The expense of quadrans

[basemetal]

I'm going to ask a question, and perhaps partially answer it as well.
Quadrans for sale seem to always go for a higher price than their size and of course ancient value would seem to indicate. Of course extremely worn examples go for not that much.   I'm thinking that because of their low value in ancient times, they were traded to the point of slugs, rather than conserved or hoarded and now are relatively rare in comparison to many other coins.  If this is the full truth, I'll just sit and post to myself, and listen to the echoes. 

[slokind]

I'd only add that a smaller and thinner coin takes less chemical action to reduce it to dust; at least, I think so.  Pat L.

[peterpil19]

Both explanations make sense to me, I do not often come across many quadrans for sale, and when I do, they are not often in the highest state of preservation, I'm sure others would agree?

Peter

[jamesicus]

Edited

[peterpil19]

That's a very nice quadrans James.

To qualify my previous statement, quadrans of Trajan are offered quite frequently for sale, particularly on eBay.

Peter

[sid]

High price? I actually thought they were surprisingly cheap. After cleaning about 3000 coins I recently ran across my very first quadrans (Trajan with a wolf reverse), and I couldnt recall anyone else here ever posting an unclean quadrans. I was sure that must mean they are extremely rare. A first or second century coin that the middlemen can't cherry pick like they do the silver or the great big sesterti, so the rarity in uncleaned isn't artificial. In my imagination an ebay dealer who advertised QUADRANS FOUND!!! would only have slightly more credibility than one who said GOLD FOUND. Add to that the fact that it's a coin mentioned in the Bible (not my Trajan of course, and not in most translations, but it's there). Then I looked up what they're selling for. Oh well, I guess I'm not going to be retiring on this one.

[jamesicus]

Edited

[basemetal]

A question to you all:
Didn't quadrans eventually assume the status of tokens rather than an actual spendable coin later in the empire?  And by tokens I mean that one couldn't amass a large number and trade them in for larger value coins.
I may be wrong but I think I read that.

Thanks.

[moonmoth]

I read that Vespasian's tax on the urine used for tanning was collected by having people drop quadrantes in the street containers when they used them.  (Maybe Nero did the same.)  Which led to Vespasian saying "pecunia non olet".  This sounds very picturesque, so is probably not true .. but if it's true, those who like to imagine where their ancient coins may have been will have an interesting time with a quadrans.

[Robert_Brenchley]

How would you enforce that, though? Strikes me it would be completely impractical, and therefore, presumably, untrue. The tax probably came out of the tanners' profits.

[moonmoth]

Vigiles would say "Pay up or take that with you?"  Yes, but it's a nice story, isn't it?  I also heard that Titus once picked up a coin, sniffed it disgustedly and said "One of yours, I think, Father!"  (or similar).

Bill

[Robert_Brenchley]

With no street lights and a bully boy at the urinal demanding a quadrans, the essential urine would surely end up in the nearest dark alley!

[moonmoth]

Also, I wouldn't like to have been the tax collector, though I suppose being a tanner would have been worse.

[Robert_Brenchley]

You'd have your hands in it every day. There were some really disgusting jobs back then.

[basemetal]

Wow!  A literal example of what many of us still do today.
Pissing our money away

[moonmoth]

Urine was also used as a mordant - if you soaked wool in it before dipping it in dye, the dye would stick better and be brighter.  This was essential for good quality togas.  In fact I heard that until quite recently, the House of Lords used to smell of urine because it was used in the manufacture of tweed.

It's such useful stuff that I don't see why we can't get a reduction in tax today based on the amount of urine we can contribute to the government.  (Pause for obligatory joke about what the government extracts from us.)  On the other hand, it's also a source of urea, which is used to make explosives, so there's a danger that if the government knew you were in possession of urine it would render you liable to arrest.

[Numerianus]

In fact, the expresiion "pecunia non olet" comes from a story communicated by Suetonius (Vespasian, 23) to ridiculize the emperor.
I think that  there are no evidences how the tax was collected. Should we imagine companies collecting precious liquid (e.g., in Colloseum ) and selling it to tanners? 

[jamesicus]

Edited

[ecoli]

This brings new meanings to uncleaned coins.

I will stop wondering about where were my coins and who touched them - at least for the Quadrans...

[jamesicus]

Edited

[Robert_Brenchley]

Suetonius, Tiberius, 58. I'm never sure how far to believe this guy, but I'm currently reading Tacitus' Historia, and it'll be interesting to see whether he corroborates the story.

LVIII. It was at about this time that a praetor asked him whether he should have the courts convened to consider cases of lese-majesty; to which he replied that the laws must be enforced, and he did enforce them most rigorously. One man had removed the head from a statue of Augustus, to substitute that of another; the case was tried in the Senate, and since the evidence was conflicting, the witnesses were examined by torture. After the defendant had been condemned, this kind of accusation gradually went so far that even such acts as these were regarded as capital crimes: to beat a slave near a statue of Augustus, or to change one's clothes there; to carry a ring or coin stamped with his image into a privy or a brothel, or to criticize any word or act of his. Finally, a man was put to death merely for allowing an honour to be voted him in his native town on the same day that honours had previously been voted to Augustus.

[basemetal]

IMHO, I think quadrans were just minimally struck because it was cost effective to use a simple repetitive pattern that would not change as a result of a "victory" or in celebration of this or that. One could perhaps ingrave a large number of dies perhaps in advance  and just turn 'em out-the quadrians, I mean.
I am a prime product of "perceived value".  While this thread is going on, I bought 6 quadrans at auction.
Mostly Claudius.  The Nero quadrans are almost always a little expensive, as are all (in decent condition) except Claudius and Trajan.

[Diederik]

There is something else as well; quadrantes and semisses in later years did not weigh half or a quarter of an as.
This would indeed mean that they had token value.

Frans

[jamesicus]

Edited

[Diederik]

It is Vespasian 802, winged caduceus between crossed cornucopiae IMP.VESP.AVG.COS VIII /SC in wreath, described as a semis.
This coin weighs 2.7 grams!

Frans