A trip to Coventry - 'Roman Empire: Power and People'

The latest British Museum touring exhibition doing the rounds is currently residing at the Herbert in Coventry, and having failed to make it down to Norwich to see it at its previous venue, I was very pleased to be able to head across this evening to not only look around the exhibition, but also attend a very good lecture on Roman numismatics, of which more later.

I have to start with a tiny grumble, though not one that the Herbert has any control over.  Its something that afflicts every BM touring exhibition - a ban on gallery photography.  I get why some exhibitions have copyright problems, but the archaeology in this show doesn't suffer from this hindrance.  Likewise, some material is susceptible to light damage, but only allowing non-flash photography is now standard in most institutions.  There are no photographic restrictions when the objects are on display in the BM or in their local galleries, so why the change in policy when they are part of a formal exhibition like this?  It feels like such a backward step when we should be encouraging people to share their gallery experiences and promote the subject in the process.

But enough with the grumbles as the exhibition is very good, and strikes a lovely balance between BM material (British and international in nature) and local material.  This is a nice parallel with the study of Roman archaeology in general, which can vary hugely in scale between the truly classical and international and the incredibly local picture encountered in the different parts of Roman Britain.  A particularly nice example of this was the film of the Herbert's archaeology curator, Paul Thompson, teleporting around the Midlands to talk about local sites, which I really enjoyed.

Some of the objects on show are wonderful, and the selection for a touring show is adventurous.  Items like the gilded bronze Hercules from Birdoswald, the stone carving of Horus in armour, the flourite 'Crawford Cup', and the variety of fine marble tomb monuments and altars are objects of the highest quality and benefit from the detailed attention they are given.  Also to be lauded is the decision to place so many of them on open display.  The lack of a pane of glass between viewer and object, as we all know, enhances the experience immensely.

On a more local level, it was an unexpected thrill to see items such as the Mars rider figurine from Norton Disney and a votive plaque with Vulcan from the famous Barkway hoard - both items I only knew from photographs and had not expected to come face to face with during my visit.  I was also very happy to see the coins and pot from the Selby coin hoard, which I have previously blogged about because of the funky science used to examine it.

One area where photography was allowed was a neat section where visitors can step into a Roman coin and become the Imperial portrait of Constantius Chlorus, father of Constantine the Great.

The second element of the trip was a very enjoyable evening lecture by Dr Clare Rowan of Warwick University.  Her topic was 'Coinage and Communication in the Roman Empire', which she tackled with palpable enthusiasm, keeping a good balance between the development of Roman coinage and its myriad imagery and social contexts.  Her blog on Roman numismatics can be seen here, and is well worth checking out.

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Derbyshire's Corieltavian cave coin cache

There has been a lot of media buzz recently over the discovery of a small hoard of 26 coins at Reynard's Cave at Dovedale in Derbyshire. The excitement has even spread to Lincolnshire (part of the Corieltavian heartlands) and I spent a while on the phone with the Lincolnshire Echo this afternoon discussing the finer points of our understanding of the Iron Age and why this find is significant to us.

Leaving aside the rather unusual find spot for the moment, the first thing that makes the hoard significant is the fact that of the 26 coins, 23 are examples of the later Iron Age inscribed coins of the Corieltavi, but 3 are Roman Republican silver denarii.  One of the holy grails of late Iron Age archaeology is concrete evidence of material and cultural relationships between Britain and the Roman Empire prior to the invasion of AD43.  The presence of pre-invasion coinage included with material of Iron Age date (as was discovered at the incredible shrine site at Hallaton in Leicestershire) always offers this exciting possibility.  The problem lies in the fact that Republican denarii, due to their silver content, circulated for a long time and can still be found in 2nd Century AD contexts.  It will therefore be interesting to see when these coins were minted (denarii began to be produced in 211BC) and how worn they are.  Iron Age coins fell out of production very soon after the Roman invasion, however, so there does seem to be a good chance that the hoard dates at the very least to the time of the invasion.

The second thing of interest is that the coins are Corieltavian, when Derbyshire was part of the tribal area of the neighbouring Brigantes.  This in itself shouldn't surprise us too much, as Corieltavian coins are often found in Yorkshire - indeed, it used to be thought that they were made by the Brigantes, with only 20th Century scholarship proving their East Midlands manufacture.  Nevertheless, the hoard is indicative of the fact that this group of Corieltavian coins had been obtained by a Brigantian, perhaps as part of a trade agreement, as payment for a service or as part of a gift exchange to seal an alliance.

Finally, we turn to the cave itself.  The finder apparently was sheltering from the rain in the cave and happened to have a small metal detector with him, which he used on the floor and found the first few coins.  This then led to an excavation which uncovered the rest.  The excavation is worth noting, as it was carried out using personnel from Operation Nightingale - a wonderful scheme to get wounded servicemen and women into archaeological fieldwork.  Its a great scheme and it seems like the thrill of archaeological discovery will long remain with those involved.  But why were the coins buried in a cave in the first place?  It may simply have been seen as a safe location, but there remains the possibility that the cave was a sanctuary of some sort, and the protection of more spiritual inhabitants of that dark and secluded place may have been sought.  Of course, 'ritual' is a dirty word in archaeology and such theories of sacred caves remain completely baseless without more evidence to support them.

The hoard is currently going through the treasure process, and will hopefully be acquired by Buxton Museum.  I for one can't wait to head across for a look at them in due course, and to see the results of the identification work on them which is only just beginning, and will hopefully begin to answer some of the questions we still have about how and when the hoard was constructed and deposited.

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Stories from The Collection #5 - 'Julia Maesa denarius ring bezel'

This is the fifth in a series of posts about recent acquisitions to the collections of The Collection: Art and Archaeology in Lincolnshire.

This article was published in the Autumn 2012 issue of ‘Lincolnshire Past and Present’ magazine, published by the Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology.

The Collection has recently acquired an unusual piece of Romano-British jewellery.  The item in question is the bezel of a ring made from a Roman coin.  Although the hoop of the ring is lost and only the bezel survives, it is nonetheless a most unusual and noteworthy addition to the county's archaeological collections.

Click to enlarge

The bezel was discovered at Ulceby with Fordington, between Alford and Spilsby in March 2011 and reported as treasure.  Although single coin finds are not classed as treasure under the definition in the 1996 Treasure Act, the conversion of this coin into an item of jewellery makes it eligible.

The coin is a silver denarius of Julia Maesa, minuted in Rome between AD220 and AD222.  The obverse shows the draped bust of Julia Maesa, the reverse the figure of Felicitas, the personification of good fortune, holding a long caduceus whilst sacrificing over an altar.  The reverse legend, now almost entirely lost, reads 'SAECVLI FELICITAS' - which optimistically translates as 'the happiness of the age'.

Julia Maesa herself was a member of one of the most interesting of Imperial dynasties, the Severans, and related to a number of Emperors.  She was the sister-in-law of the Emperor Septimus Severus, grandmother of the Emperors Elagabalus and Alexander Severus and the aunt of the Emperor Caracalla and his murdered younger brother Geta.  Far from being a passive figure, she actively involved herself in Imperial politics, particularly in her successful plot to overthrow the Emperor Macrinus and replace him with Elagabalus.

This type of reuse of a coin is extremely rare in Britain, though the practice is better evidenced on the continent.  This example is particularly interesting for the fact that it is the reverse of the coin that was chosen for display in the ring, rather than the portrait.  This strongly suggests that it was the fortuitous attributes of Felicitas that were sought or promoted by the wearer, and the Imperial imagery of decidedly lesser importance.  Of course, the conversion from coin to ring may have occurred many years after the death of Julia Maesa herself, and after the coin had ceased to be legal tender.

The Collection is grateful to both the finder and the landowner for waiving their rights to a reward and donating the bezel to the museum.

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Stories from The Collection #4 - 'Romano-British snake bracelet terminal' and 'Chinese hell banknote'

This is the fourth in a series of posts about recent acquisitions to the collections of The Collection: Art and Archaeology in Lincolnshire.

This article was published in the Summer 2012 issue of ‘Lincolnshire Past and Present’ magazine, published by the Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology.

For this issue's journey into the museum's recent acquisitions we will be looking at two objects with connections to religious belief, but from quite different periods in history and from different sides of the globe.


Romano-British snake bracelet terminal from Marton, near Gainsborough

This small gold item is the broken terminal from a bracelet, in the form of a snake's head.  The semi-naturalistic head is oval in plan and is very flat, with the details of the head marked out in low relief.  A cross hatched section of the body gives some indication of the decorative pattern on the remainder of the bracelet, which would have wound around the wearer's arms a number of times.


Snake motifs occupy an interesting position in Romano-British jewellery, with the design known mainly on rings and bracelets.  In classical antiquity, the snake did not carry the same negative association with evil and deceit that it would later adopt in Christian mythology, and was instead seen as a creature connected with healing, regeneration and rebirth.  The slender image of the snake associated with the healing deity Asclepius may form the basis for the jewellery we find in Britain.  It has been suggested that bracelets such as this were worn by pregnant women as protective charms.


Such bracelets are usually found in bronze or silver, and this gold example is the first of its type recorded in Lincolnshire.  The Collection has another, complete, bronze example from Ancaster in its collections.  Bracelets such as these were a cultural import of the 1st Century AD, but this example could date to any time between the 1st and 3rd Centuries.


The Collection would like to take this opportunity to thank both the finder and the landowner for waiving their right to a reward and donating the terminal to the museum.


Chinese 'Hell' Banknote

The Collection's numismatic collections contain many examples of rare and important coins and tokens from Britain and across the world, from the Iron Age to the modern day.


The collections are more than simply examples of legal tender, however, and aim to demonstrate the ways in which the concept of money has been used by different cultures right up to the present day.  This Chinese banknote is not legal tender and was made only very recently.  It is, however, indicative of Chinese beliefs surrounding the afterlife, and a central element of important annual festivals.


The banknote was collected in Chengdu, in China's south-western Sichuan province, and is made of joss paper.  Notes such as this are burned by families at their ancestor's gravesides throughout the year, but particularly at the festivals of 'Ching Ming' ('Festival of Pure Brightness') and 'Gui Jie' ('Festival of Hungry Ghosts').  The Chinese belief is that spirits go to a form of limbo, but where money is still required to purchase goods.  In order to ensure that the ancestors are being provided for, the banknotes are burned, often in large quantities, while saying the names of items that could be purchased with them.


The banknote is based on a Hong Kong note, and displays noticeably western imagery.  The figure on the right is the 'Jade Emperor', the supreme deity with responsibility for the afterlife.  The concept of 'hell' does not translate directly into Chinese belief, but the word became associated with the afterlife after Christian missionaries arrived in China in the 18th and 19th centuries.

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The sexy science of coin hoards

OK, hold everything.  I’ve just seen the best thing ever!

The latest Money and Medals newsletter (what do you mean you don’t read it?  Check out the website here) has a piece by Richard Abdy of the British Museum about the preliminary study of a Roman coin hoard found near Selby in North Yorkshire.  The hoard is an interesting enough find in itself – an Antonine hoard of around 300 denarii still contained within two pots – but the technology being employed by Southampton University to analyse the coins while still inside the pot is quite simply the ‘sexiest thing ever’™

The team at the spectacularly named ‘μ-VIS Centre for Multidisciplinary, Multiscale,Microtomographic Volume Imaging’ were able to produce 3D scans of the hoard such as the one above*.  However, as Dr Abdy explains, the technology goes far beyond such images, special as they are, as it allows individual layers inside the hoard to be stripped back -  revealing individual coins, even when corroded, stuck to other coins and slap bang in the centre of the pot.  These can even be rotated to enable identification from different angles and with different light sources.

Although coin hoards are not commonly found sealed inside their containers, until now the only real option to study such coins without physically removing them has been through x-radiography.  This has its drawbacks such as not allowing layers to be individually examined, not allowing coins to be studied when not face on, and showing obverse and reverse details superimposed, as the x-ray of this sestertius of Nero from the Lincoln museum numismatics collections demonstrates quite clearly.

Of course, the real wow factor of such new technology is that such amazing details can be extracted without a single coin being disturbed.  Although not available for every find, the possibilities of such technology in the future are quite mouth-watering.

*I’ve reproduced the image from the newsletter – if anyone from the BM or Southampton University objects to me using it, please let me know and I’ll remove it!

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Stories from The Collection #1 – ‘Rothwell boar‘ & ‘late Roman gold solidi’

This is the first in a series of posts in which I will examine some of my favourite objects held in the archaeology collections of The Collection: Art and Archaeology in Lincolnshire.

This first post was published in the Autumn 2011 issue of the ‘Lincolnshire Past and Present’ magazine, published by the Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology.

The Collection: Art and Archaeology in Lincolnshire (formerly known as the City and County Museum) holds the main public archaeological collections for Lincolnshire.  These are estimated to contain some 2 million objects, ranging from the unique to the commonplace.  It is a collection that is always growing, through systematic professional and amateur fieldwork and through casual finds – whether made by someone digging in their garden or searching with a metal detector.  This article will examine two recent, and rather interesting, acquisitions by the museum, which deal with both the beginning and the end of Roman Britain.

The Rothwell boar

Not all of the objects the museum acquires are fresh from the soil.  This chubby and cheerful looking bronze boar statuette was found at Rothwell, near Caistor in 1990, but acquired by the museum in 2007.

It dates to the 1^st Century BC / 1^st Century AD, and is one of those most interesting of archaeological finds – one that spans two cultures, in this case late Iron Age and early Roman Britain. 

The boar was a potent symbol of the Corieltavi tribe, who occupied Lincolnshire as well as most of the modern East Midlands.  The image of a bristly, aggressive boar appears on their silver coins as well as on the famous Witham Shield, discovered in the River Witham in 1826.

Other examples of boar statuettes are known in Britain, but they invariably tend to be of the spindly, aggressive type that is seen on the coinage, not the more rounded, naturalistic image we see here (for example, see the boars from Hounslow, now in the British Museum).  The prominent dorsal bristles and tusks still mark this boar out as a warrior’s totem, just one produced by a sculptor with a better sense of porcine proportions, or at least one who valued the realistic depiction of the boar over one focussing on its aggressive attributes.  Perhaps the style of the boar suggests that we are looking at a statuette made with the technical skill of Roman manufacture, but adhering to the belief system of the Corieltavi – the perfect example of the gap between two cultures being bridged.

This statuette is complete and free standing, so it was not made to be attached to a vessel or helmet, as other examples are thought to have been.  Perhaps it was produced to be a votive offering, to be deposited in water as the Corieltavi did at the Fiskerton site, or to reside in a shrine?

The boar was purchased by the museum with the kind assistance of The Art Fund and the V&A/MLA Purchase Grant Fund.

3 late Roman gold solidi from Nettleham

Coin 1 - Theodosius I

Coin 2 - Gratian

Coin 3 - Valentinian II

Traditionally, history textbooks present the end of Roman Britain as occurring in AD410.  In reality the situation is far more complicated, and far more interesting, than that.  The big question about the end of Roman Britain basically comes down to how long a Roman way of life continued after the withdrawal of Rome’s official support systems.

These three gold coins, all in superb condition, are of a denomination known as a solidus.  They were discovered together by a metal detector user and seem to have formed part of a small hoard, perhaps contained together in a bag.  The coins range from AD378 to AD392, and represent some of the last official coinage to enter Britannia.

The chronology of the later Roman Emperors is far more complicated than their predecessors of the 1^st and 2^nd Centuries, as these coins attest.  The coins were struck at a time when the eastern and western elements of the Roman Empire had split, and combinations of co-emperors and junior Emperors were common.

Coins 1 and 2 were produced at a time (AD378-AD383) when the Emperor Gratian was ruling the western Empire with his younger half brother Valentinian II, but had given control of the eastern Empire to Theodosius I, a general who had served in Britain.  They are struck in the names of Gratian and Theodosius I.

Coin 3 is slightly later in date (AD388-AD392), and was produced after Gratian had been killed, and when Theodosius I had named his son Arcadius co-Emperor in the east.  It is struck in Valentinian II’s name.

Despite the changes in Emperors, the coins all bear the same reverse image – that of two emperors holding a globe between them while an angel looks over them (this being the time of the Christian Emperors the winged figure is an angel rather than ‘victory’).  This image of peace and harmony was no doubt not taken too literally by the people living in an age of uncertainty and strife.

The coins were purchased by the museum with the kind assistance of The Art Fund and the Friends of Lincoln Museums and Art Gallery.

Other ‘Stories from The Collection’ posts

#1‘Rothwell boar’ and ‘late Roman solidi’

#2 ‘Roman Bacchus intaglio ring‘ & ‘Anglo Saxon cloisonné insect pendant’

#3 'Erotic Roman knife handle'

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Old coins and dead Egyptians

It’s a funny old life being a museum curator.  I had a very long day in London the other day, getting up far too early to catch a train to get me to the British Museum for 9am.  The reason for this act of masochism was that I was attending a conference to celebrate the 150^th birthday of the department of coins and medals (though I didn’t even get them a card – I’m a terrible guest!)  I have to say that it was worth the effort, with some very good papers on the history of the department and some of the current projects being undertaken in the UK and abroad.  The updates on British projects such as the Portable Antiquities Scheme and the progress the BM is making on putting more of its collections online were particularly interesting.

One thing that did make me and a few provincial colleagues smile, though, was the way that some of the senior BM curators were criticising the lack of specialist numismatic posts in some museums, and highlighting how important it is that major research projects continue to be carried out.  It seemed to us that that view is slightly out of touch with the reality most museums are facing, when curators of huge collections and entire education and outreach departments are being culled en masse because of government cuts.  The luxury of specialist numismatic curators with the time and resources to carry out personal research projects is long gone, and the BM may do well to reflect how lucky they are to still have that role at all.

Having said that, it was a stimulating discussion, and I returned to Lincoln bursting with enthusiasm and ideas for new ways to get all of the people of Lincolnshire crazy about ancient coins.

While I was at the BM, I took the opportunity to go and see their latest exhibition – ‘Book of the Dead’.  Now, I have to confess that despite being a history buff, the Egyptians have always left me slightly cold – maybe it was the whole brain out of the nose thing when I was a kid?  Anyway, as a fully paid up, card carrying member of the Museums Association, I can get into the BM’s exhibitions for free, and I’m never one to pass up a freebie.

As I went round, I realised that the thoughts going round my head were the same as when I had visited the last few BM blockbuster exhibitions.  The objects are as wonderful as you’d expect them to be, the interpretation is informative and well planned and the dome of the reading room makes for a beautiful setting.  It should combine to make the perfect experience, but somehow it doesn’t.  The popularity of the exhibitions means that the visitor experience is poor.  For me, things like the large crowds in front of every case, being hit in the face by some tourist’s rucksack, having some screaming kid push past you the wrong way, or simply just having to stand and wait as you can’t even ignore a case and move on as the throng have created a bottleneck - all combine to just make me want to get through and out again as quickly as possible – and meaning that I take very little enjoyment or knowledge out of the experience.  I fail to see how anybody else could either.  It’s like an inverse ratio – as popularity increases, enjoyment for the individual visitor decreases.

I think a large part of the problem with this exhibition is that a lot of the objects are papyrus, meaning that you need to be close to them to get any sense of their detail.  The last BM exhibitions I really enjoyed were Hadrian and the Terracotta Warriors, and I think it’s no coincidence that they contained larger objects that could be appreciated from a distance.  If I could find a time to see this one when it was quiet, I’m sure I’d come away with a far better impression.

I actually went into ‘Book of the Dead’ twice.  My first visit was during lunchtime, but I tried again after the conference before my late train home, at about 7 o’clock in the hope it would be quieter.  It was actually worse – even more visitors and a child with some clacking toy that its parents evidently enjoyed the sound of.

Ultimately it’s hard to see how the BM can change it – getting lots of people to come to an exhibition is a sign of success, and lord knows the heritage industry in England at the moment needs every good bit of press it can get.  I just hope the hoards of other tourists didn’t feel as disappointed as I did, and will continue to come back again and again – if only they could keep away when I’m there…

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