Numismatic and History Discussion Forums > History and Archeology

Foundation deposits: was there a public ceremony?

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rjohara:
Among the sources of datable ancient coins are foundation deposits: coins that were set into the foundation of a building (such as a temple) when the building was built. The foundation deposit under the temple of Artemis at Ephesus is a famous example, containing a large group of early electrum coins.

I was wondering about the practice of making foundation deposits. Do we have any historical/literary documentation that describes the practice? Something along the lines of, "The people assembled at noon, and after the soothsayer read some entrails, the king took a handful of change from his pocket and tossed it in the hole, just before the crane lowered the cornerstone in place."  ;D

I know foundation deposits pre-date coins, and often contain jewelery and other valuables beside coins. I'm just wondering if we know anything about the ceremony--if there was one--surrounding the placing of a deposit.

RJO

Robert_Brenchley:
The idea was probably to make a sacrifice of something valuable, so it would presumably have been accompanied by prayers and some form of ceremony, but I don't know whether there are any actual records.

Bill Perry:
The tradition of foundation deposits stretches back to the first major builders - the Egyptians (and I mean MAJOR builders).  The greeks probably adopted that tradition from them, the Romans adopted it from them, and most other cultures adopted it from them (George Washington used it :) ). A web reference for the Egyptians would be

http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/foundation.htm

for the Greeks (indirectly) showing other than coins or metals but actually valuable texts...

http://oi.uchicago.edu/OI/MUS/PA/IRAN/PAAI/PAAI_Misc_Finds.html

and the romans I'm sure you have your own references on as you brought it up here :)

wolfgang336:
Not just temples either... Ships often had a coin inserted between the mast and the hull.

Evan

Heliodromus:
From collecting coins as a kid in England, I remember reading that more than one of the 1933 pennies (one of the famous rarities of British coin collecting) had been placed in the foundations of buildings.

I just learned something new by searching for a reference to this... the few 1933 pennies (~6-7) that were made were specifically issed by the mint in response to requests for "foundation coins" for that precise purpose!

http://www.royalmint.com/RoyalMint/web/site/Corporate/Corp_museum/txt_1933penny.asp

Ben

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