METAL ANALYSIS OF TWENTY TETRARCHY ARGENTEUS and TWENTY FOLLIS ( A long post).

[hposner]

METAL ANALYSIS OF TWENTY TETRARCHY  ARGENTEUS and TWENTY FOLLIS
( A very long post)

I recently had some Tetrarchy coins  analysed for their metal content. Two groups of coin were tested. The first group was 20 GENIO POPULI ROMANI post reform billon follis, with assorted levels of surface silvering still visible, from seven mints (Treveri x 5, Heraclea, Alexandria x 8, Londinium, Cyzicus x 2, Thessalonika and Antioch x 2), all struck between 295 and 306 ce. The second was 20 argenteus from nine  mints (Treveri x 3, Rome x 7, Alexandria, Siscia x 2, Cyzicus, Thessalonika, Antioch x 3, Aquilea x 1and Nicomedia  x 1), all struck between 294 and 302 ce.  
   I needed the analysis to be non-destructive ( they were my coins), and couldn't get access to the most sophisticated methods that can penetrate right through the metal, so I settled for a spectroscopic analysis which penetrates about 1.3 mm into the surface. The analysis was done professionally, using  a properly calibrated DELTA Premium Handheld XRF Analyser, which is primarily used in the field for mine ore  assay work, and for the technically minded uses a 4W Rh, Au, or Ta anode X-ray tube as it's excitation source. The machine claims a penetration of up to 2 millimetres into the metal but the technicians running the test said that in reality about 1.4 millimetres is more realistic.
   The current literature says that average silver content of  a post reform tetrarchy follis between 293 and 303 ce should be about 3%, and that the argenteus had a silver content of over 90%, averaging at about 93 %.  The raw data from the testing, and a detailed description of each coin tested is  in the appendix. The sample size is less than I would have wished for, but  it seems worth posting the results and my tentative analysis, as there doesn't seem to be much  around recently on this topic, and the relative values of Tetrarchy Aureus, Argenteus, Follis and Aurelianii is a hotly debated  subject .

RESULTS

1) The 20 billon follis (nummus?) GENIO POPULI ROMANI coins.

All the coins tested were confirmed as copper/silver alloy with trace tin and lead, the copper content ranging from a high of 87.25% to a low of 64%, and the silver from 16.82% down to 3.4%. here was also quite a high lead content, from a low of 1.14% to a high of 17.18%.
The mean  silver content was 7.94% per coin , and copper 80.22% per coin. There was also a mean of 5.6% lead and 2.49% tin in each coin.
   I knew that the  results would be of limited use in determining overall silver content for the billon coins because of the different composition due to silvering near the surface, and I am aware of the statistical issues with such a small sample but I was interested to see if the least well preserved coins, that had no remaining visible silver and had been worn down so that the spectroscopic analysis was of metal closer to their core, showed a silver content that approximated to that predicted in the literature. I was also interested in differences between the coins and if I could find any pattern, and  expected the follis in general to show comparative silver contents roughly proportionate to the amount of  visible silvering. Of the twenty coins tested, five had full silvering and the  features on the coin were in  EF condition so they had lost little if any of their original content, six  had what I have called half silvering left , four had some traces of silvering but not many, and five had no visible silvering at all and were well worn down.
   The first hypothesis I tested was that the coins with most or all of their silvering visible would show a higher silver content with this type of analysis  than those with less visible silvering. I was surprised to discover that at least with my sample, they did not. The five coins that had the best visible silvering and were in the best condition  had silver contents of 4.47%, 3.59%, 13.25%, 9.48%, and 6.12% respectively for an mean average of 7.38%. The six coins that had some but not all their visible surface silvering intact ( the ones I called 'half-silvered') had silver contents of  8.68%, 16.82%, 10.49%, 11.25%, 9.61% and 8% for an average of 10.81%. The four coins with bare traces of silvering left had silver contents of  8.73%, 3.64%, 6.76% and 8.91% for an average of 7.01%. The five 'worst' coins, with no silvering left at all, well-worn and VF at best, had silver contents of 7.07%, 6.49%, 4.65%, 7.44% and 3.4%, for an average of 5.81%.    
   Some coins with  full silvering left on them were showing silver contents half as high as some completely denuded of all visible surface silver. The highest mean average silver content was shown in coins with half their surface visible silver denuded. The mean average silver content was almost the same for  fully silvered and barely silvered coins. On balance, there is not much  discernable co-relation between the visible silvering on the surface of the coins and their silver content. That content  differed widely, but not directly proportionate to visible silvering. The amount of silver in a tetrarchy coin is not related to how 'silvery' it looks, so whatever method was being used to give the surface silvering, it was not a layer, however thin, of pure silver.
   Next I looked at the  data by date of striking. Some of the coins  are difficult to tie down to a specific year, so I have divided them into three broad  categories. Seven coins were struck after 294 ce ( obviously, because that is when the  reform happened and they started to be produced) but before 300 ce. Seven coins were definitely struck in 300 or 301 ce, and six coins were struck between 300 ce and 307ce ( it is possible some of the last group were struck in 300 or 301 ce). The proportions of fully silvered, half silvered, barely silvered and no longer silvered  coins in each of these groups are well distributed (See chart 1), making it unlikely that the results are a reflection of visible or coin quality.  

CHART 1.
                           296-299 ce   300-301 ce   300-306 ce
Fully silvered                1                        3                         1
Half silvered                2                        1                         3
Trace silvering                2                      1                         1
No visible silvering        2                        2                         1


   The average silver content in the early group (296-299ce) is 8.42%, with a high of 16.82% and a low of 4.47%. Average copper content is 80.216%. The mid group (300-301ce) has an average silver content of 8.99% with a high of 13.25% and a low of 6.12%. Average copper is 82.49. The late group ( 300-306ce) has an average silver content of 6.15% with a high of 9.61% and a low of 3.4%. Average copper for this group was 79.92.
       The copper content is consistent over all the groups, with the mean for all three groups within  3% of each other in copper content at around 80%. The silver content varied by much more. The coins struck  in the late period had on average 30% less silver in them than the earlier groups.
   There does seem to have been a general debasement of the silver content in the coins struck after 300 ce. Six of the seven coins in the middle group ( 300-301ce) come from one mint, Alexandria, which as I discuss below, may be a more important factor than date of striking, but the debasement applies equally when compared to the earliest  group, which had a good spread of mints.
   The last arrangement of the data I made was to look at  metal content by mint. Many of the mints are represented by just a single sample, but it seemed worthwhile to at least try and separate by geography as well as condition and  date of striking. Two mints are well represented, with eight coins from Alexandria  and five from Treveri. There are two coins each from Cyzicus and Antioch and one from Londinium, Heraclea and Thessalonika.
Two of the mints ( Treveri and Londinium) are in the Roman west, Maximian's territory rather than Diocletian's. Six of the coins were struck in those two mints, the remaining 14 at mints in the Eastern Empire governed by Diocletian. The six western coins average silver content is 4.74%, the  eastern 14 coins average is 9.31% , more than double. The difference cannot be explained by coin quality, amount of visible surface silver, or the dates the coins were struck, as there is a good spread of quality and striking dates in both Western  and Eastern mints. ( see charts 2 and 3)


CHART 2.
                    Western mints   Eastern mints
Fully silvered                2                          3
Half silvered                                             6
Trace silvering                2                          2
No visible silvering        2                          3

There is also a good spread of dates in both groups,  ( see chart 3)
 
CHART 3
               Western mints   Eastern mints
296-299 ce      3                           4
300-301 ce                                    7
300-306 ce      3                           3

The five coins with the lowest silver content of the entire sample are all from the Western mints. Two of those are fully silvered EF coins, so Maximian's mints were striking  inferior coins to Diocletian's, even though they looked identical. Not all coins had mintmarks on them and there must have been practical problems in having identical looking coins with such large differences in intrinsic value. The literature predicted a lower silver content in Western minted coins, but  the difference is startling and occurred from the very beginning of the minting of the new reformed coinage.
   The Western mints also seem to be using more tin in their alloys. The mean tin content per coin from Western mints is 3.4%, while in the eastern mints it is only 2.09%. The five coins with the highest tin content  were all from Western mints, perhaps lending some indirect evidence  for the importance of the Cornish tin mines, which would have been much more accessible to a Western mint than an Eastern one. It would be really interesting to test the tin content of various coins during the earlier ten years of Carausius and Allectus Gallo-British revolt.
   The lead content of the coins varies more than most of the other metals. There is a mean content of 5.6% lead per coin, but it varies from a low of 0.97% to a high of  17.18%, and there is no  apparent correlation based on  coin quality,  date of striking, or the part of the Empire the coin was struck in. There is one  very clear pattern. The Alexandria mint used much less lead in its alloys than any other mint, Western or Eastern. The mean lead content  from the eight Alexandrian coins is 2.11%, while for the other 12 coins from six different mints the mean is 7.97%, close to four times the lead content. No coin from any other mint has a lead content of less than 3.6%, and the seven coins with the  lowest lead content ( all below 2.7%) are all in the Alexandrian sample.
   Alexandrian coins also had a comparatively high silver content, at  9.14%, well above the mean of the coins from all the other mints of 7.14%. It appears from the  data that Alexandria was using a completely different recipe for their billon alloy than anywhere else. They had  only just stopped minting their own currency based on a billon tetradrachma and started using Roman denominations. It would be interesting to analyse some Egyptian Tetradrachmas from the late third century ce to see if they also had  a very low lead content.
The sole coin from Thessalonika, with about half it's surface silver still visible, has a decent silver  percentage at 8.68%, but a completely different  alloy mixture with only  66% copper and a lead content of over 17%. Unfortunately a sample of one has no statistical validity but it would be worthwhile to test a few more Thessalonika Follis if I can get my hands on them.

2) The 20 Argenteus coins.
These coins do not have a  surface coating, and are supposed to be silver all the way down, so in theory spectroscopy should give a more accurate  picture of the metal content than for the follis. The coins analysed  range in date from 294 ce to 302 ce. Nine mints are represented. Rome has seven coins, Treveri and Antioch have  three each, and Siscia has two.  Alexandria, Cyzicus, Thessalonika, Aquilea and Nicomedia are represented by one coin each. Unlike the 20 alloy coins, all the Argenteus  show very similar characteristics. The mean silver content is 96.65% which is  higher than the literature predicted. There is very little  deviation from that norm, whether  the coin was struck in 294 or 302 ce, and  whatever mint  it was truck in. The  coin with the least silver content ( struck in Treveri between 295 and 297 ce) has 95.33% silver, and the coin with the highest ( struck in 302 ce at Thessalonika) has 98.69%. Fifteen of the coins fall within one percentage point of the mean. The one Western mint, Treveri still has the two coins with the lowest silver content, and three of the lowest five, but the debasement is far less, at barely 1%.
   The other metals in the coins, at least from this surface analysis, are comparatively insignificant, with no other metal in any of the coins at more than 1.6%. There are trace amounts of Tungsten, Iron and copper in all of the coins, and trace amounts of lead, Alumina and sulphur in most of them. For most intents and purposes, the Argenteus was a pure silver bullion coin, minted at a carefully controlled weight of 96 to the Roman pound advertised (at first) on the coins reverse.
If anyone looking at this has any suggestions, criticisms or corrections I would be delighted to hear them. I am very much feeling my way into this. My email is hposner@bigpond.net.au

Howard Posner.         August 2014.

[hposner]

Sorry, I know this is cheating, but i thought the raw data might be useful, so here it is as a separate post.

APPENDIX 1. THE FOLLIS.


silvering Emperor   date  range  mint  RIC VI   Cu(copper) Ag(silver)  Pb(lead)  Sr(tin)  Si(silicon)
traces    diocletian   295   295      treveri   152a   83.39   8.73         4.57        0.2   1.28
nil         galerius   298   299       treveri   375b   80.02   4.65         9.41       3.17   1.25
full          maximian   296   297      treveri   187b   82.7            4.47      4.83       3.45   1.52
traces     diocletian   300   305       treveri   583e   83.4       3.64         4.59       5.09   1.34
full         constantius 303   305       treveri   594b   77.88   3.59         8.73       5.33   1.4
half         maximian   302   303       thessal. 25b           66.58   8.68        17.18       2.1   3.1
nil         diocletian   303   305       londinium 6           82.27   3.4         4.94      3.26   1.74
traces    constantius 297   298      heraclea 20a           77.39   6.76         9.33     1.98   1.98
nil         maximian   297   299      cyzicus   12b           84.18   7.07         3.68     1.78   1.68
half         diocletian   295   296       cyzicus   10a           64.87   16.82    11.32     2.31   2.35
half         maximian   297   297       antioch   48b           74.82   10.49     9.95      1.8   1.32
nil         maximian   300   301       antioch   54b           76.69   7.44         7.2     2.43   4.57
full        diocletian   301   301    alexandria32a(3)   78.99   13.25     2.76     2.06   1.41
half        diocletian   301   301    alexandria32a(1)   81.89   11.25     1.97     2.12   1.32
half        galerius   306   306    alexandria33b(1)   84.02   9.61       1.14     2.41   1.39
full        galerius   301   301    alexandria33b(2)   84.02   9.48         2.04     2.44   1.6
traces   galerius   300   300   alexandria31b           80.35   8.91         4.96     2.17   1.8
half       maximian   302   303   alexandria34b           85.4           8         1.57     2.09      1.44
nil      constantius   300   300   alexandria31a           87.25   6.49         1.47    2.08   1.19
full       diocletian   301   301   alexandria32a(2)   88.21   6.12         0.97    1.54   1.54








APPENDIX 2. THE ARGENTEUS.

Emperor   date  mint         RIC VI Ag(silver) Al(alumi) W(tungs) S(sulph) CU(copper)Pb(lead) Fe(iron)
diocletian   300-301   treveri 119a   95.78   1.19      0.88       0               1.31      0.5         0.2
maximian   295-297   treveri 104b   95.33   1.17      0.86       0.31   1.64              0.38   0.17
constantius295-297   treveri 110a   96           1.07    0.88       0.31   1.1               0.4   0.12
galerius   302   thessalonika16b   98.69   0      0.4       0.28   0.22              0.12   0.18
maximian   294   siscia       34b   96.65   1.15      0.5       0.57   0.39              0.26   0.2
diocletian   295   siscia       59   96.71   1.06      0.77       0.58   0.34              0.16   0.25
constantius295-297   rome   35a   95.79   1.2      0.84       0.44   0.97      0.38   0.26
diocletian   294   rome      27a   96.61   1.16      0.78       0.43   0.41             0.27   0.22
constantius295-297   rome  42a1   96.57   1.14      1.34       0.3   0.2              0.1   0.14
constantius295-297   rome   38a   95.87   1.11      0.97        0          1.12             0.49       0.28
constantius295-297   rome   42a3   96.23   1.01      0.99       0.5   0.52            0.24   0.35
galerius   294   rome      11b   97.83   0      0.83        0.29   0.49             0.1          0.33
galerius   295-297   rome   42b   97.7           0       0.8         0.34    0.44      0.3       0.29
diocletian   295-296   nicomedia   25a   96.14   1.05      1.08       0.45   0.5             0.39   0.24
galerius   294-295   cyzicus   6   97.02   0      0.81       0          1.36            0.51   0.15
maximian   300   aquilea      16b   97.84   0      1.04       0.32   0.28            0.16   0.2
galerius   298   antioch      43b   96.39   1.07      0.69       0           0.99            0.55   0.18
diocletian   298   antioch     42a2   97.28   1.04      0.87      0.32   0.14             0          0.22
maximian   297   antioch     37b   96.39   0.96      1.19      0.34   0.48          0.22          0.21
galerius   300   alexandria Unlisted   96.24   1.29      1.56      0.32   0.22           0.08          0.15

[stlnats]

Interesting analysis.  Altho it results in small sample sizes, the breakdown by period was a good idea.  Not quite sure what to make of the results for the folles which are so different (~100% higher AR content) than other analyses I've seen altho it appears that the mean is driven by eastern coins.  One suggestion is that it would be helpful to have the weights of the folles analyzed.  Thanks for sharing!

PS, don't have my RIC handy but I do notice that most of the Alexandrian coins were marked with XXI, commonly considered contemporary with Dio's attempt at price controls  and perhaps a revaluation of some coins.  Not sure of the significance, but they do represent a coherent group which might differ from coins produced at other mints and earlier times.  

Also, it would be interesting to see what results you get with modern coins of known content as a validation of the technology.  You'd want to include something like a 40% silver Kennedy half dollar, a post 1983 US cent, and maybe a US "war nickel" which have unusual metal combinations.

[Lech Stępniewski]

Great work! It would be more convenient to have this analysis in one pdf file (with pictures of all analyzed coins, if possible).

BTW. Could you post on FORVM nice picture of this unlisted argenteus from Alexandria, please? With all relevant data.

[PeterD]

Many metals are found together, especially silver and lead. So it is likely that for silvering folles, different mints had access to silver of different purities depending on where their supplies came from. The only requirement was to make folles look silver to differentiate them from other denominations.

[hposner]

hi,
  Lech asked me to post details about the unlisted Alexandria Argenteus which is one of the coins I tested.
  Forum already knows about it as Lech wrote it up himself. The link is
https://www.forumancientcoins.com/notinric/6ale-13b_g.html

I was the dude who bought the coin this year for $300, which I was delighted to pay even though it has been overcleaned. I can confirm it weighs 2.95 grams,
and that like the other Alexandria mint coins i tested, it has a really low lead content compared to argenteus from other mints.

The details are as Lech listed,
OBVERSE
 MAXIMIA-NVSCAESAR [MAXIMIANVS CAESAR]; head r., laur.
 
REVERSE
 VIRTVS-MILITVM [VIRTVS MILITVM]; three-turreted camp-gate, open; no doors. Γ in right field. ALE in exergue.
 
NOT IN RIC
 UNLISTED OBVERSE LEGEND. RIC lists only shorter legend MAXIMIANVS CAES [ALEXANDRIA 13b]. Coin should be listed before ALEXANDRIA 13b.

The wall is nine rows high, and the date on Antioch coins that exactly match it in legend  and illustrations is 295 ce.
 
I enclose a picture of it.

[SC]

Howard,

Thanks for posting the results of your very interesting study.

I have some questions about the process you used.

Was the distance to the coin always the same?  Did you have the Delta premium XRF detector in a jig or was it hand held and if so was there a set distance to each coin?

Did you measure each coin/spot once only or are your figures an amalgam of several measurements?

Did you measure more than one spot on any coin?

Were the coins prepared in any was first?  Had they been cleaned and if so how?

Shawn

[SEstiot]

Quite a fascinating post, as there has been very few non-destructive modern analysis on this subject, and we miss some cross-checking of the results through different methods.
It would be great to give your Annexes in a .xls or .pdf format as presently they aren't quite understandable.
S. Estiot

[Roma_Orbis]

Thought it could be useful to have the raw data put into an Excel sheet, with associated charts per mint.

Jérôme

(UPDATED with charts for Annex 2)

[hposner]

To Jerome  and Shawn,

Jerome, many thanks for aligning my hopelessly skewed  post, ( sorry, not proficient enough with  this medium to correctly accent your name). I liked the additional data arrangements too. Looking forward to appendix 2.

Shawn, the answers to your questions.
1) In jig,
2) A millimetre  or so away, effectively touching the coins
3) Single pass for each coin.
4) Each pass was taken from approximate centre of the flan.
5) No prior preparation or special cleaning of the coins.

For anyone who is interested, the reason I did the test in the first place was because I have a  reasonably well developed theory that the exchange values for the coins in circulation in 301 ce, when the Diocletian's price edictwas published were 4, 25 and 100 denarii for Diocletian era aurelianii, post reform follis and  argenteus respectively. This differs from all the published suggestions. It is a  set of values, based on prices when  the edict was published. It all went wrong pretty quickly afterwards, but on the day the edict went up, I believe these were the  values.
My theory is based on the surviving epigraphic evidence, which most authors explain away as  'inconvenient truths', the price points chosen for the more common products in the edict, and the intrinsic metal values of the coins.

A brief overview of the theory goes like this.

The epigraphic evidence is primarily in the Aezani fragment of the edict discovered in 1970, which confirms 100 as the  value of the argenteus, and has something ending in ...ti quinquae ... for another coin value, which really does look like VIGinti quinquae, despite the best efforts of the translators do  deny it (K.Erim, J. Reynolds M.Crawford. Diocletian’s Currency Reform: A New Inscription. Journal of Roman Studies Vol 61 (1971) pp171-177). There is also support for a value based on five or twenty five in  Rylands papyrii and Talmudic references to prices, and in the enigmatic Bicharacta coin also mentioned in the Aezani fragment and possibly confirmed in the Mishnah.

The  evidence from the edict is based on the 1203 separate prices in it, and particularly from the more common products, such as  meat, fish, wine, beer, vegetables, fruit and grains. There is a really strong inference that there  must have been a 4 value coin, not just because  so many  goods are priced in units of four, but because often when a product is too cheap for that  units of it  are put together to create a bundle or bunch that can then be priced at  4 denarii. Once there is a 4 value coin in the mix, there has to be a coin with a value ending in 5, or half the goods in the edict can't be paid for as there is no way to give exact change, without having vast amounts of 1 and 2 denarii value coins (which Diocletian was not striking in bulk) sloshing around in people's tunics.

The last plank is the intrinsic value of the coins. No government  ever deliberately mints coins that have more current intrinsic metal value than their face value, as they would immediately be melted down.  Where the relative values between coins get sufficiently out of kilter Gresham's law kicks in. So the intrinsic values of the argenteus, follis and aureliani give  minimum values for them, and the relative intrinsic values between them set perameters for their relationship to each other, at least when the edict was first published.  In the case of the follis most  price points currently suggested are just not possible as they are below the metal value, or ignore the reality of actually paying  in coin for the products in the edict.

I thought that if I could get acurate metal percentages for the relevant coins, given the known cost of copper, silver and gold bullion in the edict, I could test  my model against those values.
So I tested the coins. My results suit my theory, as the silver content in the follis with the copper bullion content gives them ( in the eastern empire)  an intrinsic  of betweena quarter and a fifth of the much smaller argenteus, unlikely though that seems. I am very aware that often data that you want to come out a particular way has a habit of doin so. I would love any more independent data to help confirm (or destroy) my theory.

thanks,howard


 

[Mark Fox]

Dear Howard and Board,

By chance, where did you have the coins analyzed?  You can PM me if you would feel more comfortable doing so.  

Indeed, bicharacta pecunia makes for a fascinating area of study.  

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/lateromancoinage/bicharac.html

To think that we may be this close to actually knowing what the Romans named one of their LRBs!  It is actually a bit embarrassing, when you think that we may know more about the names (at least the denominations) of Ancient South Arabian coinage than the late Roman that many of us collect.  

Am I correct in thinking that the epigraphic evidence seems to refer to the bicharacta moneta as a Pre-Reform coinage?  If so, where do the rare double radiates fit in?  

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/historia/coins/r5/florianus.pdf

http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1671469&partId=1&searchText=Carus+&images=true&page=1

It is late here, so I must be missing a point you made somewhere...        


Best regards,

Mark Fox
Michigan

[hposner]

Hi Mark,
              the company that did the tests for me  is called LMATS ( Laboratories for Material Analysis and Testing Samples). They've got branches round Australia and earn their living primarily from the mining industry, which is huge  in this part of the world.
 The identity of the BICHARACTA coin is anyone's guess. I lean towards it being the post reform  GENIO follis, not the earlier radiates, but  no one knows for sure, which is what makes this stuff so much fun.
My reasons for leaning that way are that the original editors of the fragment with it on thought it might be that, although their explanation for how that fitted with the meaning of bicharacta as ' double stamped' was a bit thin.
(K.Erim, J. Reynolds M.Crawford. Diocletian’s Currency Reform: A New Inscription. Journal of Roman Studies Vol 61 (1971) pp171-177).
I am more persuaded by an unconnected  halachic text that talks about coins called DISGNIM. Disgnim is a hebrew loan word from Latin that means exactly the same thing as Bicharacts does in greek. the text is as gloriously obscure as only a religious tract can be, all second tithes and subsituted money exchangers, but in essence it seems to be saying that the coins were losing their nominal value compared to their official exchange rate between 294 and 307 ce. That makes them very much Dio's silver washed 294 post-reform follis.
The reference to it is in Daniel Sperber. Roman Palestine 200-400: Money and Prices. Bar-Ilan University Press 1991 at p 94-95. The Halachic text is in the Jerusalem Talmud Ma'aser Sheni 1.1
Of course this interpretation suits my theory, so i am biased towards it.
If you've got any other info i'd love to hear it, although i think we may be drifting a bit off topic for this forum.

Howard

[hposner]

Mark,
         My problem with the  radiate theory for the bicharacat is that it is largely dependent on the unpublished, otherwise unprovenanced missing shard that was allegedly seen by John Kent, but not issued and so far not  refound by the British Museum.
I would love to have that confirmed, and have tried various  ways to see if anyone is aware of it, but to no avail. I am not saying it doesn't exist, but it really would be useful if it could be verified  from more than one hearsay source. Sorry if i have offended anyone.

[maximinvs]

A favourite topic of mine Howard!

I thought I would share this chapter, which covers this topic in some detail. Howard, you are well read on the topic so there may not be much in here that is new to you, but the list members might find it interesting:

Hope this works...
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BxLwinlW_uqkX1BnQ1ZObl9zUk0/edit?usp=sharing

Cheers (from downunder)
Ian

[hposner]

Thanks ian. I have been unable to open the  PDF, even through Google Docs. It might be a firewall issue at my work. Do you have it as text or a vanilla PDF?

Howard

[maximinvs]

Sent to your email...