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 Replies: 11 / Views: 926 |
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Pillar of the Community
2087 Posts |
I know very little about medieval issues from Armenia. I know the Armenians had a huge trading network( stretching as far as China) I was doing some browsing and saw some AR Trams for sale. I was intrigued some of the issues are quite charming. Could some kind person point me in the direction of a reliable reference?
Sorry no picture I don't have one( yet)
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Moderator
 United States
34425 Posts |
@AK, I think you will need to pick up a Bedoukian.
"If you climb a good tree, you get a push."
-----Ghanaian proverb
"The danger we all now face is distinguishing between what is authentic and what is performed."
-----King Adz
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Moderator
United States
23731 Posts |
I collect Cilician Armenia coins and find them a very interesting series. Here is a pdf that will help you: http://www.numismatas.com/Forum/Pdf...0Armenia.pdfI also recommend getting a copy of "Coins of Cilician Armenia by Paul Z Bedoukian", I was lucky to find a new copy for under $10 on ebay. |
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Pillar of the Community
 United States
7955 Posts |
Quote:
I was doing some browsing and saw some AR Trams for sale. I was intrigued some of the issues are quite charming. Every time I see some medieval Armenian coins in an auction catalog, I think something similar, but have thus far managed to resist. But I do not have your broad interest in history of coinage. |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1554 Posts |
You can download a copy of the 1962 edition of Bedoukian at Hathi Trust. The major difference between the 1962 and 1979 editions seems to be that the 1962 edition was published by the ANS in its Numismatic Notes and Monographs series and the 1979 edition was published privately. Both are 494 pages. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt...uc1.$b687478Edited by Kushanshah
12/08/2018 7:14 pm
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Pillar of the Community
 2087 Posts |
Thanks for that everyone. The AR Tram has created a little puzzle for me. It is about the same size as a Venetian Grosso. The puzzle is which one came first the Grosso or the tram? I know the minting of the Grosso was approved in 1194 but the first date of striking is not known. The first clear record/tradition is of the grossos striking in 1202. Cilician Armenia was an important trading nexus. Although it is possible the tram was copied from the Grosso, the idea that the Grosso was copied from the tram also comfortably fits with the little I know about the Venetians and Cilician Armenians. A Christian enclave at the edges of the Christian world, like all peripheral states, is more likely to develop new solutions and technology, for example, the transfer of advances in Castle building from Armenia to Western Europe). Then again thinking harder: was it Venice that was on the periphery of the civilised world?
Edited by austrokiwi
12/09/2018 01:51 am
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Moderator
United States
23731 Posts |
I have no proof either way which came first, but before the Armenians moved into Cilicia and formed their principality Venice was a major hub for trading. No doubt that Cilician Armenia traded with Venice but they had more contact with the Byzantine Empire which was much closer than Venice and for a time they were on a friendly basis.
That being said the Byzantines did not have much use for silver coinage so most likely if the Armenians did copy there trams if wasn't from them, so it's very possible that they might have copied from the Grosso.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1554 Posts |
If I'm not mistaken. the word "tram" derives from drachm and is about the same weight as the contemporary Seljuq dirham struck in great numbers by their neighbors to the north. The word "dirham" also derives from drachm. Both the Muslim dirham and the Armenian tram ultimately derive from the Sasanian drachm. At 3gm, the Armenian tram and the Seljuq dirham are significantly heavier than the Venetian grosso (2.2gm). According to Wikipedia, the grosso seems to have been a novel invention of Venice, perhaps inspired by the fine silver pennies of England.
Edited by Kushanshah
12/09/2018 05:45 am
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Pillar of the Community
2087 Posts |
Wikipedia is useful but isn't the greatest of sources. I find when I dig hard that some of the accepted stories behind coins become very blurred. All I know is that for Venice and other states there were economic forces driving the need for larger coins. Venice is accepted as the first to produce the Grosso. I am confident that Venice leads Western Europe with the Grosso, but that doesn't mean it didn't copy some other states coins. Or at least was inspired by the larger coins of more eastern states.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
7955 Posts |
Poking around on CoinArchives a bit, I see trams back to the reign of Levon I, which started 1198 ... No info on dating those trams more narrowly, though. I did see there is a "coronation tram" which led me to wonder if this one had been more narrowly dated to earlier in the reign. (I suspect these things are well known to most of those who are commenting here).
What I also noted was a reference to double trams of 6 g. as far back as Levon I. On another thread, we were discussing medieval coins larger than the gros / grosso. Clearly the double tram pre-dated anything that large that I've run across for western Europe.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1554 Posts |
At the time the grosso was introduced, the Venetians were using debased Italian imperial (HRE) denarii for domestic transactions and Islamic dirhams for trade, as was common in the eastern Mediterranean. Venice's role in the crusades necessitated a better domestic coinage which could also be used for trade. The Armenian tram was the local Cilician Christian version of the 3.0gm Islamic dirham circulating in Anatolia, the Levant and Egypt. The problem with connecting the grosso directly to the dirham/tram is that the 2.2gm grosso is approximately 11/15 of the dirham or tram, an odd fraction.
Edited by Kushanshah
12/09/2018 08:03 am
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Pillar of the Community
2087 Posts |
Kushanshah makes a good point. I understand The Venetians would have had difficulty trading with their own coins and using someone else's( Byzantine and Levantine) would have been an expensive option( they lose the Seigniorage). Once they had decided to strike a larger coin would have been the technology they had. For me it all makes interesting digging, sometimes without answers... but the digging tends to give me a better understanding
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Replies: 11 / Views: 926 |
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Posted 12/08/2018 3:39 pm
