Did ancient Greek Bactrian counterfeiters do gold coins?

[Lloyd Taylor]

Ancient Greek silver coinage frequently exhibits test cuts, presumably aimed at establishing the silver metallic composition of the core of a coin.  This is consistent with a high incidence of counterfeits in circulation at the time; estimates range 2-5% of silver coinage in circulation.  Ancient gold coins on the other hand appear to be rarely test cut, with the exception noted below.  Possibly, the high density of gold made it more difficult to make a credible counterfeit gold coin. Also with gold valued at roughly 10-14 times silver by weight, gold coinage was probably the basis of large official transactions, rather than day to day transactions, making it more difficult to pass-off fake gold coins.

However, in mid third century BC Greek Bactria the situation appears to be reversed.  Silver coins of Diodotos and successor kings are infrequently test cut, while the majority of the gold staters of Diodotos I & II bear test cuts, precisely and consistently placed on the obverse image of the ruler in a manner that does not disrupt the facial features in any way (example below). 

Because of the great number of specimens exhibiting the test cut, almost always on the rear of the head of Diodotos, it has been suggested that the purpose of the cut was official, but a rationale for this is not apparent. Frank Holt in Thundering Zeus suggested that it was to reduce the weight standard from 8.6 gm to 8.3 gm during Euthydemos' revolt under Diodotos II.  However, test cuts do not remove metal, only displace it and thus do not impact coin weight.  Moreover, many lower weight specimens without the test cut have appeared in the market in recent years, supposedly sourced from a hoard found in India.

Did Bactrian counterfeiters seek to replicate the gold coins of Diodotos, to the extent that most gold coinage was subject to an official test cut?   If so, was this a strategy in the struggle for supremacy between Diodotos and Euthydemos, with the latter perhaps seeking to undermine confidence in the currency of the former?

Does anyone know of comparable examples of testing of ancient gold coins? Do gold fourees even exist?

[archivum]

The more or less uniform placement of these cuts may simply be aimed at the coins' thickest point, where a core of non-gold might be easiest to reach; I don't think an official test-cutter would mangle a coin quite so forcefully.

[Lloyd Taylor]

The more or less uniform placement of these cuts may simply be aimed at the coins' thickest point, where a core of non-gold might be easiest to reach; I don't think an official test-cutter would mangle a coin with quite this much force:

Which would confirm that these are genuine test cuts, implying that ancient Greek, or at least Bactrian gold coinage was subject to counterfeit activity.  But where are the fourrees? And why was counterfeiting gold coinage apparently limited to Bactria?

[archivum]

I remember poor fourres of several gold goins, from Lydian and Lesbian and Alexander III staters and fractions to late Roman and Byzantine tremissis; you're right that they're relatively rare, since it's hard to make weight without making the coin oddly thick.  But technologies differ, and maybe the Bactrians' counterfeiting-technology made the test-cut especially helpful there.

[Lloyd Taylor]

Thanks for the info regarding gold counterfeit activity elsewhere in the Greek and Roman periods. The scale of of the test cutting of gold coinage in Bactria is anomalously large and suggests to me that it was a response to some crisis of confidence in the official gold coinage of the time.  The period in which it occurred appears to be pretty narrowly defined, ca 230-225 BC based on Holt's studies. This is co-incident with the struggle for power between the incumbent king, Diodotos I, and the usurper and eventual successor, Euthydemos I, so it may be related to attempts of the latter to subvert the currency of the former via counterfeit production.  I guess the proof awaits the discovery of Bactrian gold fourrees!

[Volodya]

I assume these were simply test cut further east in India proper, where Bactrian coinage was not well-known and not automatically trusted.

Phil Davis

[Lloyd Taylor]

Good point and possible in so far as most of the examples in the market are reported to have come from an Indian hoard. But it still begs some questions and explanation:

The contrary argument is that Bactrian silver coins from Indian hoards show few, if any test cuts and I am unaware of any Diodotid silver that shows comparable deep test cuts.  I would expect Bactrian silver sourced from Indian hoards to have undergone comparable testing, but we have no examples of this.

Moreover, the precise and consistent placement of the cuts is unparalleled, to the best of my knowledge, in other test cut coin series (gold or silver), suggesting some official basis of testing by an administration aligned with Diodotos. There is no defacement, via test cut, on any known example of the face of Diodotos which is unusual if it was simply a market based practice of testing an unusual foreign coin. If the Indian origin of the test cuts is the case, then I would anticipate greater randomness to be exhibited in the placement of the cuts.

[archivum]

I agree these are targeted cuts, but still not necessarily official.*  Suppose there was a particular issue of Diodotos gold counterfeits with a small core of silver or bronze lurking there in the thick; the large value-differential would make this particular scam fairly profitable even if the coin's bulk were good gold.  Once discovered, this scam might well lead to test-cutting of all the coins, there in the thick.  Of course it would be handy to have that one telltale example, a counterfeit bearing this particular cut, but would that one be likely to last long enough to oblige? Mind, an "outed" gold fourre of this sort might be worth more scrapped than returned to exchange with its bogus showing.

   *There are plenty of targeted cuts on Athenian and Macedonian tetradrachms; they go for the heads and and the flanks, where the coin's at its thickest.

[bpmurphy]

You see similar chisel marks on Roman aurei found in India. Here the chisel marks are similarly found on the head of the issuing authority. The cut aurei are always heavily worn and are only the heavy, pre-reform of 64 AD aurei, not on later issues. It has been suggested by Tara Hellings that this occured during Trajan's recoinage in 107 AD when all the old, worn out coinage was removed from circulation. Those that were too heavily worn were demonetized with a chisel mark and sold to the bullion markets in the east.

I think the same thing happened to the staters of Diodotos. The chisel mark across the head was a way to demonetize the issues of Diodotos, probably done by Euthdemos and his supporters after the defeat of Diodotos in 225 BC. The cut on the head was an insult to the defeated Diodotos and showed anyone trying to use the coin that it had lost it's value as a unit of money. These coins were no longer staters, they were just bullion. This prevented the coins from reentering circulation so that the only gold issues in circulation with value would have been the issues of Euthydemos.

Interestingly, in both cases (Diodotos and Roman times) you don't see the silver issues with chisel marks. Why? Perhaps it was realized that there were just too many silver coins around to make test cutting them all impossible. Perhaps because of the lower value of silver it was easier to demonetize the silver issues with a pronouncment instead of actually defacing them. Or perhaps the silver issues weren't demonetized, just the gold.

In both cases I don't think we are looking at "test cuts" in the usual sense of a test cut being used to check for authenticity. A test cut could be done anyhwere on the coin. The fact that in both cases you have the marks being applied across the issuer's head suggests a different reason for the marks and to me demonetization makes the most sense. Under Euthydemos it was done for political/propoganda reasons, in Roman times for practical reasons.

Barry Murphy

[Lloyd Taylor]

Barry - Thanks for a great explanation, the first I've seen that seems to reconcile all the known facts. It is a pretty compelling explanation and one that fits very well with the inferred history of the dynastic change that occurred from Diodotos II to Euthydemos I. 

In support of it, I also recall that in Thundering Zeus, Frank Holt noted that the gold issues that featured Diodotos I, issued posthumously by his son Diodotos II, (Holt's Series B) seemed to be free of cuts.  This could be out of respect for the memory of the original founder of an independent Bactria, or more likely reflect a concession to popular opinion of the founder of the state who had also successfully fended off a  Parthian invasion under Arsaces.  Much of the populace probably saw Diodotos I as a true "Soter", while his son possibly was perceived to be the opposite, having done a deal with Arsaces after his father's death.  Under these circumstances, Euthydemos probably would be reluctant to move in a manner completely counter to popular opinion by defacing/demonetizng the gold posthumous issues celebrating the founder and protector of an independent Bactria, Diodotos I.

It also occurs to me that demonetizating the coin may not have been the ultimate purpose of the cut.  Rather, in the context of propaganda it may have been used to signify the passing of a regime, the death of the king at the hands of the usurper... perhaps by a blow to the head! A bit fanciful, but it would send a powerful message about the "new guy in town" in the days before newspaper, television and internet.  In such a context it was an official cut, precisely placed to send a message to the people.

Thanks again for providing a previously undocumented, new explanation that reconciles the known facts.

[napki]

It also occurs to me that demonetizating the coin may not have been the ultimate purpose of the cut.  Rather, in the context of propaganda it may have been used to signify the passing of a regime, the death of the king at the hands of the usurper... perhaps by a blow to the head! A bit fanciful, but it would send a powerful message about the "new guy in own" in the days before newspaper, television and internet.  In such a context it was an official cut, precisely placed to send a message to the people.

Unless the coin circulate at significant premium like copper coin, how then "demonetize" gold? Gold is gold. If it then become unlawful to use coin of this ruler, why they not melted down? I like better this idea of political message. However, I like even better idea that they simple test cuts (occam's razor) probably by same hand who like to chop at one particular point.

[bpmurphy]

Most of them probably were melted down. We have only a couple hunderd that survive today. You'll also notice that nearly all the know test cut examples are in EF or better condition, suggesting that they didn't circulate after they were cut. If these were simple test cuts in order to check authenticity, you'd expect them to have circulated after being cut.

While there's no evidence for this, I'd hypothesize that these coins were booty capture by Euthydemos. He had debts to pay and used the captured coins. Not wanting them to re-enter circualtion he had them test cut on the head and used them strictly as bullion.

Barry Murphy

[Lloyd Taylor]

I think Barry has hit the nail on the head with this explanation.

After a bitter struggle the usurper defeats the incumbent king and claims the royal treasury.  Heavily indebted the usurper finds the  royal treasury almost bare of silver coinage due to his opponents high spend during struggle for power. High value gold coinage forms the bulk of what remains in the royal treasury.  Pressured by troops and debtors for payment and unable to spare the time to mint new coinage, he has the image of the old king wacked and distributes the gold coinage to clear his debts.  In doing so, he makes no uncertain statement on the coinage as to who is in control.

Elegantly simple, it satisfies the test of Occam’s razor.  No need to invoke official action associated with coinage weight reduction, or high levels of gold counterfeit activity to explain the anomalously high incidence of what have been inappropriately described as “test” cuts, or the need to invoke testing of coins in unfamiliar territory to that in which the coinage was struck.  The misleading aspect of Bactrian numismatic studies to date appears to have been to describe the cuts to rear top of Diodotos head on gold coinage as “test cuts”.

No proof of this will ever be forthcoming, but it is a most satisfying and simple explanation to what has been a perplexing (for me at least) problem.

Thanks to everyone for the input.  Now all I need to find is a lazy couple of grand to purchase one of these pieces of dynastic change. 

Hey Joe (aka Mr Sermarini) how about a juicy discount on one of these items in your store?
https://www.forumancientcoins.com/catalog/roman-and-greek-coins.asp?srch=2&pos=1&attribution=&grade=&what=baktria&B1=Search&category=&metal=&denomination=&pricel=&priceh=&obvinsc=&obvdesc=&revinsc=&revdesc=&status=available&B1=Search