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Roman Provincial Coinage - Coggle Diagram
Roman Provincial Coinage
Core argument
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provincial coins show how cities, leagues, colonies and provinces negotiated life under Roman rule, using coinage to express both loyalty to the emperor and a local identity
Rome's approach
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Cassius Dio imagined the advice of Maecenas to Augustus: cities should not have separate coinages, weights, or measures, but should all use Rome's
This is not what Rome did, at least immediately, but it does reflect an increasing ideological sway towards centralisation, at least in the time of Cassius Dio (3rd century AD Severan period)
in reality, Rome often allowed regional currencies to continue, and gradually assimilated denominations to Roman values
Romanisation of coinage was gradual, uneven, and regionally varied
East vs. West
Western provinces
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civic coinages were produced in Spain, Africa, and Sicily under Augustus but declined quickly afterwards
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Eastern provinces
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eastern local coinage endured until the time of Tacitus, AD 275-276
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Obverse and Reverse
a common provincial pattern is obverse: emperor/imperial family, and reverse: local god, monument, myth etc.
Zeugma, Syria
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reverse: temple with four columns on a hill, colonnaded peribolos below
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significance:
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shared obverse die with Antioch important because it suggests links in production, perhaps a shared workshop
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Antioch, Syria
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significance:
Tyche as personified city fortune, Orontes as local river geography
Neapolis, Syria-Palestina
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Homonoia
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Smyrna and Athens
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reverse: winged Nemesis of Smyrna standing, with Athena opposite
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significance:
shows two cities through their patron/representative deities. Smyrna has Nemesis and Athens has Athens
