Do you have any coins of Sparta?

This is just my basic understanding (so, please correct if I'm wrong), but in order to mint gold coins back in that time you needed more than just desire - you needed gold mines in your control. This is the same case for silver - a number of rulers minted only bronze coins due to lack of access to silver.

My understanding is the major gold mines back then were Lavrion in southern Attica and others in Macedon and Thrace. I don't believe there was considerable gold mining in the Peloponnese. Granted, during times in their history Sparta did have enough control in Attica that they could have minted gold coins had they wanted (which, as evidence from their lack of silver coins - they didn't), but at the time of Cleomenes Sparta was a has-been player on the field.

 

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The way I’m thinking of it though is that gold coins can be melted down and reminted.

Gold coins (such as the Greek stater) could have been received as payment for goods & services right?

Sparta was a part of Greece and many other Greek city states managed to mint some beautiful gold coins.

Like this one which is nearly 6 troy oz of solid gold.

Imagine 6 Gold Buffaloes melted and minted into this one coin.

 

Again, more knowledgeable members please feel free to correct me, but silver and gold coins during this time were minted to pay for something - usually wars but also construction. The government would take a resource they possess (a mine) and create coins, which would then pay for their ambitions.

In this case, it didn't make sense to melt down others' coins, because there's no net gain for the government. They would have had to take something that was already valuable and re-mint it.

Rulers did at times do exactly that, but for two main purposes:
1) Political - to get rid of event's they'd rather not emphasize (this is why there are so few Eid Mars) or to appease egomaniac rulers (Nero).
2) Financial. The government would take a heavier or purer coin and mint their own coins with a lower weight and/or less purity. Egypt under the Ptolemies did exactly this, but also Rome over time.

However, given the paucity of Spartan silver coins, there clearly was no appetite to do either for gold coins.

Just remember that all coins minted back then had a purpose. The Spartans would not have minted a gold coin because 2300 years later Game3rBlake will think it would be neat.

 

Someone far after Spartas peak, Sparta first minted coins only around 265 BC + even then, I think only to pay mercenaries,

When Sparta was at its most powerful (around 600-371(defeat at Luectra)), they didn't mint any of their own coins + Spartans were not supposed to own any coins or precious metals

 

Ok well as you said:

“Just remember that all coins minted back then had a purpose.”

That’s fine I agree with that.

But just because they had a purpose didn’t mean they disappeared after they were used for that purpose.

For example the Athenians used the silver from the Mines of Laurion to mint lots of Athenian owl Tetradrachms to fund projects like the Parthenon.

Well those coins would be used to pay the workers and such and I’m guessing many of the owl coins we still have around today were used as payments for such projects. They had a purpose but many survived to the modern day.


As for the melting and reminting of coins. The only reason I brought that up is because I remember reading that after Alexander the Great conquered Persia he had many Persian gold darics melted down and reminted into gold staters with his image.

My thought process was:

“Maybe the Spartans melted down coins from people they conquered and reminted them to use for payments that had a purpose and perhaps some of those coins still survive to the modern day like how some of the owl Tetradrachms did.”

In my mind and thought process it sounded like it wasn’t implausible.

 

I'm not sure what you're after. You seem to insist on Sparta minting gold coins that no expert/scholarly publication gives even a whisper of existing.

It's been stated here already several times what Spartan values were, and with an understanding of them it's crystal clear why no coins exist from them from their heyday, and further why the handful that exist from long after that period are few and far between.

To understand purpose, you need to consult references to understand the specific situation of Sparta.

 

I’m not after anything I’m just explaining what I was thinking and asking which part of it is wrong.

Also you keep mentioning that no coins exist from their heyday whereas from the very first post I was asking about Spartan coins in general not just from their heyday. I don’t care when the coins were minted as long as they were minted in Sparta while it was still considered Sparta.

I think that’s where the confusion is because you were misunderstanding what I was looking for.

 

I think @kirispupis explained it pretty good in general and answered your questions.

You are making too many comparisons. You ask about Sparta but you bring up examples of Alexander the Great, Athenian owls and the 20-stater AV piece (which was by the way not really a coin and never circulated, it was more of a gift and an exception).
During the 'heyday' of Sparta, the Spartans never minted coins at all, they were not even allowed to own any coins and they abstained from accumulating wealth so they could focus their energies on preparation for war, not money making.
Later on Spartan Mercenaries were being paid by foreign money, such as the tetrobols from Phokis during the Third Sacred War that I mentioned. Only much later when there were no Heliots in the Spartan society anymore and they started to become regular Greeks as they had to focus themselves on agriculture etc, they started to mint coins during the Achaian League and after. As mentioned the Kleomenes tetradrachm is an exception and used to pay mercenaries.

Sparta most certainly did not mint gold coins, where could they have gotten that from? They are in fact a quite poor city-state. Both before and after Alexander the Great it was quite unusual to mint gold coins and was only reserved for powerful empires, special occasions and during emergency issues (when they start to take gold from statues such as nike in Athens and Antioch). The fact coins were discouraged in Sparta and only much later when Sparta was just a regular Greek city state and started to mint coins, they had no resources nor intentions to struck gold coins. As @kirispupis mentioned, there are reasons coins are struck.

Most Athenian owls we can buy today were either hoarded or exported, the owls that circulated in Athens were folded and restruck after the Peleponessian war, so yes coins do disappear.

 

Not to thread hijack, but... (a phrase that is usually followed by exactly that)...

I've long been fascinated by the Battle of Thermopylae (~480 BC). From what I gather in this thread, there are few (no?) coins minted *in* Sparta from that time period? Is that true?

 

dm: correct

 

That sounds true based on what I learned about Sparta while studying for my Classical History degree.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m no expert but from my reading & lectures I was taught that in the time of Leonidas the Spartans viewed money in general as an unmanly (and thus un-Spartan) luxury.

Hence the reason they used large lumps of iron as “money” since they were heavy and low value and discouraged the accumulation of wealth.

The Spartans of Leonidas’s time didn’t believe in any kind of luxury as they believed suffering made better soldiers who could tolerate being in pain, being cold, being hungry and still remain an effective fighting force.