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Ancient flans - hot or cold

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Altamura:

--- Quote from: otlichnik on April 02, 2020, 09:06:13 pm ---… Too many of the "cold" arguments rely on a "we experimented and it couldn't be done" kind of argument, which is entirely too unscientific for me. ...
--- End quote ---
I don't understand why trying out physically what is discussed theoretically should be unscientific  :-\. Not testing theoretical results in reality is in my eyes unscientific.
There is e.g. a very productive relationship between theoretical physics and experimental physics.  And nobody is arguing that experimental physics is unscientific  :).


--- Quote from: otlichnik on April 02, 2020, 09:06:13 pm ---… On the other hand, Thomas Faucher's 2017 article on experimental striking of Ptolemaic coins ...
--- End quote ---
Which can be found here:
https://www.academia.edu/37598729/Coin_Minting_Techniques_in_Ptolemaic_Egypt_Observe_Analyze_Recreate_Notae_Numismaticae_2017_p._71-90
the question of cold or hot striking is discussed on pages 84-85. The conclusion is:
"In conclusion, we do not see any decisive arguments that would prove that hot-striking was used during antiquity, at the very least for Ptolemaic coins."

Regards

Altamura

SC:
Exactly.  But what is missing from everything I have found so far except Cope is the metallurgical evidence.

Experimental work can only tell us about the thing that they experiment on. We can then try to draw analogies based on what we see in ancient coins. 

But take Faucher's work.  It was based on experiment compared to a physical examination of ancient coins but not a destructive metallurgical examination.

So he laid out three pieces of evidence:

1) Signs of mis-strikes and repeated strikes proves that many of the Ptolemaic bronzes had to be struck more than once.  He believes this proves they were struck cold - that is why they were difficult to strike and thus took multiple strikes.  But in the Bouyon, Depeyrot, Desnier book looks at the same issue with different conclusions.  The evidence is ambiguous either way - you could still have multiple strikes for hot striking - the flans aren't melted blobs - just slightly softer.  B, D and D believe that multiple strikes were required with hot striking for such large coins.

2) It is hard to work with hot flans.  I am sorry but that is not proof that such techniques were not used, just a fact that modern experiments find it harder.  Maybe the ancients had better processes, or maybe they accepted it was harder and still used the process.   In fact it appears that hot flans were used in some Indian and Islamic production processes.

3) Hot striking would result in black layer that had to be removed.  Again, not proof that it was not done.  Sure it would add another step but several authors have already postulated that this was done - some sort of picking or bath would be easy to do.

Faucher's final conclusion is that there is no evidence of hot striking and the several factor showing it was inconvenient.  But again, his evidence is only based on looking at the coins.

By contrast, Cope's argument was based on the metallurgical analysis of actual coins.  The internal structure provides irrefutable facts about what happened to the metal.  For example, late Roman bronzes were heated and cooled, usually numerous times.

What we don't know, and this I think is the key gap that needs to be explored, is exactly when that heating occurred vis-a-vis the striking.

Maybe the cold school is right and ay heating was done separately and prior.  But I want to see some cold school scholarship that takes into account the metallurgical evidence. Maybe the 1995 German book does.  I don't have it.

SC

Joe Sermarini:
It seems likely with the number of different cultures, peoples, states, cities and mints, and the centuries of time involved, that methods may have varied considerably.

I speculate that for any combination of metal, flans, and dies, when cold works well enough, it was probably the most likely method. Few would choose to do things the harder way.

Ron C2:
Hardly definitive, but a few days ago I watched an old "Time Team" episode from the UK on Youtube.  In the episode, where they were digging a roman coastal settlement up by Hadrian's wall (I can't remember the precise season and episode). They often do color pieces apart form actually archaeology, and in this episode they re-created striking sestertii.  They went through the process of making sprue tree molds, casting flans in replica ancient furnaces, and then tried striking them both hot and cold from replica dies, and for hot striking they tried multiple light strikes vs a large single strike. 

Cutting to the case, only a single hard strike on a hot flan would produce a passable sestertius. 

Not definitive, but I found it interesting nonetheless.

Serendipity:
One of the effects I always love on ancient coins, especially Roman silver denarii, are those beautiful radiating flow lines. I’m a complete ignoramus about metallurgy and I don’t know if that effect is caused by the flan being struck when it’s hot or cold. Here’s one of my Hadrian denarii showing that classic radiating flowing lines effect which makes the emperor look positively divine!

Hadrian (11 Aug 117 - 10 Jul 138 AD), Silver Denarius, RIC II 257, RSC II 1028, BMCRE III 685, SRCV II 3513, gVF, excellent portrait, well-centred and struck on good metal, much mint lustre, little wear, radiating flow lines, small edge cracks, weight 3.33g, maximum diameter 17.0mm, die axis 180°, Rome mint, 134-8 AD; obverse HADRIANVS-AVG COS III P P, bare head right; reverse PIET-AS AVG (Piety of the Emperor), Pietas, draped, standing half-left by lit altar, raising both hands in prayer.

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