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<p>[QUOTE="Sallent, post: 2841304, member: 76194"]Of course not. If you want coins 2,000 + years ago with stated values on them, maybe a handful of Roman Republic denarii and quinarii had them (and that was only in a very tiny minority of these types of coins). I would say almost all ancient European coins don't have a stated value. We know however what they are from surviving ancient texts that give us the name of denominations and the weight for them.</p><p><br /></p><p>The ancient Europeans didn't really do numbers on coins. Weight was the main distinguishing feature. Weight was also key because size of the denominations was not standardized. You could have a particular issue of Denarius be only 17mm in diameter, and another issue be 20mm in diameter, but at least the weight was standardized.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here is a Tetradrachm that's about 22mm in diameter:</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]672238[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>And this one featuring a portrait of Alexander the Great is almost 28 mm in diameter:</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]672239[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>One is noticeably bigger than the other, and they vary in thickness quite a bit, with the Athenian Owl Tetradrachm being noticeably chunkier.</p><p><br /></p><p>But let's look at the weight. The Athenian is 17.12g, and the Seleucid Tetradrachm is 17.20g. Based in the near identical weights alone you know they are Tetradrachms. Size doesn't matter, standardized weight does. They weigh almost the same despite being minted 2000 miles apart (one in Athens and one in Babylon, near modern day Baghdad.)[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="Sallent, post: 2841304, member: 76194"]Of course not. If you want coins 2,000 + years ago with stated values on them, maybe a handful of Roman Republic denarii and quinarii had them (and that was only in a very tiny minority of these types of coins). I would say almost all ancient European coins don't have a stated value. We know however what they are from surviving ancient texts that give us the name of denominations and the weight for them. The ancient Europeans didn't really do numbers on coins. Weight was the main distinguishing feature. Weight was also key because size of the denominations was not standardized. You could have a particular issue of Denarius be only 17mm in diameter, and another issue be 20mm in diameter, but at least the weight was standardized. Here is a Tetradrachm that's about 22mm in diameter: [ATTACH=full]672238[/ATTACH] And this one featuring a portrait of Alexander the Great is almost 28 mm in diameter: [ATTACH=full]672239[/ATTACH] One is noticeably bigger than the other, and they vary in thickness quite a bit, with the Athenian Owl Tetradrachm being noticeably chunkier. But let's look at the weight. The Athenian is 17.12g, and the Seleucid Tetradrachm is 17.20g. Based in the near identical weights alone you know they are Tetradrachms. Size doesn't matter, standardized weight does. They weigh almost the same despite being minted 2000 miles apart (one in Athens and one in Babylon, near modern day Baghdad.)[/QUOTE]
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