In 1713, a medals inspector documented the
acquisition of eight gold Roman coins that had been buried in
Transylvania. For
centuries, experts believed them to be forgeries — and poorly made ones at
that.
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The coins
featured the image of an otherwise unknown leader and characteristics that
differed from other mid-third century Roman coins. But now researchers who have
re-examined the coins, which were in a collection at the
University of Glasgow
in Scotland, say they may, in fact, be authentic.
The design on
the coin was irregular for the time period, and the man depicted on them,
Sponsian, was mostly lost to history. The coins included references to “bungled
legends and historically mixed motifs”, experts said.
Research
published last week in the journal PLOS ONE posited that the coins — and
Sponsian, the man depicted — deserved another look.
Using modern
imaging technology, researchers said they found “deep micro-abrasion patterns”
that were “typically associated with coins that were in circulation for an
extensive period of time”. In addition, researchers analyzed earthen deposits,
finding what they called evidence that the coins had been buried for a long
time before being exhumed.
The coins are
also “uncharacteristic” of the forgeries from around the time they were found,
researchers said.
“If the coins
proved to be fakes, they would make a particularly interesting case study in
antiquarian forgery,” researchers wrote. “If authentic, they would be of clear
historical interest.”
The name Sponsian would not have been an obvious
choice to forgers centuries later, as he was an obscure figure, the research
team found. It hoped the research might bring him back into focus as a minor
historical figure. On the coin, he is depicted wearing a crown like those worn
by emperors.
“Nothing can be
known about him for certain, but the coins themselves, together with the
provenance recorded by Heraeus, provide clues as to his possible place in
history,” researchers wrote in reference to Sponsian and Carl Gustav Heraeus.
It was Heraeus, an inspector of medals for the Imperial Collection in Vienna,
who documented the acquisition of the coins in 1713.
Early writers
considered Sponsian a historical usurper, who potentially made a bid for power
during civil wars that ended the reign of another emperor, Philip. Now,
researchers hypothesize that Sponsian may have been a commanding officer of a
province during a period of military strife.
“Our evidence
suggests he ruled Roman Dacia, an isolated gold mining outpost, at a time when
the empire was beset by civil wars and the borderlands were overrun by
plundering invaders,” Paul N. Pearson, lead author of the paper, said in a
statement.
A fraudster in
Vienna frequently duped collectors in the 18th century, when the coins were
found in Transylvania, or modern-day Romania, researchers said.
Forgers at the
time used artificial aging methods, such as abrasion, to make artifacts
including coins seem older. Superficial scratches and earthen deposits led
investigators, including Pearson, an earth sciences professor at the
University College London, to determine that the treatment seemed natural, prompting them
to think the coins were authentic.
“We suggest that
the Sponsian series coinage was used to pay senior soldiers and officials in
gold and silver by weight and then traded down at a high premium for regular
imperial coins that were already circulating in the province from before the
time of crisis,” the research paper said.
Despite
researchers’ conclusions, some experts saw holes in the findings.
In her Times Literary
Supplement column, Mary Beard, a professor of classics at the University of
Cambridge in Britain, pointed to the coins’ composition among factors that
raised questions about their authenticity. “There is still very powerful evidence
that they are fakes,” she wrote.
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