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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;medoraman, post: 1655335, member: 26302&quot;]If a coin is only token value, as nearly all copper coins were in antiquity, isn&#039;t the amount of metal only for illusory purposes? I mean, you want enough metal in there to give the illusion of value, the exact number of grams not really mattering except for maybe a slight P&amp;L affect to the mint. </p><p><br /></p><p>I would postulate that by this point the public was accepting of the denomination only, and the illusion of a sestertius worth of metal was not terribly necessary anymore.</p><p><br /></p><p>Just my guess why such variations occurred. I see the same thing happen over and over in history. With bronze denominations, they at first are careful at maintaining tight weight controls, trying to convince the population there is &quot;value&quot; in the weight. Later, weight control gets sloppy since this illusion is not really necessary anymore, since everyone now only concentrates on the denomination, not the metal content.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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