Tuesday, 22 November 2016

Syrian coin in UK Jumble Sale


Obviously we are going to see a lot more of this as poorly-curated ephemeral personal collections of what was once archaeological evidence are scattered (jumble sale find). "Can detectorists be archaeologists?" some simpleton asked....
Detectski » Sun Nov 20, 2016 4:56 pm    jumble sale roman find for ID please [emoticon] [...] Here's how it went down...Pot of coins and random ear-rings etc, tipped em out and had a poke through them, vicky pennys/euro cents/thruppenny bits etc, oh hello that's a roman, had a look any sign it might be a repro, nothing obvious. Me: 'how much for this one?' Brummie stall holder: ' coins are 20p bud' Me: pause / sucking noise / pause 'this one's a bit dirty, how about 10p'  Brummie: 'go on then duck'  That's how they roll at those sort of events... [emoticon]
Apparently it was a 'Theodosius I AE2. DN THEODOSIVS PF AVG, rosette-diademed, draped and cuirassed bust right / GLORIA ROMANORVM, emperor standing facing, head right, holding standard and globe. Mintmark ANTA' (Antioch, Syria).

Now, what happened to the rest of this individual's 'collection'? Where are all those artefacts now? Is this the way we should be treating the archaeological heritage?
 
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1 comment:

  1. kyri22 November 2016 at 11:14

    hi Paul,you will be surprised what can turn up at these kind of sales.there are thousands of pieces out there.with the british army spread all over the middle east for the good part of 200 years many portable pieces were brought home.i myself have found pieces in provincial sales from deceased estates thrown into boxes with bits of old china ect.i have found greek and roman oil lamps,coins and even the odd miniature apulian vase.the sad thing is that any ligitimately found pieces will be tainted and linked with the recent looting.
    kyri.

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