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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Nap, post: 2977821, member: 73099&quot;]Coinage in Northumbria took a somewhat different course in the early 700s than in the rest of England.</p><p>They were the first kingdom to have a regal inscribed coinage, in the name of Aldfrith (685-705)</p><p>[ATTACH=full]732046[/ATTACH] </p><p>O: +ALDFRIDUS</p><p>R: &quot;fantastic animal&quot; facing left, tri-forked tail</p><p><br /></p><p>Then an odd thing happened, the coinage reverted to anonymous sceattas with no names on the coins, such as this one:</p><p>[ATTACH=full]732047[/ATTACH] </p><p>O: bust facing right, cross</p><p>R: two birds, one walking, one flying, cross</p><p><br /></p><p>This coin dates approximately from the 720s and has no mention of any king at all.&nbsp; It seems odd that this coinage would revert to the abstract sceatta type, once a literate regal type was established (a type that would persist, though later).&nbsp; Hard to believe they are from the same series, but all the currently available data indicates that they were coined in York and from this period.</p><p><br /></p><p>Then in the 740s-750s the inscribed regal sceatta with the fantastic creature was back:</p><p>[ATTACH=full]732048[/ATTACH] </p><p>O: EOTBEREhTVſ.</p><p>R: &quot;fantastic animal&quot; facing left</p><p><br /></p><p>The coinage remained literate, with the king&#039;s name upon it until the time of Aelfwald I (780s) or Aethelred I (790s), when moneyers started dropping their names on the reverse of the coins, eliminating the beast.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]732057[/ATTACH] </p><p>O: +AEDILRED (central Rx)</p><p>R: +CEOLBALD</p><p><br /></p><p>Over time, the silver degenerated into base copper/brass.&nbsp; The designs remained simplistic.&nbsp; The beast was then, for whatever reason, briefly revived in the 840s for Aethelred II by Leofthegn as illustrated above.&nbsp; I believe there is only one die known for the creature, so they must have been a very small coinage, with the possibility of some special purpose (presentation, etc) certainly something worth considering.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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