In connection with the Plevna
hoard,
Mattingly attempted to reconstruct the coinage of
Trajan Decius, and to identify what particular
style of
obverse portrait was used in each
officina.
The illustrations to
his article, pl. XVIII-XIX, are all cited in connection with this reconstruction. Apparently the coins illustrated are not Plevna coins at all, but BM coins! Apart from the four illustrated Divi coins which did not occur in the
hoard, note pl. XIX.1-5 with Decius' latest
obverse legends, which were also totally absent in the
hoard. I suspect Joachim will find that the four Divi coins illustrated in the article are BM coins that are
still in the
collection today.
It is a little confusing that
Mattingly does not specify that the illustrated coins are NOT from the
hoard, and that he does not tell us what happened to the
hoard coins, only that they were "examined and noted at the British Museum." I would presume that the coins belonged to a collector or dealer and that
Mattingly compiled a written
catalogue of them only, without making plaster casts or photos of them. When he came to write
his article on the
hoard, he could therefore only use BM coins to illustrate
his points!