Thanks for the info! I just ordered the books. You have to be careful where you look ... one site listed the Agora Vol 26 book at $4,000! I got one for $80.
Is it safe to assume that silver and gold coins were done the same way?
You'll enjoy the books. The Agora volume is particularly informative dealing with over 17,000 Greek (not just Athenian) coins found in the Agora excavations. Beautifully documented and illustrated its a wonderful blending of archeology,
numismatics and
history. The Halieis volume is equally fascinating dealing with this little known but remarkably preserved fortified site which was abandoned for reasons unknown in the 3rd century BC. The information gleaned ion the construction of classical and early Hellenistic fortifications is wonderful. The book is very well illustrated with diagrams and photos although the
quality of the images for Chapters 8 & 9 (the
Mint and Coins) is less than great. A brief summary of the site:
http://home.comcast.net/~btse1/halieis/history/history.htmWith respect to coin manufacture quite different processes
applied to precious metal and base metal coinages. It appears that in
Athens the precious metal coinage was produced at a different
mint to the base metal coinage (at least no evidence of co-incidence in minting has been found in excavations). Halieis was a relatively
poor city and with the exception of a handful of
rare silver obols, never struck precious metal coinage, probably relying on the precious metal coinage struck at its neighboring parent city Hermione. In some other excavations there is evidence for the possibility that bronze coin manufacture may have been outsourced or contracted out by civic authorities to families as a domestic
home industry and the Halies volume touches on this possibility.
Silver and gold flans were
cast in molds from carefully weighed quantities of metal so as to conform to the
weight standard -
weights were checked at every step of the minting process to ensure tight compliance with the applicable
weight standard - typically +/- 2% for Gold and +/-5% for Silver.
Bronze on the other hand was only about 100th the value of silver by
weight so that no such care was necessary in
flan and coin manufacture. As a result speed and efficiency in manufacture determined the process which was to cut bronze rods and/or bars by a chisel blow into a rough length and
weight chunk, then
flatten and shape the chunk of cut metal with a few hammer blows prior to heating and striking. This is why the Bronze coinages rarely adhere to any defined
weight standard and show an enormous dispersion in
weights for any
denomination (which as much as anything is based on
flan diameter as well as
weight and often with differentiated design from one
denomination to the other). These points are amply demonstrated with the metrological studies to be found in the two articles.
I am sure you'll enjoy both volumes for they really add a huge amount of context and insight to the
numismatics of this period of Greek
history (350 BC-267 AD). Also if you are remotely interested in archaeology then they afford a nice insight into the practical basis and methodology of the subject as
applied to two sites over many years of excavation.
