Numismatic and History Discussion Forums > Classical Numismatics Books and References Discussion Forum
reka devinia hoard
jakeveteran:
hi all,
is there a small, english book (durst reprint?) on this topic
thanks, jim hauck
curtislclay:
The publication of the Reka Devnia hoard is in French and is very rare. However Barry Murphy has done a photocopied reprint for $25 and told me yesterday that he still has a few copies left.
The coins in the hoard are published by listing their reverse legends in alphabetical order for each emperor or empress, specifying the Cohen number, then noting the number of specimens of that Cohen number in Sofia (which got 5/6 of the hoard) and in Varna (1/6 of the hoard). So you only need some basic French when Mouchmov designates a particular type as a variety of that described by Cohen, then specifies in a footnote how it differs, for example "On obv. IMP IIII not IMP III" or "Pudicitia on rev. stands r. not l." Also in Mouchmov's short lists and descriptions of types not in Cohen at all.
Federico M:
Dear Mr. Clay,
In a message of some time ago you said that the report of Mouchmov contains numerous errors "that one has to try to correct, but that's a topic for another day." Since I'm now one of the happy owners of the copies made by Barry Murphy, I was curious to know if there is something published about these errors and if you noticed mistakes in the lists concerning Geta and Elagabalus in particular.
Thanks and best regards,
Federico Morando
curtislclay:
Federico,
I wrote the following preface to the Reka Devnia publication and posted it on Moneta-L in Jan. 2003 when Barry Murphy reprinted the book for the first time:
The Reka Devnia hoard is by far the largest hoard of Roman silver coins of the period c. 64-238 AD ever published. Reign by reign, the representation of the individual types in the hoard clearly closely reflects their original volume of production, and the publication is therefore an essential tool both for the researcher who wants to reconstruct the chronological sequence of the coinage and for the coin dealer or collector who is interested in the true comparative rarity of the various types.
To make proper use of the publication, however, one must be aware that whereas the listing of the 68,783 coins in Sofia seems to be generally accurate, that of the 12,261 coins in Varna is full of obvious errors. It frequently happens, for example, that all Varna coins of a certain reverse type will be reported under just one Cohen number with that type, overlooking date and obverse variants, whereas the Sofia coins of the same type will be carefully divided among all the applicable Cohen numbers and footnotes recording variants not in Cohen. To take one example, the common denarius of Septimius Severus with the type Victory holding garland over shield and date TR P VIII, Cohen 454, is reported to have been present in 157 specimens in Sofia but none in Varna, whereas the very rare variant of the same type with date TR P VIIII, Cohen 457, allegedly occurred in no specimens in Sofia but 21 in Varna! Obviously the 21 Varna specimens too almost certainly all read TR P VIII and have simply been misreported. It is essential when using the publication, then, not just to read off the alleged total numbers of each type, but to accept those numbers as correct only when they are composed of about 5/6 to 6/7 Sofia coins and 1/6 to 1/7 Varna coins, and to assume an error and attempt to correct it in all other cases. Until now scholars and other users of the publication have generally not recognized its defects and have therefore accepted the printed specimen totals without question, so introducing significant errors into their own works.
The listing of the Varna coins is inaccurate in another way too: three rarer and more valuable groups of coins were apparently removed from the Varna section of the hoard before it was published, i.e. were doubtless stolen and sold. According to the publication, there were 54 denarii of Pertinax in the Sofia portion of the hoard, but only 1 in Varna; 70 denarii of Aquilia Severa in Sofia but only 1 in Varna; and 71 denarii of Orbiana in Sofia but none whatever in Varna. It cannot be mere coincidence that these three rare personages were so poorly represented or totally absent in Varna. There should have been 7 or 8 denarii of Pertinax and 10 or 11 each of Aquilia Severa and Orbiana in the Varna section of the hoard. These apparently missing Varna coins should be added to the published totals when judging the relative rarity of denarii of these three personages on the basis of the Reka Devnia figures. Fortunately the coins of other rare personages were present in the expected numbers in Varna so were evidently not looted: so the published Varna coins include 13 denarii of Nero, 8 of Galba, 7 of Otho, 22 of Vitellius, 24 of Aelius Cassar, 21 of Clodius Albinus, 51 of Macrinus, 18 of Diadumenian, and 42 of Julia Paula.
curtislclay:
(cont.)
A modern republication of this hoard would be extremely valuable, but will probably never come about. In the 1970s Dr. H.-D. Schultz, the curator of Roman coins in Berlin, was allowed to consult the Reka Devnia denarii of Lucilla in Sofia, but I believe he is the only scholar to have been granted access to the Sofia section of the hoard since World War II. Others desiring to view the Sofia coins have been turned down with excuses such as that the coins had to be individually catalogued before they could be shown or that they had been deposited in the National Bank for safekeeping. In the late 1980s or early 1990s the Numismatic Institute of the University of Vienna, Austria, conceived the project of sending teams of professors and students to Bulgaria in order to photograph and republish the Reka Devnia coins, but despite contacts to the Bulgarian academic community the Institute was not permitted access to the Sofia portion of the hoard and the project fizzled. The relevant correspondence is archived in the Institute's library in Vienna. Inquiring about the Reka Devnia denarii of Otho in Sofia via a Bulgarian professor in 1997, Dr. Jyrki Muona of Helsinki was informed that the coins were "unexpectedly 'totally unavailable' "! One has to fear that some of the rarer and more valuable coins in the Sofia section of the hoard may have suffered the same fate as the Pertinaxes, Aquilia Severas, and Orbianas at Varna!
Curtis L. Clay
Chicago, Illinois
January 2003
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