I won this tiny little guy for 99 cents on ebay the other day and he arrived this afternoon. I knew that nummi were small since a follis is supposed to be 40 of them but I wasn't prepared for just how small. This little guy weighs in at a whopping 0.90 grams and is dwarfed by his bigger brother. Now it's time to find a pentanummium, decanummium, and a half follis! Anastasius 491-518 AD AE Nummus (0.90 gm) Constantinople mint Obverse: DN A-NAS, pearl diademed, draped, cuirassed bust right Reverse: Monogram of Anastasius within linear circle (rudimentary wreath) Show us some of your biggest/smallest coins of the same ruler together if you have them
Finding an Anastasius monogram bronze for $.99 is quite an accomplishment. That's some good sleuthing. Congratulations.
The shipping, $2.95, cost 3x the coin itself. I know the coin isn't in great shape...but it is identifiable. And for that price, I couldn't say no.
My page included a comparison image but photos have trouble making the point as well as holding the things in hand. My single example here shows the nummus at a bit high weight since 40 x 0.46=18.4 while 17.29 / 40 = 0.43. personally, I believe we can forgive a 0.03 slop factor when we consider the size of the coin and the number that were made in a minute with the technology available. Your little fellow suffers from numismatic hardening of the arteries or a bunch of calcium deposits that may account for some of its overweight assuming your 40 coin is similar in weight to mine. It might look a little better if you put in in distilled water to see if any of that surplus 'fat' came off but, again IMO, we can not expect the things to be exactly on weight for every specimen. From my page: The value of the nummus was so little that most purchases required a bag (follis) full. In 498 A.D. Emperor Anastasius reformed the coinage issuing bronze denominations up to 40 nummia (a "follis") with values marked on the reverse in Greek numerals (M=40). For comparison, our photo includes an 8mm, 0.46g. pre-reform single nummus of Anastasius and a 35mm, 17.29g. post reform 40. The styles and weight standards would vary greatly over the following centuries but the follis of 40 nummia became the standard bronze coin of the Byzantine economy. Several were shown in our previous feature page on Byzantine coins.
Great write up Doug. I will toss this little fella in some distilled water for a bit and see what happens!
These are not in RIC X but I think they should be up to 498 when supposedly the new large first "Byzantine" denomination was introduced.
Sear Byzantine 13 says there are four varieties of his monogram. My example is different than most shown here. I did find one like mine online. https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=6695846 Does anyone have a link to a chart showing the four?
Nice little run, @furryfrog02 ! EUGENIUS RI Eugenius 392-394 CE AE 12mm 1.0g Aquileia SPES wreath palm Victory RIC59 ZENO RI Zeno 476-491 CE 2nd reign AE 10mm Monogram LEO I RI Leo I 457-474 CE AE 4 10mm Salus Emp stdg hldg Globe and Standard VALENTINIAN III? RI Valentinian III 425-455 CE AE 9mm Rome mint
Nice catch @furryfrog02 and cheaper than a candy bar. Just holding something in your hand that is 1500 years old for that price is amazing. I've got a few nummus' but I have yet to identify them. I see that they have monograms but little else and the portraits (which are highly worn) are almost insufferable.
congrats, great pick-up at a buck per gram. I like your size comparison. My cast bronze collection has lots of size differences. The Janus head / Prow right series has significant weight changes. You can see the difference in the Shell / knucklebone series best from the side. The largest weight difference in in my steelyard scale weights.
Anyone wishing a pretty example of the late Roman tiny AE needs to be very lucky or very persistent. I found a few I could tolerate among the really common rulers like Marcian and Leo I but those who seek the rare guys can not be picky about things like faces and legends. Marcian, Constantinople (trace barely shows at bottom) Leo I: The fact on these is that more coins show the D at the start of the legend and the G at the end than any other part of the legend but this one was selected for Leo's cute lion. Again, this coin required a lot of luck but is fully identifiable as the variety where the L in Leo was replaced by a Greek lambda. Some people might dislike the coin because of the natural flan flaw hole (filled with dirt) that runs diagonally through the flan just under the duck-lips portrait. The mintmark is off flan but the lambda only comes from Constantinople (RIC686). From my point of view, the faults of this coin do no damage at all. I would not trade this coin for a mint state example with no hole but with that lambda off flan. Below there is no Leo legend but the reverse is said to be his wife Verina. I take the word of experts on this one. I might have guessed it was a chameleon. I have to wonder about the portrait. Mumps? Chewing tobacco? I probably bought this one because the NIC mintmark is mostly there (although I do like chameleons).
Here is one of my nummi resting on a Nicomedia follis. The follis is a little unusual in that it carries Anastasius' monogram under the mark of value, where one expects an officina letter. It is Sear 37, Hahn 44. As far as I know, mine is the 4th example. Hahn notes 2 examples, one in the Skoplje Museum and one in trade (Num. Circ 89 (1981), no. 3921. A third specimen appeared in Goldberg 53, lot 1966 (26 May 2009). It entered a private collection I curated during the owner's lifetime and is now in DO. Also unusual is the expanded mint mark. Of it, Hahn notes "[t]he adoption of the heavy standard in 512 made possible on the folles the long and eloquent mint mark NIKOMI (the I being the abbreviation mark)".
Some very nice minimi, Doug. These present a real challenge! The technical term we used for these as Classics graduate students in the early 70's was "flattened BBs"! Here are a few: First Row Eugenius. Aquileia, 393-4. 0.77 gr. 14 mm. Hr. 6. RIC IX, 59. Theodosius II. Alexandria, 406-8. 1.81 gr. 16 mm. Hr. 11. RIC X. 159. NOT a "flattened BB" - sorry for its inclusion! Johannes, Rome. 1.57 gr. 11 mm. Hr. 6. RIC X, 1920. Marcian, Cyzicus, 450-7. 1.03 gr. 11 mm. Hr. 6. RIC X, 561. Second Row Marcian, Heraclea, 450-7. 1.42 gr. 11 mm. Hr. 12. RIC X, 537 var. (Monogram 2 instead of 1). Not a complete legend, but one ending in the dative case. Leo, Constantinople, 457-74. 1.04 gr. 12 mm. Hr. 7. RIC X, 667. A rarer variety with standing, not crouching lion. Leo, Constantinople, 457-74. 1.29 gr. 11 mm. Hr. 1. RIC X, 674. The usual variety with crouching lion. Majorian, Ravenna. 1.54 gr. 14 mm. Hr. 6. RIC X 2615-18 var. Third Row Basiliscus. Constantinople. 0.75 gr. 10 mm. Hr. 2. RIC X, 1014. Basiliscus. Constantinople. 0.60 gr. 10 mm. Hr. 6. RIC X, 1016. Zeno, Cyzicus, 476-91. 1.06 gr. 10 mm. Hr. 6. RIC X, 966. Zeno, Cyzicus, 476-91. 0.79 gr. 10 mm. Hr. 12. RIC X, 953.
