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Message:: [QUOTE="lehmansterms, post: 3264672, member: 80804"]I suspect that the operation was broken out into specific tasks and the guys holding the tongs on the reverse die and swinging the hammer just struck whatever blanks they were fed by the flan-making staff. Why a half-follis reverse die was used to strike a small flan on a follis obverse die is a bit harder to explain, but it seems fairly well established that the striking duo worked with more than one reverse die in rotation to allow them to cool between strikes. Perhaps the "tongs guy" (suppositor) was fed a smaller flan and chose a half-follis reverse (particularly if they were striking more than one denomination that day in that officina) without thinking about the obverse die in the anvil, then the "hammer guy" (malleator) just hit whatever was "presented" without questioning which die the suppositor had chosen or even being aware of the size of the blank.Another possibility might be that near the end of the "shift", the half follis obverse die they were working with suffered a catastrophic break and a whole follis obverse die was the closest/easiest replacement to finish up the last of a consignment of blank flans.[/QUOTE]