Posted 01/11/2008 02:50 am
Roman "provinces" like Britannia, Egypt, Pannonia, Lusitania and so forth, didn't issue their own coinage. "Roman Provincial" coinage was in effect a continuation of the old Greek city-state system.
In ancient times, the distinction between city and country was blurrier than it is today. In ancient Greece, each city was in effect an independent country, and the issuing of your own coinage was one way of a city asserting it's greatness and independence. The Romans, on the other hand, preferred to keep their provincial governors well and truly dependant, and never granted a province that kind of autonomy. Well, not voluntarily, anyway.
The first "national" or "empire-wide" coinages were those of Persia and the Empire of Alexander. The Hellenistic monarchies of Egypt, Syria, Macedonia, Pergamum etc. continued this practise. But city-coinages continued to flourish alongside the imperial issues.
Rome's attitude to city-state coinage was much the same as their predecessors in empire-building. As the Roman empire expanded, the cities in the new territories which were either allies of Rome or joined the Empire voluntarily continued to issue their own coinage. For some cities, you can't even tell which coins are "Greek" and which ones are "Roman Provincial".
Cities which were not so... circumspect... had their coin-issuing status revoked by the Romans, either permanently or until the city was well and truly Romanized. Roman colonies founded in the occupied territories might also be granted the right to issue coinage, as a sign of the new city's importance.
Eventually, the last remnants of the city-state coinage were subsumed by the Roman economy. With Diocletian's reforms in the late third century, the old separate coinage systems were replaced with a new, empire-wide monetary system, with clear, easily translatable mintmarks to designate in which city the coins were struck. But even this series focussed more on "cities", rather than "provinces".
Now, to your question of a complete list of Greek and Roman coin-issuing cities... that is more difficult than you might think. The Wildwinds index page is pretty good, but I doubt it could be considered complete and comprehensive. New cities and coinages are still being discovered all the time, while scholarship and archaeological findings can cause coins "of unknown origin" to be allocated a home, and occasionally coins attributed to one city are re-allocated to other cities.
If you want "coins from the Provinces of the Empire", might I suggest Hadrian's "progress" series. A couple of times, the emperor went on a grand tour of the Empire, and as the emperor visited each province, coins commemorating the visit to that province were struck, either in the main mint or a "travelling mint" the emperor took along with him.
In ancient times, the distinction between city and country was blurrier than it is today. In ancient Greece, each city was in effect an independent country, and the issuing of your own coinage was one way of a city asserting it's greatness and independence. The Romans, on the other hand, preferred to keep their provincial governors well and truly dependant, and never granted a province that kind of autonomy. Well, not voluntarily, anyway.
The first "national" or "empire-wide" coinages were those of Persia and the Empire of Alexander. The Hellenistic monarchies of Egypt, Syria, Macedonia, Pergamum etc. continued this practise. But city-coinages continued to flourish alongside the imperial issues.
Rome's attitude to city-state coinage was much the same as their predecessors in empire-building. As the Roman empire expanded, the cities in the new territories which were either allies of Rome or joined the Empire voluntarily continued to issue their own coinage. For some cities, you can't even tell which coins are "Greek" and which ones are "Roman Provincial".
Cities which were not so... circumspect... had their coin-issuing status revoked by the Romans, either permanently or until the city was well and truly Romanized. Roman colonies founded in the occupied territories might also be granted the right to issue coinage, as a sign of the new city's importance.
Eventually, the last remnants of the city-state coinage were subsumed by the Roman economy. With Diocletian's reforms in the late third century, the old separate coinage systems were replaced with a new, empire-wide monetary system, with clear, easily translatable mintmarks to designate in which city the coins were struck. But even this series focussed more on "cities", rather than "provinces".
Now, to your question of a complete list of Greek and Roman coin-issuing cities... that is more difficult than you might think. The Wildwinds index page is pretty good, but I doubt it could be considered complete and comprehensive. New cities and coinages are still being discovered all the time, while scholarship and archaeological findings can cause coins "of unknown origin" to be allocated a home, and occasionally coins attributed to one city are re-allocated to other cities.
If you want "coins from the Provinces of the Empire", might I suggest Hadrian's "progress" series. A couple of times, the emperor went on a grand tour of the Empire, and as the emperor visited each province, coins commemorating the visit to that province were struck, either in the main mint or a "travelling mint" the emperor took along with him.
Don't say "infinitely" when you mean "very"; otherwise, you'll have no word left when you want to talk about something really infinite. - C. S. Lewis
Edited by Sap
01/11/2008 02:50 am
01/11/2008 02:50 am
