Message:

<p>[QUOTE=&quot;DonnaML, post: 4498939, member: 110350&quot;]This is what the 2015 Woytek &amp; Butcher article surmises (at p. 127 of the journal issue containing the article*) as the reason for the mysterious depiction of a Bactrian camel -- exactly what I guessed, as it happens:</p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;[R]ecently, one of the present authors argued that the choice of the Bactrian camel as a coin type for drachms circulating in Arabia may have been the</p><p>result not of political considerations, but of a simple mistake by the Roman official</p><p>responsible for the design of these coins, who was probably working in the central</p><p>mint administration in the empire’s capital and who was not aware of zoological</p><p>subtleties. Admittedly, this radical re-evaluation has not gone unchallenged. There seems to be archaeozoological evidence for the presence of Bactrian camels on various Roman sites in Europe, and Diodorus Siculus specifically mentions that</p><p>among the different kinds of camels occurring on the Arabian Peninsula in his day,</p><p>i.e. in the first century BC, there were also two-humped camels. It may thus be</p><p>presumed that Bactrian camels were present in Arabia for breeding purposes in the High Principate, too. Still, in view of the fact that there was an indigenous camel variety in Arabia with one hump which normally featured as the region’s mascot, the choice of a two-humped animal as a coin type for Trajanic coins circulating in Arabia continues to be perplexing, in our opinion.</p><p><br /></p><p>The reason why an involvement of some sort of the mint of Rome in the production of these coins may be regarded as certain is above all their style. Apart from the two imitative pieces catalogued above ‒ which are stylistically quite diverse between themselves, by the way ‒ the dies used for the production of these drachms are uniformly characterised by very fine engraving.&quot;&nbsp; [Article continues with explanation.]</p><p><br /></p><p>(Footnotes omitted.)</p><p><br /></p><p>* The Numismatic Chronicle (1966-) Vol. 175 (2015), pp. 117-136.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

Your name or email address:

Do you already have an account?

• No, create an account now.
• Yes, my password is:
• Forgot your password?

Stay logged in