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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 2757052, member: 19463&quot;]I was cleaning out a pile of old papers and ran across one I printed out from an online source I was not certain would still be around when I wanted it back when someone mentioned it (here?) before.&nbsp; I suggest you consider doing the same even though the site is still maintained.</p><p><a href="http://www.nowandfutures.com/large/Roman%20Currency%20of%20the%20Principate.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.nowandfutures.com/large/Roman%20Currency%20of%20the%20Principate.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.nowandfutures.com/large/Roman Currency of the Principate.html</a></p><p><br /></p><p>The paper was originally a handout for a college course (I believe by Kenneth Harl?).&nbsp; It has a lot of very detailed information on alloy averages showing who debased what and when they did it.&nbsp; While interesting and undoubtedly correct in an average sense, users need to be aware that a coin listed as being made in, for example, 49% silver will vary a lot within the issue so you can&#039;t say your coin is &#039;wrong&#039; if it tests quite a bit off this number.&nbsp; If we read it to the level that coins of Septimius Severus from his first year are better silver than those of Commodus or of Septimius&#039; later period, there is a lot of good information.&nbsp; One bit I recall learning long ago that I found interesting was the amount of silver in the 1st century denarii and matching billon Alexandrian tetradrachms was quite similar.&nbsp; The larger coin just had additional base material. </p><p><br /></p><p>Enjoy.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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