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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kevin McGonigal, post: 3789852, member: 72790&quot;]I have often wondered about the Roman coin we call a &quot;dupondius&quot;. it was supposed to be from the metal we call brass, while they called it something like &quot;orichalchum&quot;. When we think of brass, we envision a metal with a somewhat yellowish caste to it. But from my collecting experience, that does not quite seem an accurate description of ancient brass, at least as it has come down to us as brass coinage. The larger sestertius and even a few smaller coins like some of the quadranes were also sometimes described as brass but it is with the dupondius that I most notice the differences. Some of the differences, over time, may have been caused by environmental factors such as the soil conditions in which the coins were deposited in different soils and water percolation factors. Some of the differences may have been from varying percentages of zinc. I understand that lead tended to replace zinc in the mid to late Second Century AD and that may explain why this dupondius of Marcus Aurelius comes up almost as black. But even when issued at about the same time, the two dupondii of Nero pictured here, come out very differently, one a bright brass and the other a dark green. By the way, my avatar, a dupondius of Trajan comes off as a medium green. The dupondius of Hadrian appears as a medium dark brown with some &quot;brassy &quot; highlights. Perhaps when first coined they all had that brassy appearance, but I wonder about that.</p><p><br /></p><p>So what I am asking readers here to do is post different dupondii of various time periods so that we may see what different hues the dupondius might take, and speculate on what might have caused them and if the differences are explained by any rhyme or reason[ATTACH=full]1012266[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1012267[/ATTACH] . We might as well include sesterces as well as they are described as &quot;Aes&quot; which frequently gets translated as brass. By the way, notice the symbol that looks like the Greek letter for Pi on the reverse indicating the value of the coin, that is, two asses.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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