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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Nefarius Purpus, post: 9539322, member: 116505&quot;]Thank you for you posting Suarez. I should state the obvious and reveal that Nefarius Purpus is me, Paul Pearson.</p><p><br /></p><p>Our paper was mostly aligned at testing the notion that these coins are 1713 forgeries which has been the numismatic consensus since Cohen. The possibility of contemporaneous ‘barbarous’ imitations of Roman was one that we of course considered and briefly mentioned (on p. 33), although not specifically those from India, which however I can assure you we are well aware of. Those coins are generally copies of known emperors and in the weight range of regular aurei or slightly heavier (or lighter), whereas the 1713 pieces are much heavier. Generally the barbarous imitations appear struck rather than cast, although that is not always clear without proper study. Stylistically the barbarous coins vary greatly and none much resemble the 1713 coins in our view, although that is in the eye of the beholder. The 1713 coins were found in Transylvania not India. The metal major element composition is similar to Dacian gold objects from that area (the ancient mines in the Apuseni Mountains) but we do not yet have a precise fingerprint.</p><p><br /></p><p>We do not like the traditional term ‘barbarous’ but of course these coins were not made in Rome and are of crude style etc., which we discuss, hence propose that they were likely of artisan workmanship from the end days of Dacia when there was no official mint. None of the Indian or other barbarous coins that we know of features Sponsian or any other unknown emperor. It could simply be a random list of letters but it is an actual Roman name, albeit a very rare one, so we think it more reasonable to conclude he existed, and there is certainly scope in the historical record for a secessionist regime in Dacia in the 260s. But our hypothesis for the historical Sponsian is labelled as that (notwithstanding the recent media hype), and we are open to alternative interpretations. So your suggestion is an important one and we would not reject out of hand the notion that they could have been ancient coins minted somewhere else that for some reason got to Transylvania. Fingerprinting the metal more precisely is the best option for clarifying, and we already have plans for that.</p><p><br /></p><p>I should make clear that we sent early drafts and preprints of our paper to the several leading numismatic experts, including those who have studied ‘barbarous’ productions, and all the museum collections where these coins are housed for comment, so we have followed due diligence in that regard. It was also reviewed by three anonynous reviewers.</p><p><br /></p><p>BUT following your link I noticed this coin for the first time</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="https://www.coryssa.org/503767/subcategory_id/299/page/0/period/roman_emperor/denom/Aureus/period/roman_emperor/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.coryssa.org/503767/subcategory_id/299/page/0/period/roman_emperor/denom/Aureus/period/roman_emperor/" rel="nofollow">https://www.coryssa.org/503767/subcategory_id/299/page/0/period/roman_emperor/denom/Aureus/period/roman_emperor/</a></p><p><br /></p><p>This is definitely of the same manufacture the 1713 group and would have been included in the overall list in our paper. It is very worn. Most likely it is part of the Transylvanian hoard but it could have an alternative provenance. Unfortunately such details are rarely recorded and usually impossible to determine.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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