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New gold hoards from Bornholm with rare types of Valentinian III solidi
Abstract
The article provides a preliminary publication of the important finds of two hoards of combined Late Roman solidi and bracteates in the central place settlement at Sorte Muld, Bornholm. One of the hoards contained one coin and five bracteates, while the other one contained five bracteates, eight gold foil beads and six solidi, among which four are die linked examples of the rare type RIC 2036.
... The Tjurkö silver buckle is very important because it highlights the question as to what role silver played in the Migration period solidus economy in Scandinavia (see Fagerlie 1967;Herschend 1980;Kyhlberg 1986;Horsnaes 2002Horsnaes , 2010Horsnaes , 2013Fischer 2005Fischer , 2019Fischer , 2020Fischer , 2021Fischer & Wood 2020). This is the case because an overall comprehension of numismatic material from the Scandinavian Migration period requires not only an in-depth understanding of the Scandinavian Migration period material culture in general but also of the ideological framework that surrounded the solidus import. ...
This is a discussion on the role of silver in the Scandinavian Migration
period. It departs from a decontextualized find from the island
of Tjurkö in the county of Blekinge in Southern Sweden (Fabech
1994). The paper has a distinct focus on evidence from Sweden and
Denmark. While the Norwegian material is obviously equally interesting,
there was no time or room to include it in this brief study.
The gilt silver buckle from the island of Tjurkö (SHM 1452:265)
is an outstanding piece of anthropomorphic Migration period art,
see fig. 1 (Arwidsson 1963). What is more interesting, the buckle
may perhaps be associated with the dispersed gold hoard from Målen,
discovered on the very same island (see SHM 1453:3–4, LUHM
6000-6002, and possibly also DNM, KP 316).
The two inventory numbers SHM 1452 and SHM 1453 in the
SHM accession catalogue encompass two private collections that
once belonged to the pharmacist Moses Söderström (1774–1857),
and the engineering lieutenant Carl Daniel Pettersson (1787–1847),
respectively. There was no immediate connection between the buckle
SHM 1452:265, that had been acquired by Söderström from the
goldsmith Estberg in December 1842 in the town of Karlskrona
and the other finds from the Målen hoard filed as SHM 1453:3–4.
For one, Söderström appeared unsure if the object was medieval or
“from pagan times”.
Today, however, there is an understanding at the SHM that the
two private collections and the SHM inventory numbers overlap,
as Pettersson and Söderström were close friends and traded objects
with each other. Moreover, the Söderström catalogue had been taken
over by Pettersson prior to the SHM acquisition of the two collections.
In a study devoted to the Late Roman and Early Byzantine
solidi of Blekinge, one must therefore seek to reassess the Tjurkö
buckle anew.
... Post-World War II studies include Werner 1949Klindt-Jensen 1957;Fagerlie 1967;Herschend 1980;Westermark 1980;Kyhlberg 1986;Kromann 1990. In the 21st century, works include Horsnaes 2002;2012;Fischer 2008;Fischer et al. 2011 It is not known how the transfer of solidi from the imperial mint to the barbarian mercenaries was organized, nor is it clear how such arrangements were ever represented in the official propaganda and public records of the Late Roman state apparatus and Germanic successor kingdoms-was it all presented as dilectio, that is, a sort of voluntary bonus when the ruler was pleased with his army? Note there that the Roman ruler portrayed on the solidi could have been uninformed of the newly struck issues or even opposed to their distribution, as they could have been considered counterfeit or illegitimate. ...
This paper is a study of three solidus hoards located at strategic passages through the Italian Alps. It is argued that the hoards are connected to barbarian mercenaries in Roman service. The hoards are analysed and compared to historical sources and solidus hoards from Scandinavia. It is argued that it may be possible to distinguish between hoards that contain solidi used to pay for barbarian recruits and hoards that are proof of dilectio, bonus payments. In the latter case, it is argued that freshly minted solidi from northern Italy are more likely to represent dilectio than older and imported coins.*
... However, the one solidus not from the time 395 to 518 found on Bornholm was first attributed to Constantine the Great (306 to 337) (ref. 15), but later ascribed to Theodosius I as struck between 379 and 388 (ref.14). Mixed precious metal hoards with both denarii and western (early) solidi are instead known from Germany and Poland, so it is assumed that streams of precious metal coins were directed at different times to different destinations in the barbaricum (ref. ...
This article is about the historical consequences of our scientifically reinforced hypothesis that the West-Roman empire is conventionally dated some 232 years too old. We offer an alternative interpretation of some Roman heirlooms retrieved from the grave of the Frankish king Childeric, and from a Japanese grave dated to the late 5th century.
... This allows us to reconstruct the path of these solidi to Scandinavia via frontier areas along the old limes in Central Europe. In particular, the Bína hoard from Slovakia (deposited c. 450) and the Szikancs hoard in Hungary (deposited c. 445) are die-linked to the solidus hoards from Skogsby and Stora Brunneby (tpq 451) on south-western and south-eastern Öland respectively and the settlement complex Fuglsangsager in the Sorte Muld area on north-eastern Bornholm (Fagerlie 1967;Kolnikova 1968;Biró-Sey 1976;Kent 1994;Horsnaes 2002Horsnaes , 2009Fischer et al. 2011). ...
The strongest archaeological evidence for the presence of Scandinavians inside the Western Empire in the 5th century is discussed. The purpose is to address a set of questions related to the return of military veterans from the Continent to the Scandinavian periphery during the 5th century. The key issue here is to discuss whether it is possible to prove the very existence of returning warriors in the Migration Period material culture in Scandinavia by means of die-identical coins found in Continental coin hoards. It is argued that numismatic evidence in the form of die-linked solidi allows us to track at least four different payments in which Scandinavians received gold coins from the main actors in the Late Roman military state apparatus, which were then brought back to Scandinavia. Two or three of these payments in the years AD 465–476 can be described as direct from Italy to South Scandinavia, while an earlier payment after AD 435 can be explicitly linked to the former limes area of Pannonia by means of die-links to solidus hoards found in Slovakia and Hungary, and may be classified as a payment through mid-level intermediaries.
Finds of Roman gold coins of the 5th –6th centuries AD are virtually unknown from the areas occupied by the Baltic tribes during the Migration Period. Recently, information has been obtained about a solidus of Valentinian III, minted in AD 440–455 in Rome, found within the range of the East Lithuanian Barrow culture, in the vicinity of the present-day village of Roŭnaje Pole (Ašmiany Raion, Hrodna Voblast’ in the Republic of Belarus). The coin probably arrived in the right-bank part of the Neman River basin from one of the areas with a large number of finds of 5th -century solidi, i.e. from the southern coast of the Baltic Sea or from the Carpathian Basin.
ABSTRACT
Svante Fischer 2020. Th e Late Roman and Early Byzantine Solidi of the
Stiernstedt Ancient Coin Collection.
Journal of Archaeology and Ancient History. 2020, No. 28 pp 1–26. http://urn.
kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-426054
Th is is a study of 33 Late Roman and Early Byzantine solidi from the period
394-565 that are kept in the Stiernstedt Ancient Coin Collection. Th e solidi
were acquired in the late nineteenth century by the co-founding president of
the Swedish Numismatic Society, August Wilhelm Stiernstedt. After his death,
the solidi along with 2,434 other coins were published as a coherent assembly,
the Stiernstedt Ancient Coin Collection (Heilborn 1882). Th e entire collection
was acquired at a sale from the Bukowski auction house in Stockholm
by the Swedish-Texan antebellum cattle baron and gilded age banker Swante
Magnus Swenson the same year. Together with many other coins and various
prehistoric objects acquired in Sweden, the Stiernstedt Ancient Coin Collection
was donated by Swenson in 1891 to the State of Texas under the name of
the Swenson Collection. Th e Stiernstedt Ancient Coin Collection is currently
kept at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the University of
Texas at Austin. Th e study concludes with a catalogue of the 33 solidi. In the
commentary, I have tried to identify and recontextualize the solidi by comparing
them to recorded hoards from Scandinavia and the European Continent as
well as unprovenanced solidi in Swedish and European collections.
KEYWORDS
Late Roman Empire; Scandinavian Migration Period; Roman Solidus;
Wilhelm August Stiernstedt; Coin collection; 19th century antiquarianism;
Scandinavian Archaeology; Late Roman and Early Byzantine Numismatics
How did Roman Britain end? This new study draws on fresh archaeological discoveries to argue that the end of Roman Britain was not the product of either a violent cataclysm or an economic collapse. Instead, the structure of late antique society, based on the civilian ideology of paideia, was forced to change by the disappearance of the Roman state. By the fifth century elite power had shifted to the warband and the edges of their swords. In this book Dr Gerrard describes and explains that process of transformation and explores the role of the ‘Anglo-Saxons’ in this time of change. This profound ideological shift returned Britain to a series of ‘small worlds’, the existence of which had been hidden by the globalizing structures of Roman imperialism. Highly illustrated, the book includes two appendices, which detail Roman cemetery sites and weapon trauma, and pottery assemblages from the period.
The Udovice solidus pendants : late 5th century evidence of South Scandinavian mercenaries in the Balkans Fischer, Svante Fornvännen 2008(103):2, s. [81]-88 : ill.
The Stora Brunneby hoard of 17 solidi with a terminus post quem of 451 is presented and analysed. The hoard's type composition and the coins' average weight are quite unusual, and the hoard was therefore selected for publication in order to present some preliminary results of the interdisciplinary LEO Project at the Department of Archaeology and Ancient History of Uppsala University. LEO is an acronym for Liber excelsis obryzacusque, "the elevated book of pure gold". We have primarily used the tenth volume of The Roman Imperial Coinage in the assessment of Scandinavian solidus hoards, which has led to an improved chronology and enabled renewed study of die identities within solidus hoards across Europe and the Mediterranean. This publication of the Stora Brunneby hoard should be regarded as a first step towards the evaluation of the LEO databases, now that the relationship between Scandinavian solidus hoards and political events in the Late Roman Empire has been firmly established. Our study of the Stora Brunneby hoard revealed that it is the third largest solidus hoard from Öland, and the tenth largest solidus hoard from Scandinavia. Its accumulation period chronology, from tpq 394 to 451, is unusually early. The coins are comparatively heavy, giving the hoard one of the greatest average weights in Scandinavia. Our interpretation of the hoard is that it is the earliest numismatic evidence of Scandinavian mercenaries receiving solidus payments from the West Roman emperor on specific occasions.
In this paper, I discuss the context of a Late Roman solidus hoard found in the Casa delle Vestali on the Forum Romanum in Rome. The hoard consists of 397 solidi, Late Roman gold coins. Most of the hoard consists of uncirculated solidi struck in the name of the Western Roman emperor Procopius Anthemius (AD 467-472). By means of situating the hoard within the context of the reign of Anthemius and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, the aim of this paper is to determine if the coins in the Vestal hoard can be related to other contemporary coin hoards by means of numismatic typology; this information could add to our understanding of why Anthemius' reign is considered such an unmitigated failure and why the Empire collapsed soon after his murder. In this article, the composition of the hoard is examined, and the contents are compared to other contemporary solidus hoards in the Mediterranean, Gaul, Poland and Scandinavia'. I argue that this comparison shows that the Vestal hoard is not part of a larger network but that the hoard constitutes the remains of an isolated occurrence as initially suggested by its unusual composition and location.
THIS ARTICLE DESCRIBES the recent discovery of Britain's first certain hoard of gold bracteates, found in a field in Binham (Norfolk). This find is unique in Anglo-Saxon England where bracteates have previously been found either in graves or as single finds. A further two gold bracteates and a possible die have been discovered in the vicinity of Binham suggesting a 'bracteate cluster'. It is argued here on the basis of analogies with sites in Scandinavia and northern Germany that Binham may have acted as a central place in northern Norfolk in the early Anglo-Saxon period. In light of bracteate distribution across Anglo-Saxon England, the area of Binham is suggested as one of several sites with meaningful clusters of bracteate finds; these may have belonged to a network of central sites distributed across Scandinavia and along North Sea coastal areas in England.
In Barbaricum, area stretching east of the river Rhine and north of the Danube 1 , Roman coins begin to appear in larger number starting from the second half of the 2 nd century AD and continue to occur in native contexts until the Migration Period 2 . Fig. 1. Kostkowice, distr. Zawiercie (PL), late 4 th century hoard of Dancheny-Brangstrup horizon with denarii and solidi (Dymowski A. 2007); private collection. The largest group is represented by 2 nd century denarii; their significant concentrations are registered in the valley of the Vistula in Poland, in north–western Ukraine, Denmark and in the Baltic islands of Gotland and Bornholm 3 . Most commonly they appear in later assemblages dated to the 4 th , 5 th and even the 6 th century (Fig. 1). Territories of former East Prussia (Ostpreussen) i.e. areas of Mazuria, western Lithuania, estuary of Neman river and Samland (Sambian Peninsula) – zone of Balt settlement, have produced an impressive number of brass sestertii dating from the 2 nd c. and the first half of the 3 rd c. mostly found in 3 rd 1 On the term "Barbaricum" cf. Sarnowski T. 1991; in this contribution we concentrate on the territory of the more remote parts of Barbaricum, east of the Elbe and north of the Carpathian mountains, consequently, coin finds from the area occupied by Sarmatian tribes will not be discussed here cf.
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