Use Your Greek ¡V 8 : Greek Coinage Exhibition

History Re-Stored : Ancient Greek Coins From The ZhuYueTang Collection (14/7-4/10/04)

Other Reference:

The Greek Coinage System (Please read this before going to the exhibition.)

A Case for the World's First Coin: The Lydian Lion

Table of Content :-

1. The Earliest Coin. 1

1.1 Introduction. 1

1.2 Beginning (Natural Resource available) 2

1.3 Standardization. 2

1.4 Guaranteed by State Authority. 2

2. Summary of the coins in the leaflet of the exhibition. 3

2.1 The words found in the coins: 4

3. Others from the internet 4

3.1 Words found in these Greek coinage. 5

1. The Earliest Coin

1.1 Introduction

A Coin is defined as a device-marked piece of metal, issued by a governing authority and intended to be used as money. So, when does our discussion of coin making technology actually begin? Most numismatic scholars, historians and archaeologists agree to give credit for the introduction of coinage to the Lydians as they were the first to combine the universal acceptance of metal as a precious commodity, a design denoting authority or ownership, and the custom of forming metal into objects of standard weight with markings to indicate their value. The Kingdom of Lydia in Asia Minor, now a part of the Republic of Turkey, was to survive just long enough to witness its coinage become the accepted standard for the period. (Source)

1.2 Beginning (Natural Resource available)

King Ardys of Lydia (652-615 B.C.) established a mint in the Lydian capital of Sardis where coins were produced from a naturally occuring alloy of gold and silver known as electrum. Lumps of electrum were found quite readily in the mountains and streams close by. The lumps were softened by heat, or annealed and placed on a plate with a roughened face. Then they were struck with a hammer and punch. These first coins were quite random as to size, weight and purity; nevertheless, they served an important role for the period.

1.3 Standardization

Two major advances were made in the production of coinage during the reign of King Alyattes (610-561 B.C.), the son of King Ardys. First, an established weight of 168 grains was set as the standard for a Stater, and fractional coins of the Stater were produced as well. Secondly, a reverse design was now employed on most coins replacing the plain or blank reverse. The coins struck during Alyattes' reign were struck with both an anvil and hammer die. This allowed for a design to be simultaneously struck on both obverse and reverse sides.

1.4 Guaranteed by State Authority

The infamous Lydian King Croesus (561-546 B.C.), created the first official coins in the true sense of the word. This king's coins were issued by a state authority and guaranteed by the monarch. They had the official design (a lion's head) of the empire, and the coinage metal content was pure. He even went so far as to prohibit the use of electrum, allowing only pure silver and gold coins to circulate freely. He is also credited with establishing the first bimetallic standard, in this case with the ratio of silver-to-gold set at 13 to 1.

According to ancient records, two primary methods were used to separate gold from silver. The Amalgam Process combined liquid mercury to finely crushed electrum ore. The mercury combined with the gold to form a gold amalgam, which was then heated to vaporize the mercury leaving gold of about a 98% purity. In this process, the gold, silver and mercury could all be recovered. Distillation of gaseous mercury yielded liquid mercury for subsequent re-use. In the Cementation process, the electrum ore was crushed and melted together with a simply clay. This caused the silver to be destroyed through oxidization, leaving behind gold, again with a purity of about 98%. This process wasted the silver content, but did produce the desired gold purity level, not to mention it was a heck of a lot safer than playing around with mercury. With the newly discovered techniques used to separate silver and gold, Croesus managed to maintain a surprising degree of consistency with most gold coins being about 98% pure gold. It comes as no surprise that the coins of Lydia became so widely accepted in trade.

The Kingdom of Lydia came to an end in 546 B.C. when they were conquered by the Persian King, Cyrus the Great. Cyrus' successor, Darius the Great (521-486 B.C) began striking a new coin known as the Daric. Darius introduced a small amount of copper in order to overcome the problem of pure gold being too soft for daily use.

The daric comprised 95% gold, 3% copper, and 2% silver and other impurities. This coin would become the new standard throughout the areas under Persian rule and the Mediterranean for nearly 200 years to come.

Mitch Hight is the owner of Rarity Exchange Company. He has been involved in numismatics for over 30 years and is a life member of the American Numismatic Association. Mr. Hight may be contacted at Rexco, P.O. Box 8123, Colorado Springs, CO 80933 or by email at mitch@coin-gallery.com

2. Summary of the coins in the leaflet of the exhibition

No	B.C.	Material	value	Mint	Obverse	Reverse
7	625-550	Electrum	Stater	unknown	Deer	?
23	350	Silver	tetradarchm	Kierion in Thessaly	Zeus	Asklepios (god of healing)
31	445	Silver	Decadrachm	Athens	Athena	Owl (symbol of wisdom)
37	365-323	Silver	Stater	Elis	Zeus	Eagle	Olympic Games
38	375	Silver	Stater	Elis	Hera (Zeus¡¦s wife)	Eagle	Olympic Games
65	500-450	Silver	Tetradrachm	Dikaia in Macedonia	Cow	Octopus	A colony of Eretria
98	336-323	Silver	Decadrachm	Babylon	Herakles	Zeus
101	323	Silver	Decadrachm	Uncertain eastern	Alexander the Great	He is crowned by Nike	With thunderbolt & lance
107	281	Silver	Tetradrachm	Pergamon	Horned horse	Elephant	Selecus I (305-281BC)
108	305-281	Silver	Tetradrachm	Lysimachu of Thrace	Alexander the Great	Athena	Diadem & ram¡¦s horn of Ammon
113	63-47	Gold	Stater	Uncertain	Pharnaces II of Bosporus	Apollo
117	196	Gold	Stater	Uncertain	Flamininus	Nike	Wreath, palm branch
336	336-323	Silver	Diachm[1]		Herakles	Zeus
184	323-317	Silver	Tetradrachm	Tarsus	Herakles	Zeus	Philip III
214	359-336	Silver	Tetradrachm		Zeus	riding	Philip II Palm branch, thunderbolt
112	160-145	Silver	Drachm	Indo-Greek	Manander	Athena

2.1 The words found in the coins:

98 AL?ENADDROU  (hard to see) Should be Alexander III

107  BASILEWS SELEUKOU (in small letter, basilewV seleukou, basileuos seleukou) Of king, of Seleukcus (both in genitive). ¡Vus is in Latin form.

108  BASILEWS LUSIMACOU (in small letter, basilewV lusimacou, basileuos lusimachou) Of king, of Lysimachus (both in genitive). ¡Vus is in Latin form.

113  BASILEWS ? ( hard to see, in small letter, basilewV , of king.

117 T. ?VINCTI (T. QUINCTIUS, Latin. Roman general T. Quinctius Flamininus.)

3. Others from the internet

336 ?L??ANA?OU

184 FILIPPOU  ?AS?LEW? (in small letter,filippou ?as?lew?, philippou basileos, of Philip, of king.)

214 FILI?P?U  (in small letter,fili?p?u , philippou, of Philip, Philip II, Alexander¡¦s father.)

112 BASILEWS SWTII(N)ROS  MENANDROU (in small letter, basilewV swtii(n)rou menandrou, basileuos sotii(n)rou menandrou) Of king, of Sotii(n)rou, of Manander (All in genitive).

3.1 Words found in these Greek coinage

The following is taken from a source selling Greek coinage.

336 [2]

184 [3]

214 [4]

 112 [5]