Background to Kapostaler coins
The Kapos (
Regöly)
type, which received its name from the valley of the Kapos River
north of the town of Pécs in southwestern
Hungary, where most coins of this
type have been found. Tetradrachms and drachms are known from this group, and the discovery of coin dies in the ruins of a foundry and
mint in the settlement of Szalacska nearby Kaposvár indicate that at least silver drachms of this
type were minted in Szalacska in the 1st century BC. E. Gohl assigned the foundry or
mint in absolute chronological terms to the middle of the 1st century BC on the basis of archaeological (
tools, jewellery) and numismatic material. Later coins of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type in the size of tetradrachms and drachms, which were otherwise not discovered in the
area of the
mint in Szalacska, were minted exclusively from copper. The silver and copper coinage of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type were limited in monetary circulation primarily to the central Danubian region,
north and east of the town of Pécs, and belonged to what has been termed the eastern
Celtic minting group. D. F. Allen was inclined to the opinion that the minting of such coins could be attributed to the tribe of the Andizetes, who he incorrectly assumed
had been settled in the region under consideration, but he later attributed the minting of this coinage to the Hercuniates.
The minting of silver coins of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type belongs to the later phase of eastern
Celtic minting, and in an absolute chronology, R. Göbl placed the beginning of minting of this coin group in the period after 53 BC, and K. Biró-Sey placed it as late as just before the
Roman conquest of
Pannonia. D. F. Allen supported a fairly early beginning of minting silver coins of this group, while M. Torbágy placed it in the last third of the 2nd century BC. At
first coins of this
type were minted from high
quality silver, while later the
quality of the metal declined, indicating that they
had a lengthy existence. A. Kerényi also decided for a lengthy minting of coins of this
type because of the minting in two metals. The early silver tetradrachmas and drachmas of this
type were minted at the same time, with the early tetradrachmas weighing between 12 and 14 g. Their later phase was characterized by an exceptionally
poor quality of the metal from which they were minted, in most cases almost entirely copper, and the
weight of these bronze coins was on
average between 8 and 9 g. The large bronze coins have the same
diameter as the tetradrachmas (22-23 mm), and bronze coins were also minted in the size of a drachma. M. Torbágy assigned the minting of bronze coins of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type to the second half of the 1st century BC. The minting of stylistically coarse coins from
poor quality metal was placed by D. F. Allen at the end of the 1st cent. BC, as A. Kerényi
had also suggested previously. R. Göbl, to the contrary, set forth a thesis that the coins of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type had been minted yet further to ca. 21 BC. An entirely new absolute chronology of minting bronze coins of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type was suggested by K. Biró-Sey, who explained the transition from silver to bronze minting of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type coins with the fact that coins with the poorer
quality metal only began to be minted after the
Roman conquest of
Pannonia and that they were used exclusively for local purposes. The fact that bronze coins were not documented in the framework of the
mint or foundry activities at Szalacska would perhaps speak in favor of their very late minting. Nonetheless, the thesis about the minting of bronze coins of this
type as late as the
Roman conquest of
Pannonia (which can be placed in 12-9 BC) does not seem likely. The analogous minting of their own coinage among the tribe of the Eravisci in the vicinity of
Budapest (again primarily for local use), immediately prior to the
Roman occupation shows that the coins then minted in this
area were created under the decisive influence of
Roman coinage and that they were also minted according to the
standard of the
Roman denarius. The minting of their own coinage by
Celtic tribes according to a Greek monetary
standard (modelled on the
tetradrachm) after the
Roman conquest of
Pannonia would have undoubtedly required some kind of
Roman agreement, and is thus highly unlikely. Also, the minting of coins of the Syrmian
type in bronze (phase C) among the more easterly Scordisci, which is similar to the example of the Kapos (
Regöly)
type coins at least in terms of the continuation of minting coins of the same
type as in silver (phases A and B), is assigned chronologically to the mid 1st century BC. Both kinds of
Celtic coinage represented in the find could theoretically have circulated monetarily for decades after the
Roman occupation of
Pannonia.
Source
Peter Kos: A find of
Celtic coins from the
area of Balina Glavica (Sinotion) in Dalmatia
Vjesnik Arheološkog muzeja u Zagrebu. 3. serija (0350-7165) 35 (2002)
(Mentioned Hungarian persons: Krisztina Bíró-Sey, Melinda Torbágy, András Kerényi are archaeologists, and Ede Gohl was a
numismatist, the editor of
Dessewffy catalog)
