Hoard of 14,528 late roman coins (article in French)

More details about the hoard :
To date, the numismatic study has cataloged and identified 3501 coins, a quarter of the total of the hoard.
The coinage prior to the reform of 318 (mainly the type SOLI INVICTO COMITI) is only residual. The issues of the years 318-324 and 324-330, with the types VICTORIAE LAET PRINC PERP,BEATA TRANQVILLITAS, SARMATIA DEVICTA, and PROVIDENTIAE AVGG / CAESS, are better represented, but remain modest compared to those of the period 330-341. The largest part of the treasure consists in fact in number offering the reverse GLORIA EXERCITVS to one or two standards, or one of the urban types associated with it, VRBS ROMA and CONSTANTINOPOLIS. In this set, it seems that the emissions of the period 330-337 are nevertheless more numerous. Added to this is the regular presence of imitations. Of these, the reproductions of Nummi on the reverse GLORIA EXERCITVS (two banners), VRBS ROMA and CONSTANTINOPOLIS were preferred. Finally, the most recent of the 341-348, VICTORIAE DD AVGGQ NN strikes, close the treasure and are very discreet.

 

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How much are these coins worth? $145,000? More? Less? $72,000?
How much of a lower price affect on the current market will this take?
I don't read French. Is it all going to a museum, or will they be sold?

 

The hoard had been bought by the Museum of Normandie in Caen. Mr. and Miss Ledanois (the discoverers) wanted the treasure to bear their name, but since they sold it to the museum, it is now impossible...

 

Thanks for sharing this fascinating article. Impressive how they perform "surgery" to remove the coins. That is really something!

 

To add to this - there will be a big exhibition, then the coins go into storage probably for decades, until forgotten. I wonder how many coins are moldering away in museum basements with moisture slowing turning them to dust? I recall reading a story about six barrels of fourth century coins found in Germany - you know of any museum that has that many ancient coins on display? That's why I cringe whenever I see an article indicating that a museum is taking over a large group of coins.

 

Probably they will not see the market if a museum has purchased them. They will take their good old time cleaning them up and attributing them, if ever. What I find interesting about such hoards is what they tell us about economic conditions at the time, where and which coins were circulating simultaneously and so forth.

 

Perhaps relevant is my own experiences regarding the financing of rescue archaeology in the UK?

When I was younger, and less understood how the world works, I raised quite a fuss about the fact that archaeological buildings were often being dug to destruction using gvt sponsored rescue funds.

Thus the buildings, it seemed to me, were being destroyed by their "rescuers”. The reply I got from the professional archaeologists involved was that they were not rescuing archaeological structures - they were rescuing information.

My problem with that is that it seems to put an infinite value on the understandings of a small group of professional archaeologist, and zero value on the independent understanding of those who might later visit sites to see the structures for themselves.

This numismatic matter seems similar, again professional analysis is prioritised over amateur interest.

Personally, I feel the best way to counter this growing trend is to promote and engage in serious objective critical amateur numismatic scholarship (as was normal - over many previous generations).

Rob T

 

By definition, professionals do it for the money and amateurs do it for the love of it. I admire people who can get a paying job doing something they love. I never did. On the other hand, I retired 17 years ago and have not worked for pay since while some of my classmates are dropping dead at the work they love. In a perfect world all school teachers would love teaching and all museum curators would study antiquity even if they were not paid.

Yes, it is good to dream of a perfect world. I have known two serious amateurs who died in the middle of a study that I believe would have been very valuable had they had more time or had someone to pick up where they left off. Neither did.

 

While I agree that coins (and artifacts in general) often end up neglected and forgotten in museum basements, I have to defend its destructive nature. While preservation and archaeology are not mutually exclusive, they are not the same. The reality is that it is simply impossible to preserve everything, and so archaeology seeks to preserve what it can - the information, if not the substance.

It is true that that information is not always published and presented as well as it should be (although this is sometimes due to funding issues), those sites which are destroyed in the process of excavation would have likely been destroyed anyway, just without any information being salvaged. And of course, in order to understand the full story of a site, it is necessary to excavate it fully to understand what came before the structures.

Destructive analysis is inherent to archaeology and is the only means we have for recovering anything from those sites. The fact that it is destructive is why the recovered data has to be recorded so carefully and minutely, so that the excavation can be reconstructed as accurately as possible. That said, I am an advocate for and involved in public archaeology, and have been lucky enough to see professionals, amateurs, and what many would consider 'treasure hunters' all working together quite fruitfully.

 

Thanks for the thoughts, which I fear too often represent only laudable aspirations - at odds with real life

Perhaps, as you say, you have just been lucky?

If you wish to discuss this in detail, I hope you will look at a book I published bearing on this matter

https://www.academia.edu/356702/The...excavated_wheelhouses_of_North_and_South_Uist

This is hyperbole.

Ritual activity at Stonehenge apparently runs way back into the Mesolithic, at least 8,000 BC. Would you suggest the Neolithic stones are carted away, in order to fully understand the site?

Surely a rational balance of interests is needed? In the UK, at least, that balance has been too often lost due to the high handed actions of professionals in recent decades.

Rob T