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Author Topic: Standing Emperor Arab Byzantine Imitation from Caesarea Maritima  (Read 618 times)

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Offline v-drome

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Hi, all.  I have downloaded a number of old references for the Arab Byzantine imitations and am starting to go through them, but I have not found this one, yet.  Any additional information, and interpretations, or direction I should look in would be appreciated.  This is the first time I have tried to tackle this very interesting part of the collection.  Thanks, V-drome

These are the closest I have found, so far, but mine is apparently retrograde:

http://numismatics.org/collection/1972.161.11?lang=en

http://numismatics.org/collection/1967.110.7?lang=en

I have also downloaded the BMC Collection of Islamic coins, part II, by John Walker.

BCC IC8
Umayyad Period - AE Fals
Arab Byzantine Imitation of Constans II
692-694 CE?
Uncertain Mint - Syria
Obv: Standing Emperor with globus
cruciger and staff surmounted by cross.
[EN TOTO N] I? [KA]???
Rev: Cursive M surmounted by cross.
Crescent and circle? to either side.
To left retrograde ΛE..? TO RIGHT ???
In exergue: ~[AV]?
20mm. 3.04gm. Axis:0
Surface find, Caesarea Maritima
(click for larger pic)

Offline v-drome

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Re: Standing Emperor Arab Byzantine Imitation from Caesarea Maritima
« Reply #1 on: May 07, 2020, 01:16:08 am »
Hi, all.  I received a very informative answer from a colleague in Israel, Dr. Yoav Farhi, who spoke with Tony Goodwin and kindly wrote back to me.  Here are some excerpts from his letter.

"... this coin is Pseudo-Byzantine SICA Type E, i.e. a relatively early Arab-Byzantine coin. Type E is by far the most common type, roughly imitating the early standing emperor folles of Constans II, and was minted in large numbers from the 640s right through to at least the 670s.

... in this case we can be a little more specific because it belongs to a group of coins - probably the product of a single mint - which have a random selection of letters around the reverse 'm', often supplemented by 'squiggles' and occasionally circles or crescents. The dies are quite neatly engraved and the letters usually quite well formed, but the 'legends' are completely meaningless.  A retrograde epsilon is also common.

Occasionally one can recognise remnants of the original 'ANA-NEOS' legend,  but generally it looks as if the 'mint' tried to avoid making exact copies of the Byzantine prototype.   This group was first recognised by Andrew Oddy in an article entitled 'The Christian coinage of early Muslim Syria' in ARAM 15 (2003) pp. 185-196 and has come to be informally known as the 'LITOIE group' as some coins have an approximation to those letters around the reverse 'm'.  General opinion (which I would agree with) is that the group is relatively late in the Pseudo-Byzantine phase, so nearer 670 than 640, but at the moment there is no reliable dating evidence. 

Andrew's title is at first sight slightly misleading as the coins are no more 'Christian' than most Arab-Byzantine coins. But the paper was first presented at a conference on Palestinian Christianity, and I'm sure that in the mid 7thc. most coins were produced by Christians rather than Muslims.

... at the moment the location of the 'mint' is unknown. Indeed the die engravers (or their dies) may have travelled. I've seen many coins from this group over the years and interestingly from both Syria/Lebanon  and Israel, so it looks as if they circulated widely. 

P.S. Your coin seems to be struck from the same dies as Cat. 3.2 in Oddy's article (see attached)."

Thanks, again, to all my friends at ForumAncientCoins.  Jimi

 

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