Numismatics has often been seen as a rather arcane and obscure discipline, which circuits like a satellite around the major planets of Classics, History and Archaeology. K. bookends this work by discussing a paper written by A.H.M. Jones, in 1956, in which he outlined what he thought was needed from numismatic research. This enables a succinct conclusion to the book, where K. is able to report that enormous strides have been made in the last 60 years, raising the profile of numismatics and showing its real importance to other branches of historical and archaeological research. Although the scope of this book is very broad, it is highly condensed, and so there is no room for any depth of discussion in this short review. At the outset, I can only strongly recommend that anyone with an interest in the Roman world should read this work.
K. explains how coins can be used as both historical and archaeological sources, showing how more critical and quantitative methodologies have led to important developments in the assistance of both disciplines. She identifies two key themes: first, coins as a tool of political communication; second, the function of coins as monetary instruments. I believe that one should also add the non-monetary functions of coins, such as in ritual.
Chapter 2 discusses recent methodological, theoretical and technological developments. Foremost is the advent of the metal detector since the 1960s and the ever-increasing amount of material available for numismatic research. Many coins are recorded on official websites, such as that of the Portable Antiquities Scheme run from the British Museum (finds.org.uk), but much is also seen in the trade and on less-regulated sites such as eBay; K. acknowledges the issues of illicit looting as well. However, properly recorded coins do afford an enormous amount of data for increasingly sophisticated quantitative and statistical research. Furthermore, there is a growing number of powerful web-based resources, driven by institutions such as the American Numismatic Society and the Ashmolean Museum. Online Coins of the Roman Empire (OCRE: http://numismatics.org/ocre/) and Roman Provincial Coinage Online (RPC: https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/) are both excellent examples. K. notes the major strides that have been made in metallurgical analysis, notably by K. Butcher and M. Ponting. She also highlights the role of numismatics within the field of economic theory, discussing the concepts of intrinsic and face value whilst also acknowledging how ethnographic studies are an important influence on our understanding of how money operated within Roman and newly conquered societies.
Chapter 3, ‘Structuring the Material’, is an outline of the traditional areas of ancient numismatic study: Roman republican, Roman imperial and Roman provincial (formerly Greek imperial). The standard works are noted, most importantly Roman Republican Coinage by M. Crawford (1974), Roman Imperial Coinage (1923–1994) and Roman Provincial Coinage (1992–2015). Two very useful works by the late J. Melville Jones could be added: Dictionary of Ancient Roman Coins (1990) and Testimonia Numaria (1993 and 2007), which are essential for any numismatist wishing to read about coins in the ancient texts. K. ends with Anastasius’ coinage reforms (actually in ad 498, not 491). This is one place where I take issue. Anyone studying ancient coin finds in the Mediterranean world really needs to have a working knowledge of Byzantine coinage down to the end of the seventh century, the coinage reforms of ad 498 having nothing like the impact on the Roman world that the Islamic invasions did in the seventh century.
In Chapter 4, ‘Coins as a Means of Communication’, K. shows how enormous progress has been made since the 1980s in understanding the propaganda function of coins. Qualitative analysis of messages on coins, such as by A. Meadows and J. Williams in the Republican period, have been complemented by quantitative analysis to ascertain which messages were deemed the most important, a methodology adopted by C. Rowan to analyse the messages on imperial coinage. There have been several studies of Antonine, Severan and later third-century coinages that show conscious decisions about the nature and development of imperial messaging on coins, such as imperial representation and legitimation. Furthermore, studies of particular reverse types on coins have demonstrated that some appear to have been sent to specific regions, K. citing her own work on Flavian base metal coins in the western provinces. For later Roman coinage there is discussion of the Christogram and Sol; in addition, I recommend work by R. Abby on Christian imagery (R. Abby and A. Dowler, Coins and the Bible [2013]). There has been prodigious progress in the study of Roman provincial coins, largely facilitated by the ongoing publication of Roman Provincial Coinage volumes.
Chapter 5, ‘Monetary Instruments’, covers mints, denominations, metrology, metal sources, quantification and die-studies, which are all crucial areas in numismatic research. K. outlines the discovery of subsidiary mints and discusses the possibility of more mobile mints. She also highlights issues with the identification of, and terminology used for, different denominations, an area still fraught with problems. Work on metrology has made great strides, which has fed into the identification of potential new sources of metal, with Butcher and Ponting suggesting a possible source of silver in the Balkans. The quantification of coinage remains a contentious issue, but K. shows how work on die-studies is beginning to provide more solid results. The chapter ends with a long discussion of coinage and monetary and fiscal policy, outlining various arguments about the purpose of coinage for the state. Coinage played a crucial role in the payment of the army, notably in silver, and in the funding of major infrastructure projects. However, smaller denomination coins were also required to enable low value transactions; indeed, when in short supply, local populations would produce their own copies. K. asks if there was a Roman monetary policy at all, a fascinating debate that can be fed by the increasing amount of numismatic data being collected. A comparison of numismatic data with information from Egyptian papyri enables D. Rathbone to argue that the rampant inflation of the third century, claimed by many scholars, only occurred in ad 274–5. In late antiquity payment in kind becomes more important, but gold becomes increasingly significant for donatives and for paying subsidies to Germanic and other tribes across the frontiers.
In Chapter 6, ‘The Use of Coinage’, K. covers what we often call ‘applied numismatics’, a discipline pioneered by R. Reece and J. Casey, which analyses excavation, field-walking and detector finds. Excavation reports, rather than just providing a commentary on a catalogue of coins, are now increasingly using statistical methods to analyse the coins in their archaeological context and against other sites and regions. In this way, numismatics is becoming much more embedded in archaeology than ever before. Studies have shown how the Roman conquest of the Greek cities in Italy, of Spain, of southern France and of Asia Minor resulted in specific, but different changes in the nature and use of coinage. It is clear that across the Roman world there is an increasing identification of a patchwork quilt of varying currency pools, which helps to inform us about the diversity of the Empire. In addition, we are able to show how the nature of currency use in the Empire changed over time.
This excellent book should be required reading for anyone embarking on historical or archaeological research in the Roman world. It will stand alongside such works as P. Grierson's Numismatics (1975), J. Casey's Understanding Ancient Coins (1987) and C. Howgego's Ancient History from Coins (1995), in addition to numerous works on applied numismatics by R. Reece, largely summarised in Roman Coins and Archaeology (2003). K. has shown that numismatics has risen to many of the challenges set by Jones in 1956 and can no longer be regarded as a merely peripheral subject of occasional utility to the Classicist, historian and archaeologist.
