new site to indicate to the locals that the Roman-made coinage was of high quality and not plated en masse. By this hypothesis, serrates should correspond to dates of new colonies or territorial expansion during the middle and late Republic.

3. Precious metal saving. I'm less certain about the impact of this one, but in principle the little bits of clipped away silver could be regathered as a way to cut costs without actually shrinking the flan. However, this should be immediately obvious by a change in average weight, and I don't think this pans out.

4. Purely decorative or celebratory. This is what you are referring to in your topic post. It's distinctly possible that the serrated coins were just made because they looked cool. The Seleucids also made similar serrates with their bronze coins, and there doesn't seem to be a functional reason as to why they did that. Maybe it really was just to make them more flashy. For this hypothesis, we could look to see if serrate issues tend to correspond to any particular events or other celebrations.

Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #2 on: May 12, 2019, 04:00:11 pm »
Thanks for the response and those intriguing possibilities. In his Coins and Archaeology (1969), p.13 the archaeologist Lloyd R. Liang mentions a few interesting items about serrated coins. According to Dr. Liang, during the Second Punic War Carthage issued both gold and silver coins which were serrated. He states that it appears the marks were made by chiseling after being struck so in these instances the coins made may have been notched to show that they were not plated. A prudent precaution when Carthage began losing its war with Rome and its coinage was debased. He also mentions the serrated coins of Seleucid Syria under Antiochus Vi and has one pictured and there are four of these coins pictured in Sear's Greek Coins, Volume 2 (1998 edition) #'s 7081 thru 7084. Dr. Liang believes the Roman denarii were made by filing rather than by chiseling. There may be more than one reason depending on who issued them and the time they were issued. One denarius I have, issued in 79 BC by Ti. Claudius has the edges so uniformly serrated I wonder if Roman moneyers employed a serrating machine. There has got to be a good reason (or several different ones)for mints making the extra effort to produce these coins. I wish we could find out why.

Offline Andrew McCabe

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #3 on: May 13, 2019, 08:31:03 am »
Thanks for the response and those intriguing possibilities. In his Coins and Archaeology (1969), p.13 the archaeologist Lloyd R. Liang mentions a few interesting items about serrated coins. According to Dr. Liang, during the Second Punic War Carthage issued both gold and silver coins which were serrated. He states that it appears the marks were made by chiseling after being struck so in these instances the coins made may have been notched to show that they were not plated. A prudent precaution when Carthage began losing its war with Rome and its coinage was debased. He also mentions the serrated coins of Seleucid Syria under Antiochus Vi and has one pictured and there are four of these coins pictured in Sear's Greek Coins, Volume 2 (1998 edition) #'s 7081 thru 7084. Dr. Liang believes the Roman denarii were made by filing rather than by chiseling. There may be more than one reason depending on who issued them and the time they were issued. One denarius I have, issued in 79 BC by Ti. Claudius has the edges so uniformly serrated I wonder if Roman moneyers employed a serrating machine. There has got to be a good reason (or several different ones)for mints making the extra effort to produce these coins. I wish we could find out why.

Interesting to see you cite Laing's book. I have read it and thought it terrible and riddled with easily contradicted nonsense. On my web-page here I wrote:

http://andrewmccabe.ancients.info/Hoards.html

NOT USEFUL
Coins and Archaeology, Lloyd Laing, London 1969
Riddled with basic numismatic errors. Valuable as a source of amusement if nothing else. There is a tendency to make straightforward statements of facts that are not established facts, for example "during the life of a single obverse die three reverse dies at least would have been used" or "There was six different systems of putting sequence marks on Republican coins and these systems are related to each other chronologically. One can use the sequence marks to arrange the coins within each series into chronological order". There are no sources or evidence quoted for such gems ("three reverse dies at least???") and after a while one wonders what is fact and what is his own supposition. Still, he loves the subject and that shines through the text even if much of it is indeed supposition. I am curious when I see it offered for sale on the internet as to what the buyer will make of it.

Here is what I suggest instead:

IMPORTANT
Those with a deeper fascination about archaeology and hoards should obtain at least one primer on hoards and archaeology, of which the following two are my favourites, and RRCH provides a lot of fundamental evidence about which coins have been found where, and with which companions:
- Coins and the Archaeologist, John Casey and Richard Reece, 1988.
- Understanding Ancient Coins, an Introduction for Archaeologists and Historians, John Casey 1986
Either of these two books is an appropriate starting point for a proper understanding of coins and archaeology. The first is a set of papers on the interpretation of coin finds (in England, though relevant to all eras), the second is a much shorter introductory book covering the same ground, a good foundation work.

USEFUL
- Roman Coins and Archaeology collected papers, Richard Reece, Moneta 32, 2003; The coinage of Roman Britain, Richard Reece, 2002
Although Reece’s work is based mainly on English excavations and hence on Roman Imperial coinages, the numismatic and archaeological techniques are relevant to all eras. He has developed many novel concepts, for example that small bronze finds often come from discards in periods of demonetisation and/or low commercial activity, rather than being losses in a busy commercial environment.

Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #4 on: May 13, 2019, 01:03:06 pm »
Thanks for the advice. I must admit that I have enjoyed Laing's book and have read it several times over the years. I will try to find your more respected works. By the way, what do they have to say about the reasons for serrated coins issued by Carthaginians (if any), the Seleucid Greeks and, most of all, during the Roman Republic?

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2019, 01:14:55 pm »
Reason #3 is not valid whatsoever. No metal was removed to make the serrations.

Despite the existence of plated serrate denarii, I am confident they were at least a little harder to plate.  
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Offline Andrew McCabe

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #6 on: May 13, 2019, 01:40:36 pm »
Thanks for the advice. I must admit that I have enjoyed Laing's book and have read it several times over the years. I will try to find your more respected works. By the way, what do they have to say about the reasons for serrated coins issued by Carthaginians (if any), the Seleucid Greeks and, most of all, during the Roman Republic?

They don't have anything to say because this is not an archaeological matter. Laing should have (once again) steered clear of areas where he knew nothing.

The serrations were made by hand using knife strikes - the idea that they were filed is incredible, think of how long that would take - maybe an hour per coin rather than seconds AND one would actually lose metal in the process. And the lack of uniformity in general suggests no machine involved. Laing knew nothing at all about coins and didn't even have the thinking apparatus needed to make reasonable deductions. I really would send his book to the recycle bin because one has no idea what other nonsense is in it.

From all I have read and understood, reasons 1 (making plating a little more difficult) and 4 (decorative) are one or both of the main reasons (one could do it for decorative reasons while still benefiting from some fraud prevention). A further possible reason that I have heard proposed was metallurgical - that for certain metal mixes (small impurities play a large part, and that can be a function of the source of the metal), the flans were unusually brittle; serrations might have reduced the chances of a flan splitting on striking because there were already many small splits in the edges. I'm sceptical about this last reason as I think it would be a lot less work just to try and improve the metal quality by refining or additives, but who knows. I tend to think decoration was high on the list as it was an expensive process, and once the coins entered circulation, the issuer / mint magistrates were not anyways responsible for other people making plated copies. But it may have been that on the initial issue, plated coins were seen as more reassuring and anything that puts a coin in a good light has to be good for the issuer.

Below is a picture of a plated serrated denarius that I bought for my collection last week. I find it rather cute that the bankers mark is positioned so to look exactly like an ear ring  :)

Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #7 on: May 13, 2019, 02:14:50 pm »
Thanks, again, for that reply. One thing I could never quite understand was whether the serrations were made prior to striking the coin (just a blank flan) or were made after the coin was struck. The denarius that you just acquired, the serrated one pictured, you say is a plated (fourees) coin. How can you tell that? The coin looks to be a solid silver from what I see of it, banker's mark and all. Is the coin noticeably light? Did  it come up with a specific gravity test as weigh under 10.43 ? Was the serrating done to disguise the plating?

Offline Andrew McCabe

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #8 on: May 13, 2019, 03:36:59 pm »
Thanks, again, for that reply. One thing I could never quite understand was whether the serrations were made prior to striking the coin (just a blank flan) or were made after the coin was struck. The denarius that you just acquired, the serrated one pictured, you say is a plated (fourees) coin. How can you tell that? The coin looks to be a solid silver from what I see of it, banker's mark and all. Is the coin noticeably light? Did  it come up with a specific gravity test as weigh under 10.43 ? Was the serrating done to disguise the plating?

Oops my error. I had plated on the brain. It is serrated. It is not plated.

It seems teh flans were prepared in advance and then struck already serrated (hence the possible use for metallurgical reasons which would make no sense if done afterwards). The evidence for this is in the lack of any raised ridges at the sides of the serrations because they have been struck flat by the design.


Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #9 on: May 13, 2019, 05:43:53 pm »
Yes, that makes sense.

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #10 on: May 14, 2019, 07:33:34 am »
BTW, note the word serrated is blue text wherever it appears on this discussion or in Forum's shop. Blue text is a link. Click it to see additional information on serrated coins.
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Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #11 on: May 14, 2019, 08:30:41 am »
Thank you for that helpful information. It was kind of you to do that.

Offline Kevin M

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #12 on: May 14, 2019, 05:52:16 pm »
BTW, note the word serrated is blue text wherever it appears on this discussion or in Forum's shop. Blue text is a link. Click it to see additional information on serrated coins.
I just ordered a copy of the Richard Reece book on the coins of Roman Britain.

Offline TenthGen

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Re: The serrated denarius
« Reply #13 on: May 15, 2019, 01:23:19 am »
Quote
Reason #3 is not valid whatsoever. No metal was removed to make the serrations.

Ah, I hadn't realized that. I had thought a tiny, but retrievable, amount was lost in the process, but if it is none at all then #3 is completely out the window.

 

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