Hoarding and the Deposition of Metalwork from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century: A British Perspective 9781407313832, 9781407322995

Table of contents :
Front Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Table of Contents
Foreword
Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century {1}
Hoards as Places: the example of Bronze Age archaeology
Hoarding and Other Forms of Metalwork Deposition in Iron Age Britain
Coins and Conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions
Emergency or Votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards
The Composition of Hoards
The Burial, Loss and Recovery of Roman Coin Hoards in Britain and Beyond: past, present and future
The Staffordshire Hoard in Context
The Deposition and Hoarding of Non-Precious Metals in Early Medieval England
Coin Hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544
England’s Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351)
Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War
Summary and Conclusions

Citation preview

BAR 615 2015 NAYLOR & BLAND (Eds) HOARDING AND THE DEPOSITION OF METALWORK

B A R 615 Naylor and Bland Cover.indd 1

Hoarding and the Deposition of Metalwork from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century: A British Perspective Edited by

John Naylor Roger Bland

BAR British Series 615 2015

02/06/2015 11:42:01

Hoarding and the Deposition of Metalwork from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century: A British Perspective Edited by

John Naylor Roger Bland

BAR British Series 615 2015

ISBN 9781407313832 paperback ISBN 9781407322995 e-format DOI https://doi.org/10.30861/9781407313832 A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

BAR

PUBLISHING

CONTENTS Foreword Roger Bland, British Museum & John Naylor, Portable Antiquities Scheme, Ashmolean Museum

v

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century Roger Bland, British Museum

1

Hoards as Places: the example of Bronze Age archaeology Richard Bradley, University of Reading

21

Hoarding and Other Forms of Metalwork Deposition in Iron Age Britain Colin Haselgrove, University of Leicester

27

Coins and Conquest: coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions Julia Farley, British Museum

41

Emergency or Votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards Kenneth Painter, formerly British Museum

67

The Composition of Hoards Richard Reece, formerly University College London

93

The Burial, Loss and Recovery of Roman Coin Hoards in Britain and Beyond: past, present and future Peter Guest, Barbican Research Associates

101

The Staffordshire Hoard in Context Kevin Leahy, Portable Antiquities Scheme

117

The Deposition and Hoarding of Non-Precious Metals in Early Medieval England John Naylor, Portable Antiquities Scheme, Ashmolean Museum

125

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544 Martin Allen, Fitzwilliam Museum

147

England's Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351) Barrie Cook, British Museum

167

Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War Edward Besly, National Museum Wales

181

Summary and Conclusions John Naylor, Portable Antiquities Scheme, Ashmolean Museum

201

iii

Foreword This volume publishes nine papers given at a conference organised by the Portable Antiquities Scheme at the British Museum in October 2011 on `Hoarding and deposition of metalwork: a British perspective’, alongside which are four additional papers from Julia Farley, Richard Reece, Martin Allen and John Naylor written for this volume. We are very grateful to them all for providing their papers for publication. Our thanks must also be extended to Claire Costin who kindly helped to proof read and format all of the papers in this volume for publication. All papers have been peerreviewed. The aim of this volume, like the conference, is to bring together different perspectives on hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age through to post-medieval times, as this is something that has not been attempted before. Traditionally prehistorians have tended to regard the deposition of metalwork, whether in hoards or as single objects, as having a ritual significance, whereas in historic periods it has been normal to interpret hoards as having been buried by the owners for safekeeping. Certainly there is ample contextual evidence to support the ritual interpretation of prehistoric finds and from the Roman period onwards we have literary references, including a few first-hand accounts from their owners that demonstrate the burial of hoards with the intention of recovery. It has traditionally been assumed that the shift in practice occurs during the transition between Iron Age and Roman, but archaeologists are now much more ready to stress continuity rather than change in Roman and later periods. The papers in this volume all seek to tackle this issue head on. This question was brought into relief by the discovery of the Frome hoard of 52,503 Roman coins of the 3rd century AD which, because it was excavated, led us to question whether it might not have been buried for ritual purposes rather than with the intention of recovery (Bland, this volume). This in turn prompted a project, ‘Hoarding in Iron Age and Roman Britain’ which has been funded by the AHRC, to investigate the contexts of over 3,000 Iron Age and Roman hoards in order to understand better the reasons for their burial. The project started in 2013 and its results must await the project monograph in 2017. We will extend the study of hoards back into the Iron Age, through a Collaborative PhD which will focus on hoards of metalwork, and into the Bronze Age, as the card index of an estimated 30,000 finds of Bronze Age metalwork housed at the British Museum is currently being digitised. Looking into the future, it would also be desirable to re-examine medieval and post-medieval hoards. Given the great increase in the numbers of finds that have been brought to light over the last forty years since the adoption of metal detecting, and the recording of these finds under the Treasure Act and Portable Antiquities Scheme, there is no doubt that a re-examination of the very rich evidence for hoarding from Britain is timely and we hope that this volume will help to set the scene for such an ambitious project. Roger Bland Keeper, Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory, British Museum

John Naylor National Finds Adviser, Medieval and Post-medieval coins, Ashmolean Museum

May 2015

v

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century {1} Roger Bland Introduction: rate of discovery

purses or small bags of coins lost by accident; ‘emergency’ hoards comprise groups of coins taken from circulation on a single occasion and buried in an emergency, with the intention of subsequent recovery, while ‘savings’ hoards comprise coins taken from currency over a period of time, and also deliberately buried or concealed by their owners with the intention of recovery. Lastly, Grierson defined ‘abandoned’ hoards as those whose owners disposed of their coins with no intention of retrieving them and he gave as examples coins associated with burials, foundation deposits in buildings and groups of coins thrown into wells or fountains. This classification, itself a development of earlier accounts (e.g. Laing 1969: 52-68), has proved very influential in subsequent literature (e.g. Casey 1986: 5167; Reece 1987: 46-70; Burnett 1991: 51-7; Reece 2002: 67-88; Blackburn 2005: 10-17; Blackburn 2011: 585-8). The distinction between ‘savings’ and ‘emergency’ hoards is now generally regarded as not very useful (Reece 2002: 72). In practice hoards do not fall into neat categories and any attempt to do this is likely to conceal the fact that the contents of hoards will have been put together in a wide range of different ways. Both ‘emergency’ and ‘savings’ hoards are likely to have been concealed for the same reasons: because their owners felt threatened and buried their wealth in the ground with the intention of subsequent recovery.

Britain has a very rich heritage of hoards of coins and metal artefacts and their study underpins our understanding of how coins and other metal artefacts circulated in this country. The growth of metal detecting from 1970 and the introduction of the Treasure Act and the Portable Antiquities Scheme in 1997 have led to a great increase in the discovery and recording of hoards. Fig. 1 shows the numbers of hoards of Roman coins discovered each year from the earliest records in the 15th century AD to 2010, with data derived from Robertson’s Inventory (Robertson 2000) and more recent finds reported as Treasure: the steep increase in discoveries in the last twenty years is very apparent. Much has been written on what hoards can tell us about coinage, or, for example, Bronze Age metalwork and there have been many studies of hoards of different periods, but there have been few attempts at an overview of hoarding across time.{2} In this paper I hope to raise some questions about hoarding in general to see whether one can make connections across periods. In 1975 Philip Grierson divided coin hoards into four categories: accidental losses, ‘emergency’ hoards, ‘savings’ hoards and abandoned hoards (Grierson 1975: 134-59). Under ‘accidental losses’ Grierson included

Fig. 1: Number of hoards of Roman coins discovered per annum, 1400-2010. 1

Roger Bland

Traditionally, therefore, students of coin hoards of the Roman period onwards have generally seen them as having been buried for safekeeping, although Hobbs (2006: 120-34) notes that the ‘threat and response’ interpretation does not apply to all episodes of hoarding and he makes a comparison between Britain and Italy at the end of the 4th century AD and the early years of the 5th. Large numbers of hoards are known from Britain at this period, which is the very period when Britain was abandoned as a Roman province (Bland 1997) and Hobbs notes that ‘it is probably fair to say that we can equate many late Romano-British precious metal hoards with the “formal demise of the province”’ (Hobbs 2006: 129). By contrast, relatively few hoards are known from Italy at this period, even though Alaric’s invasion of 401 was to lead to the sack of Rome in 410 and Hobbs notes that there are no more hoards from Italy in the period AD 395-410 than for the rest of the fifth century AD (Hobbs 2006: 129). Instead he argues that hoarding is a reflection of social behaviour and he suggests that in some regions (he cites East Anglia and the Urals), ‘the populations … just liked to bury precious metals’ (Hobbs 2006: 133). Aitchison (1988) and Guest (1994 and 2005) had already suggested that we need to look beyond the traditional ‘threat and response’ model in understanding hoarding in the Roman period: see also the contributions of Bradley and Haselgrove in this volume and the discussion of the Frome hoard below.

this simple categorisations is provided by the theory that at certain periods, for example after AD 296 when radiates were replaced with nummi, it is possible that hoards which had been deliberately buried in the ground were not recovered by their owners because the coins had been demonetised and therefore were effectively worthless (Casey 1986: 65-6; Reece 2002: 77). The pattern of hoarding in Britain To introduce this subject I have attempted a very approximate and high level overview of hoards from Britain – both coin hoards and others. This has been compiled from a number of sources. Dr Ben Roberts kindly supplied information on Bronze Age hoards: there are 1100 on the card index of Bronze Age finds held at the British Museum which lists finds up to 1985; an estimated 200 between 1985 and 2003 when the Treasure Act was extended to include these hoards and 150 since then.{6} For the Iron Age Philip de Jersey has kindly supplied information from his forthcoming corpus of Iron Age coin hoards, which includes some 340 coin hoards (de Jersey forthcoming); in addition a further 210 hoards of metalwork are known (Haselgrove, pers. comm.).{7} The figure for Roman finds is based on Anne Robertson’s Inventory (Robertson 2000) which contained data on 1990 finds up to about 1990; there are 739 later finds until the end of 2012 (of which 185 are addenda to existing hoards). The early medieval data is based on the list held by the Fitzwilliam’s early medieval coin database and the medieval figure in Allen (2012).{8} The post-medieval figure is based on Brown and Dolley (1971), which goes up to 1967, with an estimate of the number of more recent finds and for the Civil War period we have Edward Besly’s updated summary in this volume.

In his discussion of early Medieval coin finds, Blackburn (2005: 13-14) proposes another method of classifying hoards, by analysing how the elements in the hoards were put together, rather than the circumstances of their burial. He notes that many hoards had complicated histories and that a single hoard could contain several distinct elements, citing as an example a hoard of coins found in Cambridge (Allen 2005) which contained 1805 pennies of the period 1279-1351, no doubt drawn from circulation over a period of time, with the addition of nine gold coins which were added in the 1350s (Blackburn 2005: 14). This is an important insight, but in this paper I am chiefly concerned with the circumstances of deposition rather than with the contents of hoards.

Period Bronze Age (c. 1450-750 BC) Iron Age (c. 800 BC – AD 64) Roman (AD 43-410)

By contrast when prehistorians nowadays discuss hoarding and the deposition of valuable objects they generally assume that objects are deposited for votive reasons (Bradley 1988; Bradley 1998; Needham 1988; Hill 1995), but this has not always been so.{3} Such an explanation is very rarely applied to Medieval or postMedieval hoards, as votive deposition has not traditionally been thought to fit into the Christian tradition, but that view is now increasingly being been challenged.{4} This makes the Iron Age/Roman transition a key period for study in any discussion of why hoards were buried in Britain.{5}

Quantity

550 2579

Early Medieval (410-1180)

415

Medieval (1180-1544)

372

Post-Medieval (1544-1967) Total

Notes

c. 1450

c. 854

(excludes Scotland) (estimate)

6220

Table 1: Approximate total number of hoards from Britain by period. Apart from the Bronze Age, these figures are for coin hoards. There are a few hoards from all periods from the Iron Age onwards that lack coins – the Mildenhall Treasure (Hobbs 2012), the Staffordshire hoard (Leahy and Bland 2009) and a number of Viking hoards, such as the Huxley hoard (Graham-Campbell and Philpott 2010; many more Viking hoards do include coins) – and these need to be added, but I doubt that they will substantially change this picture. The total is around 6200 and the Roman period dominates, followed by the Bronze Age.

If we focus on the reasons why hoards were buried and not recovered, we can propose the following categories: (a) accidental losses; (b) hoards buried with the intention of recovery and (c) hoards deliberately abandoned for a variety of reasons, including votive. A further variation in 2

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

Fig. 2: Numbers of hoards deposited per annum, 1450 BC – AD 1937.

Fig. 3: Numbers of hoards deposited per annum, c. 120 BC - AD 410.

3

Roger Bland

Fig. 4: Numbers of hoards deposited per annum, AD 410-1180.

Fig. 5: Numbers of hoards deposited per annum, AD 1180-1937. 4

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

Fig. 2 summarises the number of hoards from the Bronze Age to 1937. The Bronze Age data have not been analysed in more detail and so just show as a single figure, but all the later data is dated more closely.

question of whether hoarding in a time of unrest can always be seen as a way of concealing items of value, or could some of these hoards have been buried for votive reasons, as a magical way for providing protection to the community perhaps? Be that as it may, the threat of invasion at the time of the Napoleonic Wars is not reflected here.

This chart only reflects the number of hoards that have been recovered from these periods and it in no way reflects their value, which can range enormously from a handful of base metal nummi of the 4th century AD to the 5kg of gold and 1.4kg of silver in the Staffordshire hoard.{9}

Hoarding in the prehistoric period No one would question the votive nature of deposits of Bronze Age metalwork. Yates and Bradley (2010a and 2010b) demonstrated a correlation between these deposits and river valleys, especially near the source of rivers (Fig. 6). In that paper they also made the fascinating observation that ‘For some time it has been obvious that metal detectorists have been extraordinarily fortunate in locating previously unrecorded hoards. The same people have found them on a number of different occasions. Discussions with the finders have made it clear that this did not happen by chance. Long before prehistorians had realized that the siting of hoards might follow topographic ‘rules’, metal detectorists had reached the same conclusion’ (pp. 28-9).

Fig. 3 provides a more detailed analysis of the late Iron Age and Roman periods, from c. 120 BC to c. AD 410. There are lesser peaks between c. 50 and c. 20 BC, in the reign of Nero (AD 54-68) and in the 160s AD, when we have many hoards of silver denarii. There is then a huge spike in the radiate period, between 268 and 296. In the 4th century AD the number of hoards is higher than in the early empire but it is much lower than at the end of the 3rd century AD, but there is a final peak at the very end of the period, between about 395 and 410. The early medieval pattern (Fig. 4) is interesting and has been commented on by Blackburn (2003 and 2005). Most of the hoards are quite closely dated and I have divided them into ten year periods and this clearly influences the pattern. During the 5th and 6th centuries there is very little coinage in Britain (although recent work shows that it was not entirely absent) and this is reflected in the very low number of hoards. These start to increase with the resumption of coinage in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms after 600 and there is an initial peak at the start of the 8th century AD. There is then a decline and hoards start to become more frequent in the mid-9th century AD – and the period of Alfred the Great. This presumably reflects two things – the pattern of coin production and the incidence of Viking raids, so well attested in the historical sources. The dip in the early 10th century AD is interesting – could that reflect a respite from Viking attacks?{10} Numbers then rise again for the next 150 years, with a peak in the decade of 1060-70 – i.e. the time of the Norman Conquest. There is then a decline under William II and Henry I and another increase in the reign of Stephen – the anarchy.

Fig. 6: Finds of Bronze Age metalwork in Hampshire/West Sussex (Yates and Bradley 2010a).

In the next period, covering 750 years from Henry II’s introduction of short cross coinage in 1180 to 1937 (Fig. 5), things seem to settle down. The main feature of this period seems to be the great stability throughout this long period, with a modest increase under Elizabeth I and a dramatic spike at the time of the Civil War in the decade 1639-49.

It is similarly clear that the Salisbury hoard was also votive in nature. This consists of over 600 Bronze Age and Iron Age objects dug up by two detectorists just outside Salisbury in about 1985 and sold to a dealer. It was subsequently investigated by Ian Stead of the British Museum (Stead 1998). But what was the reason for the burial of the gold cup dating to the mid-Bronze Age found by detector user Cliff Bradshaw at Ringlemere in Kent in 2001 (Needham et al. 2006)? It was buried in a Bronze Age barrow, overlaid by an Anglo-Saxon cemetery: is it from a grave or was it also buried for votive reasons?

So once we move past the Roman period it is very difficult to divorce the incidence of hoarding – and it must always be remembered that we only study the unrecovered hoards – we have no means of knowing how many more hoards were buried by their owners and subsequently recovered – and times of unrest, whether it be the Viking attacks in the 9th-11th centuries, the Norman Conquest or the Civil War. This prompts the

Similarly it is hardly controversial to suggest that Iron Age hoards such as the deposits of torcs (and coins) from 5

Roger Bland

Snettisham in Norfolk might have been buried for ritual reasons (Stead 1991). The hoards of coins from Hallaton, Leicestershire, also seem to have been buried in the ground for ritual purposes rather than with the intention of recovery (Leins 2007; Score 2011). After an amateur archaeologist, Ken Wallace, discovered a number of Iron Age coins in 2000 the University of Leicester Archaeology Services carried out an excavation on the site between 2001 and 2003. They recovered a total of 5292 coins in 16 separate groups. The nature of the site remains difficult to interpret – it is on a hillside and there is an enclosure surrounded by a ditch – and it seems to have been a place where the local people gathered for ritual feasting as large amounts of animal bones were discovered. At one point, in an entrance way through the ditch, 14 separate deposits of coins were found while a further away there the remains of Roman cavalry helmet contained 1170 coins and a final deposit of 142 coins and silver objects a little further away still (Fig. 7). It is difficult to interpret these deposits as having been buried with the intention of recovery as they were so close to each other and all the signs are they were buried for ritual purposes {11}. What is interesting is the association of 1170 Iron Age coins with a Roman helmet – it is thought to be early 1st century AD – while radio-carbon dates of the pits suggests the site was being used down to the 50s AD, so into the early years of the Roman occupation.

to have been recorded from Britain (British Museum 2010, cat. 471). The coming of Rome: the disappearance of gold There is undoubtedly a very marked difference between the Iron Age and Roman practices of the deposition of hoards and precious-metal objects in Britain. Votive practices do not stop in the Roman period but votive deposits do seem to be different in character – the large assemblage of coins from Bath, that span the whole Roman period (Walker 1988), or the hoard of religious objects from Ashwell (DCMS 2004, cat. 27) are quite different from most Roman coin hoards. There is another change that takes place at this time. In the Iron Age gold – particularly gold coinage – was widespread, but that this suddenly changed in the Roman period. This can be shown by Figs 8a and 8b, which are based on the coins recorded by PAS. Fig. 8a shows the total number of coins recorded on the database and you can see that Roman coins far outnumber those of the Iron Age. However, Fig. 8b, shows the number of gold coins recorded and you can see that these are much more common from the Iron Age than the Roman period, while Fig. 9 shows the proportion of gold coins recorded on the PAS database for each period. What causes the disappearance of gold from Britain with the coming of the Romans? We do not know, although this phenomenon has already been noted by Creighton (2005), who demonstrated the same phenomenon through summarising coin hoards of the Iron Age and the first two centuries AD {12}. He argued that in the Iron Age gold coins had been struck by the rulers to validate their kingship and that the coins had been used for transactions ‘involving horsemen and chariots’ (ibid.: 83) and that, with the coming of Roman rule, these functions were no longer needed. He also noted that the main concentration of gold coins shifted from the south and east in the Iron Age to the west and north after the Roman conquest, reflecting the military zone of the new province {13}. Hoarding and coin production The numbers of hoards from a given period do not necessarily reflect the frequency of single finds of coins {14}. Fig. 10a shows the number of coin hoards per annum from the Roman period, when, as we have seen, radiate hoards of 260-96 predominate, but if we analyse site finds (Fig. 10b) we find that 4th century AD coins are more numerous than those from the 3rd. The large numbers of hoards of radiates between 260 and 296 mirrors the increase in production of these coins, while the much smaller number of coins hoards closing between 330-48 is completely out of step with the huge increase in coin loss at this period. In this case at least the number of hoards does not reflect the volume of coinage.

Fig. 7: Hallaton deposits (Leins 2007). But why were 39 gold Iron Age staters dating to c. 50 BC found inside a cow bone placed in the ground? This hoard was found during the excavations at Sedgeford in Norfolk in 2003 (Dennis and Faulkner 2005). And yet presumably hoards were also buried with the intention of recovery in the Iron Age (c. 15 AD) – for example the hoard of 840 gold staters found by two detector users at Dallinghoo in Suffolk in 2008: the largest hoard of Iron Age gold coins 6

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

Figs 8a and 8b: (a) All coins recorded on PAS database; (b) gold coins on PAS database (Bland and Loriot 2010).

Fig. 9: Proportion of gold coins recorded on PAS database (Bland and Loriot 2010).

Figs 10a and 10b: Numbers of hoards (above) and quantities of site finds (below) from Britain (10a data from Robertson 2000; 10b after Reece 1987: 83). 7

Roger Bland

The 3rd century AD

civil unrest, with the intention of returning later to recover them.

If we look more closely at the hoards of radiates which close with coins minted between 253 and 296, one distinguishing feature of them is that many are very large and, indeed, the four largest hoards of Roman coins from Britain all date to this period: • • • •

In 1988, the French scholar Daniel Gricourt tried to take this type of interpretation of coin hoard patterns to its logical conclusion in using them to trace the route of individual barbarian raids in northern Gaul in 268, following the coast and the valley of the Ijzer, or the valley of the Schelde (Fig. 11). Of course it is tempting to make an association between a large concentration of unrecovered hoards and areas of unrest, especially when as in this case they all close with coins of the same period, but is this trying to push the evidence too far?

Cunetio Hoard (1978) (Besly and Bland 1983): 54,951 coins to AD 275 Frome Hoard (2010) (Moorhead, Booth and Bland 2010): 52,503 coins to c. AD 291 Normanby Hoard (1985) (Bland and Burnett 1988): 47,912 coins to c. AD 290 Blackmoor hoard (1873) (Bland 1982): 29,788 coins to c. AD 296

However, it is clear is that there is extensive archaeological evidence for the destruction caused by the barbarian raids on Gaul, especially Gallia Belgica, in the second half of the 3rd century AD. The historical sources attest raids in 250, 259-60 and 275-6 and it is the third of these that seems to have had the greatest impact (Painter, this volume). Earlier accounts state that most of the many villas from northern Gaul were destroyed at this period and were not reoccupied (Percival 1976: 67-82; Wightman, 1985: 243-6). More recent work has modified this picture: it is possible to find some villas that seem to have survived the period intact, while it has been

The average size of 96 radiate hoards discovered since Robertson’s Inventory is 1124 coins, but of course that largely reflects their low intrinsic value. However, the fact that they are large might mean that it is more likely that they will be discovered – whether by metal detecting today, or by building or agricultural work in times past. So how do we interpret all these hoards? As I have said the normal interpretation is that they were buried by their owners in response to an external threat of invasion or

Fig. 11: Hoards of 268 from Flanders are of northern France and Belgium and possible routes of barbarian raids (Gricourt 1988). 8

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

suggested that the lack of coins of 275-96 might mean the temporary abandonment of a monetary economy rather than that the site was deserted at that time. However, towns also show much evidence of damage at this time and many of those never fully recovered, being rebuilt in the 4th century AD on a much smaller scale (Johnson 1983): the essays in Schatzmann and Martin-Kilcher (2011) provide a recent survey of this phenomenon. For example, the plan of Roman Tongeren (Fig. 12) shows how it had shrunk from the 1st and 2nd century AD city to the much smaller area that was fortified in c. AD 300. So, although the interpretation of the changes that occurred in both towns and countryside in Gaul is now more nuanced than it was 30 years ago – there are sites that escaped destruction at this time and there are suggestions that the changes seen at this period might not all be the direct consequence of barbarian raids – the overall picture of destruction and dislocation remains.

It is interesting to compare the British pattern with hoards from the rest of the Roman world. Fig. 13 is a map of hoards closing between 238 and 260 from Hobbs (2006). This includes all hoards, including gold and silver objects. Note the great concentration in the Danube area, especially present-day Bulgaria, with relatively few from Britain and Gaul. It is difficult to separate this pattern from the historical evidence we have for continued fighting in the lower Danube including the defeat of Trajan Decius at the battle of Abritus in 251. Fig. 14 is also from Hobbs’ book and shows hoards with a terminal date from 260 to 274. The focus now moves westwards to Gaul and Britain – again it seems reasonable to assume that this reflects the welldocumented pressure on the German frontier at this period. This may be compared with a map of barbarian raids on the Empire in the 260s (Fig. 15) – although of course there is a danger of a circular argument here, since the compilers of this map may well have used the pattern of coin hoards in drawing the main lines of attack. That proviso apart, there does seem to be a correlation (the lack of hoards from present-day Turkey could reflect a low recording rate). Fig. 16, also from Hobbs (2006), shows hoards with a terminal date of 274-96. It is interesting that now there is a very strong concentration in Britain and much lower numbers elsewhere. Does this mean that Britain was facing unprecedented pressures at this time? We have just seen that the archaeological evidence does not seem to support that conclusion.{15} Contextual evidence for Roman hoards So do any Roman hoards have contexts that might provide clues as to why they were buried? One of the most intriguing pieces of contextual information came from the discovery of the Frome hoard (Moorhead, Booth and Bland 2010). This was found by metal detector user, Dave Crisp, while detecting on farmland near Frome in Somerset in April 2010. The archaeological record contained no information about Roman activity on this field, although Mr Crisp had found a stray coin of Hadrian and some sherds of Roman pottery. His first discovery was a scattered group of 73 late 4th century AD siliquae and subsequent research revealed that a hoard of 111 coins of the same type had been discovered on the same farm in 1867, so perhaps this was another portion of that hoard. He continued to search in the same field and received another response about 100 metres from the findspot of the siliquae. Digging down, he uncovered the top of a large pot that turned out to be full of coins. At that point he stopped and his local Finds Liaison Officers arranged for the hoard to be excavated by the archaeologist Alan Graham.

Fig. 12: Plan of Roman Tongeren (Belgium) showing the much smaller area enclosed by the late Roman walls compared with the extent of the earlier Roman town (drawing by Stephen Crummy after Coquelet 2011). So what of Britain? If Britain has a greater concentration of coin hoards of this period than Gaul does, can we assume that the barbarian raids caused even greater destruction on this side of the Channel than on the Continent? The interesting thing is that the archaeological evidence does not seem to support that. In 1981 Peter Salway wrote: ‘the evidence suggests that … civil life … continued in fair prosperity’ (Salway 1981: 243) and ‘it seems to be established ... that Britain was relatively untouched by the convulsions elsewhere in the empire in the mid-3rd century’. The final quarter of the century saw the establishment of many villas which reached their apogee in the first half of the 4th century AD, and by this period Britain appears to have been one of the wealthiest areas north of the Alps – along with Aquitania in southwest France and the area around the imperial capital of Trier. 9

Roger Bland

Fig. 13: Precious-metal deposits of 238-59 (Hobbs 2006).

Fig. 14: Precious-metal deposits of 260-74 (Hobbs 2006). 10

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

Fig. 15: Barbarian invasions, 253-75 (drawn by Stephen Crummy after from Jones & Mattingly 2002, map 5.6).

Fig. 16: Precious-metal deposits of 275-96 (Hobbs 2006). 11

Roger Bland

Because of the size of the pot and the weight of the coins, it was dismantled in situ and the coins were removed carefully layer by layer in over 80 context bags. There were 52,503 coins, making it the second largest hoard ever to be discovered in Britain. Apart from five silver denarii of Carausius, the coins were all radiates of base silver, dating from 253 to c. 291 (the last two issues of Carausius were not represented). This is a summary of the hoard, based on a preliminary classification; it is a typical hoard of a well-known class. Central Empire (14,788) Valerian and Gallienus Gallienus and Salonina

Date 253-60

Qty

Gallic Empire (28,377)

Date

Qty

46

Postumus

260-9

257

260-8

6495

Laelian

269

4

Claudius II Divus Claudius

268-70

5421

Marius

269

35

270

1227

Victorinus

269-71

Quintillus Aurelian and Severina Tacitus and Florian

270

333

Tetricus I

271-4

12,416

270-5

279

272-4

5203

275-6

262

260-74

2954

Probus Carus and family Diocletian and Maximian

276-82

619

Tetricus II Gallic uncertain British Empire (766)

282-5

46

Carausius

286-93

284-96

60

Copies (314) Illegible (8261)

pot, which is quite thin, could never have borne the 160 kg of coins – it would immediately have collapsed under the weight of them. So the pot must have been placed in the ground empty and then the coins added to it. Because the coins were carefully recovered in a series of ten layers – or spits – we know that most of the coins of Carausius (the latest coins in the hoard) were more than halfway down the pot and Fig. 17 shows the numbers of his coins in each layer. In addition, the 43 Carausian coins in the top two layers have a much earlier chronological spread than those found lower down the pot. So the coins must all have been placed in the pot on a single occasion. This calls into question the traditional interpretation of hoards of this period. If the original owners of this hoard had intended to come back and recover it later then surely they would have buried their coins in smaller containers which would have been easier to recover? The only way anyone could have recovered this hoard would have been by breaking the pot and scooping the coins out of it, which would have been awkward. In addition there is the fact that another hoard of silver siliquae, just 100 years later in date, was buried in the same field. Could this have been a sacred field?{16} It is interesting to note that the hoard was buried on high ground, in land that would become waterlogged without drainage.

7504

Some Roman coin hoards do have contextual information that suggests a different reason for burial. The Corbridge hoard of 162 gold aurei, closing in 160 was found during archaeological excavations in 1911 (Craster 1912; Macdonald 1912). They were buried in a jug beneath the floor of a building in the Roman military supply base at Corbridge, just south of Hadrian’s Wall (Fig. 18). We know that that period was a time of considerable difficulties in northern Britain and it is quite likely that these were buried by one of the garrison at Corbridge in response to a raid across the Wall.

766 314 8261

Table 2: Provisional summary of the Frome hoard. The excavation has given us vital evidence about how it was buried. The first point that became obvious is that the

Fig. 17: Plan of the Frome hoard pot (Moorhead, Booth and Bland 2010, drawn by Alan Graham); on right, numbers of coins of Carausius in each layer (courtesy Mike Pitts). 12

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

Hoards can also be buried in several pots, such as the example from Chalfont St Peter, Buckinghamshire (Fig. 20), which contained three pots of coins, all radiates of the 3rd century AD, where the coins were carefully graded in each pot with the earlier, better quality, radiates in two pots and the later, more debased issues in a third container (Bland 1992; see also Callu 1979 on the subject of multiple hoards).

Fig. 20: Chalfont St Peter hoard (Bland 1992).

Fig. 18: Findspot of Corbridge hoard and jug containing the coins (from Macdonald 1912). Hoards can also be associated with human burials. One find made recently in the Cotswolds north of Bath consisted of two pots: a smaller one containing c. 1500 Roman coins (radiates of the 3rd century AD), while a larger one has been x-rayed and found to contain a human cremation together with another nine coins.

Fig. 21: Bredon Hill hoard. It is easy to assume that in a period when both hoards and the coins in them are very abundant, the deposition of the hoard is likely to take place quite soon after the date of the latest coin. This is certainly the case with the very numerous hoards of the second half of the 3rd century AD. However, a hoard discovered at Bredon Hill, Worcestershire, in 2011 (Fig. 21) has challenged that assumption. This was buried in a pot and contained 3847 3rd century AD radiates closing with 36 specimens of Probus (276-82) and it is a typical example of a hoard of this period. However, the findspot was investigated by the local archaeological unit which concluded that the hoard was buried inside a building and that the pit cut for the vessel containing the coins disturbed the latest layer of that building which was dated to not before 350, 70 years later than the latest coins. No other examples of the deposition of a radiate hoard so long after the date of the latest coin is known, although there is another possible example from a Romano-British site at Lilleshall,

Fig. 19: Hoard of ‘barbarous radiates’ from Cardiff Castle. Sometimes, it seems, hoards could be deliberately thrown away. A hoard of 622 small module radiate copies (Fig. 19), the so-called ‘barbarous radiates, dating to c. AD 274, was excavated by archaeologists from what was interpreted as a rubbish pit in the Roman fort at Cardiff Castle in 2006 (British Museum 2008, cat. 1248). It seems surprising that metal objects would be thrown away, but it does seem to have happened in this case. 13

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Shropshire. Here excavations in 1973 in advance of road building brought to light a hoard of 69 radiates, closing with coins of Tetricus (271-4), deposited in a ditch (Ditch VII) which also contained a coin of Honorius in its infill, therefore dating to after 395. However, since the ditch surrounded an enclosure whose function is not certain, this is not as clear cut an example as the Bredon Hill hoard (Browne and Boon 2004).{17}

believe that specifically Christian artefacts could have been buried as a votive act in the late Roman world: Petts (2003) suggests this as a reason for the deposition of lead baptismal tanks in late Roman Britain.

Of course hoards vary enormously in size and clearly we should not assume the same motive behind the deposition of a very modest hoard such as ten 4th century AD nummi found at Uckington in Gloucestershire (Treasure reference 2010 T244, PAS database record PAS-52F818) with a find like the Hoxne treasure of 580 gold and 14,654 silver coins and some 200 items of gold and silver jewellery, buried some time after AD 407 (Guest 2005; Johns 2010), and clearly belonged to a wealthy family. One is put in mind of the entry in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, under 418: ‘In this year the Romans collected all the treasures which were in Britain and hid some in the earth so that no one afterwards could find them, and some they took with them into Gaul.’ (Garmonsway 1972: 11). Although this was written more than 450 years later, it does seem to preserve the memory of an event that took place at the end of Roman rule in Britain.

Fig. 23: Water Newton hoard. On the other hand it is reasonable to assume that the 12,595 Roman coins found in the excavations of the Sacred Spring of the Roman baths at Bath, which come from the whole period of Roman occupation of Britain are not a hoard, but had been thrown into the sacred spring rather as we throw coins into fountains today (Walker 1988). Other finds like this are known from Coventina’s Well (Allason-Jones and McKay 1985), the Thames at London Bridge and Piercebridge in Co. Durham (Walton 2008). Kenneth Painter provides a very thought-provoking critique of the interpretation of Roman deposits as votive in this volume. The circumstances of burial of the Frome hoard highlighted the fact that an unquestioning assumption that all coin hoards of the Roman period were buried for safekeeping, following the threat and response model, looks increasingly difficult to sustain. We have seen that other hoards of Roman precious-metal objects seem to have been buried for votive reasons, so could not this also provide an explanation for at least some coin hoards?

Fig. 22: Ashwell hoard (DCMS 2004). Some Roman hoards clearly are votive in character. The Ashwell find of 27 gold and silver objects, including gold jewellery, a silver figurine and votive plaques of silver alloy and gold (Fig. 22) was originally made by a detector user in 2002 and the site was subsequently investigated by archaeologists (DCMS 2004, cat. 27; Jackson and Burleigh 2007). The hoard dates to the later 3rd or 4th century AD and it must have been connected to a temple or shrine of the hitherto unknown goddess Senuna, who is named on five of the gold plaques. But what about the Water Newton hoard of Christian silver (Fig. 23, Painter 1977, 1999 and 2006)? As Painter has demonstrated, that is also clearly religious in character, but could it have been buried for votive reasons? Since the hoard consists of items used for Communion and therefore votive deposition may not be appropriate, this hoard has been interpreted as having been buried for safe-keeping, although scholars are now more willing to 14

The very frequency with which Roman coin hoards have been found has curiously tended to work against systematic studies of their context and reasons for burial, as those concerned with their study have normally not had time to do more than to record their contents. For that reason the ‘Hoarding in Iron Age and Roman Britain’ project was initiated in 2013, with funding from the AHRC, in order systematically to investigate the contexts of Iron Age and Roman hoards in order to gain a better understanding of the reasons behind their burial (see Foreword to this volume). It is very early days in the life of the project, but early results from an analysis by Adrian Chadwick, a Research Assistant in the project, of the findspots of Roman hoards from Somerset are suggestive. Of 87 hoards which can be plotted onto GIS, 52 (60%) come from the summits or sides of hills. Dr Chadwick has commented: ‘In Somerset, the majority of coin hoard finds have come from elevated summits of hills and ridges, or the slopes of hills, valleys and

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

coombes, both these groupings forming nearly two thirds of all known landscape locales. Just over 10% of the known site spots are also on elevated plateau areas such as the Mendips. This evidence suggests that many sites in the region were deliberately chosen to be located as high up as possible and to have views, out across particular valleys or coombes, or areas of low-lying valley bottom and peat marsh. It could be argued that this may have reflected pragmatic concerns with visibility, and wanting to see where strangers (or tax collectors) were coming from, but these locations would also in many instances have made those burying hoards potentially more visible to those looking from below and afar. It may therefore be that in such instances more ritualised practices were involved.’ Obviously this is only a preliminary analysis based on data from a single county, but it is revealing, as one would not expect hoards placed in the ground for safe-keeping with the intention of later recovery to be buried in such prominent places. The main aim of the project will be to see whether it is possible to distinguish between hoards, such as the Corbridge hoard, which seem to have been buried in response to an external threat, and those which are more likely to have been buried for ritual or other reasons. The project will finish in 2016, after which its results will be published.

this time does support the threat model, as does Pepys’s slightly later account of how he buried a hoard of coins.

Medieval hoards

HOARDS DEPOSITED IN ENGLAND DURING THE CIVIL WAR  terminating 1641-3  terminating 1643-9

Post-Roman hoards are generally assumed to have been buried with the intention of recovery. Hoards of silver of the Viking period are well-known from Britain and Ireland, the best known recent example being the Vale of York hoard, discovered by detector users in 2007 and the largest Viking Age hoard since Cuerdale was discovered in 1840. Gareth Williams and Barry Ager were able to connect its burial with the events surrounding Athelstan gaining control over the kingdom of Northumbria in 927 (Williams and Ager 2010). Similarly the large hoard of 1237 gold coins and jewellery of the 15th century AD found during building work at Fishpool in Nottinghamshire in 1966 can be associated with known events during the Wars of the Roses (Archibald and Cherry 1966). It was probably deposited sometime between winter 1463 and summer 1464, during a Lancastrian rebellion against Edward IV.

Fig. 24: Civil War hoards from England (Kent 1974). Two documented cases of hoarding In his diary Pepys provides one of the few documented accounts that we have of the burial and recovery of a coin hoard (Painter and Künzl 1997). In June 1667, deeply concerned by the raid of the Dutch up the Medway and Thames, Pepys took all the gold coins he could lay his hands on in London (£2300 worth) and sent his wife and servant to bury them on the family estate in Brampton in Northamptonshire. In October, when the threat had past, he went back to retrieve them but had great difficulty finding where his wife had hidden the coins and, even after a great deal of digging, ended up £20-£30 short of the amount that had been buried. This is a good example of deliberate burial of wealth under threat of invasion, with the intention of recovery.

Hoards of the English Civil War In 1974 John Kent discussed coin hoards buried at the time of the English Civil War. He argued that there was no correlation between the storm centres of the war and the location of the hoards, apart from a cluster around Newark on Trent, besieged three times in 1644-6. His distribution map is shown below (Fig. 24). However, this work has been revisited by Edward Besly who, in his paper ‘Mapping Conflict’ (this volume), has able to add in many new hoards discovered since 1974 and, by analysing these much more closely according to the year of issue of the latest coin, he is able to show that there is a correlation between the hoards and the areas of fighting – which are very well documented. We can, therefore, conclude that the general pattern of hoarding at

Pepys’s account is well-known. A more recent example is provided by the discovery in 2007 of a hoard US gold ‘double eagles’ ($40 coins) in the garden of a house in Hackney (Richardson 2013). While digging out a pond in the garden of the property, residents of the block of flats there came on a glass kilner jar containing 80 of these coins, which dated to between 1853 and 1913 (Fig. 25).{18} This was an unprecedented discovery and we started a programme of research into the building where the find was made. The current building dates to the early 1950s, replacing an earlier house which was destroyed in the 15

Roger Bland

Blitz in 1940. We undertook extensive research to see if might be possible to trace past residents to identify who might have buried the coins, but the flats had been used as nurse’s accommodation and married quarters for the police and there were too many possibilities.

Fig. 27: Martin Sulzbacher. The coins had been smuggled out of Germany by Martin Sulzbacher, a German Jewish banker, who came to England as a refugee in 1938 and was subsequently joined by his parents, brother and other members of his family. Martin Sulzbacher bought the house in Hackney and lived there with his family. He put his coins in a safe deposit box in a bank in the City. In 1940 he was interned as an enemy alien and was sent to Canada on the ‘Arandora Star’ but the ship was torpedoed on the way. Rescued after many hours in the water, he was then sent to Australia on the ‘Dunera’, an equally gruelling passage. At the end of 1941 he returned to England – having travelled round the world – and, after a spell in internment in the Isle of Man was eventually released. His wife and four children were sent to the Women’s Internment Camp in the Isle of Man.

Fig. 25: Hackney hoard. So in October 2010 the coroner opened his inquest on the hoard in order to publicise the discovery to see if any claimants might come forward. Although no claimants did reveal themselves, a local historian, Mr Alan Selby, contacted the British Museum with a vital piece of evidence. He discovered that the Hackney Gazette for 14 March 1952 (Fig. 26) had published an account of a coroner’s inquest held on another hoard, also consisting of US gold coins, which had been found in the garden of the same house. The news report said that the 1952 hoard had been claimed by its owner, Mr Martin Sulzbacher (Fig. 27) and we were then able to make contact with his son, Max Sulzbacher, now living in Jerusalem, and through him the whole extraordinary story came out.

The remaining members of the Sulzbacher family continued to live in the Hackney house. In the summer of 1940 Mr Sulzbacher’s brother transferred the coins from the city safe and buried them in the back garden. At the time the threat of invasion was at its height and the family feared the Germans would break open safe deposits as they had done in Amsterdam should the invasion be successful. His brother told a family friend what he had done and the friend had asked him to let him know the exact spot in the garden where the coins had been buried. He replied that since there were five family members who knew the spot there was no necessity to reveal the location of the coins. Tragically, on 24 September 1940, the house received a direct hit in the Blitz and all the five members of the family were killed. On his release Mr Sulzbacher went to the safe in the city and found it empty. The family friend then told him what had happened and so he arranged for the garden – by that stage a bomb site - to be searched but without success. However, in 1952 as work commenced on a new building on the site of Mr Sulzbacher’s house, a hoard of 82 $20 American gold coins dating to 1890 was discovered in a glass jar on the same site. The hoard was awarded to Mr Sulzbacher by the coroner at the time. The coroner resumed his inquest on the second jar of coins on 18 April this year and heard this new evidence and

Fig. 26: Hackney Gazette 14 March 1952. 16

Hoarding in Britain from the Bronze Age to the 20th Century

determined that the coins were the property of Martin Sulzbacher’s son Max and his three brothers and sisters. So both Pepys and Martin Sulzbacher buried hoards for safekeeping.

founder of ancient times, as they comprise worn out and broken tools and weapons, lumps of rough metal, and even the moulds in which the accumulation of bronze was destined to be recast.’ Fifty years later this interpretation can still be found: Kendrick speaks of ‘these two groups of hoards [of the Bronze Age] may be taken to indicate, first, definite invaders from the West Alpine region, coming by way of N. France … and imposing themselves in the Lowland zone…’ (Kendrick and Hawkes 1932: 135). {4} Petts 2003 argues that many or most of the c.20 late Roman baptismal lead tanks found in Britain should be regarded as having been buried for votive reasons; while Thomas 2008 argues that a hoard of Anglo-Saxon ironwork from a settlement at Bishopstone, East Sussex should be regarded as votive and Ottaway 2009 for a hoard of Anglo-Saxon iron tools from Flixborough, North Lincolnshire. See also Hobbs 2006, and Richard Bradley and John Naylor in this volume. {5} Aitchison 1988 suggests that some Roman coin hoards may have been buried for votive reasons. He also makes an important distinction between hoards buried with the province of Britain and those buried north of Hadrian’s Wall or the Antonine Wall in Scotland: once coins were exported beyond the frontier their whole function changed. {6} The National Bronze Age Implement Index was established in 1910 and contains some 30,000 cards recording hoards and single finds of Bronze Age metalwork from Great Britain and Ireland (it ceased to be maintained in the mid 1980s). Thanks to an AHRCfunded research project, ‘Micropasts’ (PI Andrew Bevan, Institute of Archaeology, University College London) the cards are currently being scanned and will be available on the web and we will use crowd-sourcing to enter them into an online database. We should therefore have much better data on the number of hoards of Bronze Age objects once that project is complete. {7} In October 2014 a Collaborative PhD student, cosupervised by the author and Professor Haselgrove will start a project to catalogue and study this group of hoards, working with the ‘Hoarding in Iron Age and Roman Britain’ project. {8} See Blackburn 2003 and 2005 for an analysis of early Medieval hoards. The Corpus of Early Medieval Coin Finds can be found at http://www.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/dept/coins/emc/. {9} Value is of course a relative concept and varied over time and place. The value of an individual deposit may lie in its reason for deposition and in the choice of object buried rather than the material from which it is made. Hobbs 2006 developed the concept of ‘equivalent gold weight’ as a means of comparing the relative values of late Roman and early Byzantine precious-metal hoards. {10} Although there are some large Viking hoards of this period, such as Cuerdale (Graham-Campbell and Ager 2011) and Silverdale (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverdale_Hoard, accessed January 2014). {11} However it has been suggested that the hoards could have been buried with the intention of recovery at the time of the Roman invasion.

Conclusion The evidence does suggest that most hoards from the early medieval period onwards were buried with the intention of recovery, as well as some hoards of Iron Age and Roman coins, but we do need to keep an open mind. Equally it looks as though a significant number of hoards from the Roman period may have been buried for votive or ritual reasons. At present we need to be very cautious in over-interpreting individual hoards or groups of hoards without contextual evidence. Because coin hoards have been studied by numismatists, all too often too little attention has been paid to their contexts and that is especially true in the last forty years when so many new finds have been reported through metal detecting: the resources have not been there to carry out a full contextual study of all of these, although where this has been done, as in the case of the Bredon Hill or Frome hoards, that has proved to be very revealing. Archaeologists who study hoards of Bronze Age objects have been much more likely to carry out an investigation of the context. The best way to understand the reasons for hoarding better is to carry out a systematic survey of the contexts of these hoards, through desk-based GIS analysis and through fieldwork and in the ‘Hoarding in Iron Age and Roman Britain’ project we hope to start that process. Acknowledgements I am grateful to Martin Allen, Philip de Jersey and Ben Roberts for data on hoards; to Martin, John Naylor, Sam Moorhead, Kenneth Painter and the anonymous peerreviewer for very helpful comments on a draft of this paper and to Kenneth, Richard Bradley and Edward Besly for sight of their papers in this volume. Endnotes {1} This is an expanded version of a paper, ‘Hoarding in Britain: an overview’, published in the British Numismatic Journal 83 (2013), 214–38 (see also Moorhead, Bland & Pett 2010). {2} Blackburn has carried out a similar analysis for hoards of coins of the period 450-1180: see Blackburn 2005: 26, Figs 1 and 2. The pattern he obtained is very similar to the one for Roman hoards. {3} Scholars used to interpret such deposits as being connected with warfare: for example Evans (1881) states: ‘these (Bronze Age) hoards seem to be of more than one character. In certain cases they seem to have been the treasured property of some individual who would appear to have buried his valued tools or weapons during troublous times, and never to have been able to disinter them. In other cases the hoards were probably the property of a trader, as they consist of objects ready for use and in considerable numbers; and in others they appear to have been the stock-in-trade of some bronze17

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(ed.), Kaheinimiru Dynamism: Ou Chu Nichi Hikakuno Shitenkara (Dynamism in Coinage: Europe, China and Japan, Comparative Viewpoints), Dai 12 kai Shutsudosenkakenkyukai Houkokuyoushi in Fukuoka 2005 (Proceedings of the 12th Conference of the Coin Finds Research Group held in Fukuoka 2005) (Coin Finds Research Group, Fukuoka), 7–50. Blackburn, M. 2011, ‘Coinage in its archaeological context’, in Hamerow, H., Hinton, D.A. and Crawford, S. (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Anglo-Saxon Archaeology (Oxford University Press, Oxford) 580-99. Bland, R. F. 1982, Coin Hoards from Roman Britain III, the Blackmoor hoard, B M Occasional Paper 33, (British Museum, London). Bland, R. F. (ed.) 1992, Coin Hoards from Roman Britain IX. The Chalfont Hoard and Other Roman Coin Hoards (British Museum, London). Bland, R. F. 1996, ‘Treasure Trove and the case for reform’, Art, Antiquity and the Law I, 1 (February 1996), 11-26. Bland, R. F. 1997, ‘The changing patterns of hoards of precious-metal coins in the late Empire’, L'antiquité tardive 5, 29-55. Bland, R. F. and Burnett, A. M. 1988, The Normanby Hoard and Other Roman Coin Hoards (British Museum, London). Bland, R. F. and Loriot, X. 2010, Roman and early Byzantine gold coins found in Britain and Ireland, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication 46 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Bradley, R. 1988, ‘Hoarding, recycling and the consumption of prehistoric metalwork: technological change in western Europe’, World Archaeology 20(2), 249-60. Bradley, R. 1998, The Passage of Arms. An archaeological analysis of prehistoric hoard and votive deposits, 2nd ed. (Oxbow, Oxford). British Museum 2008, Treasure Annual Report 2005/6 (British Museum, London). British Museum 2010, Portable Antiquities and Treasure Annual Report 2008 (British Museum, London). Brown, I. D. and Dolley, M. 1971, Coin Hoards of Great Britain and Ireland 1500-1967 (Spink and Royal Numismatic Society, London). Browne, D. M. and Boon, G. C. 1974, ‘Excavations at Redhill, Lilleshall, Shropshire: an interim report’, Transactions of the Shropshire Archaeological and Historical Society 77, 1-9. Burnett, A. M. 1991, Interpreting the Past. Coins (British Museum, London). Callu, J.-P. 1979, ‘Cachettes monétaires multiples (IIIIVe s.)’, Studien zu Fundmûnzen der Antike. Band 1. Berlin, 5-16. Casey, P. J. 1986, Understanding Ancient Coins (Batsford, London). Coquelet, C. 2011, ‘Continuités et ruptures urbaines dans la seconde moitié du IIIe siècle en Gaule

{12} For the Iron Age – Roman monetary transition see Reece 1979 and Creighton 1994. {13} Sam Moorhead comments that ‘I have no doubt that the Roman authorities zealously guarded the mining and use of gold (even coin) in the military provinces. This becomes much more noticeable in the later Empire. Put simply I do not think the average person really had access to gold and that its circulation was generally restricted.’ Against this I would note that the analysis of findspots of Roman gold coins in Britain contained in Bland & Loriot (pp. 53-74) would seem to indicate that at most periods gold coins were broadly distributed across Britain, although there are distinct concentrations in military sites and towns. {14} Although Thordemann (1948) demonstrated the close correlation between the numbers of Swedish coins of 1685-1705 in the Lohe hoard and the numbers of coins struck by the Stockholm mint at that period (see also Grierson 1975: 126-8). {15} Casey 1986: 65-6 had already observed this apparent anomaly. {16} This suggestion was first made by Richard Reece. {17} Martin Allen has argued that it is possible to question the archaeological interpretation of the stratigraphy in both these cases: as he points out ‘stratigraphy is not a precise science’. {18} A great deal of the research on the Hackney hoard (including finding Martin’s Sulzbacher’s son, Max) was done by my colleague, Ian Richardson, Treasure Registrar at the British Museum, to whom my thanks. Bibliography Abdy, R. 2002, Romano-British Coin Hoards (Shire, Princes Risborough). Aitchison, N. B. 1988, ‘Roman wealth, native ritual: coin hoards within and beyond Roman Britain’, World Archaeology 20(2), 270-84. Allason-Jones, L. and McKay, B. 1985, Coventina’s Well, Oxbow Books/Trustees of the Clayton Collection. Allen, M. 2005, ‘The Fourteenth-century Hoard from Chesterton Lane Corner, Cambridge’, British Numismatic Journal 75, 63-90. Allen, M. 2012, Mints and Money in Medieval England (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Archibald, M. M., and Cherry, J. 1966, ‘Fishpool, Blidworth (Notts), 1966 hoard’, Numismatic Chronicle (7th series) 7, 133-46. Besly, E. M. 1987, English Civil War Coin Hoards, British Museum Occasional Paper 51, (British Museum, London). Besly, E. M. and Bland, R. F. 1983, The Cunetio Treasure (British Museum, London). Blackburn, M. 2003, ‘ “Productive sites” and the pattern of coin loss in England, 600-1180’, in Pestell, T. and Ulmschneider, K. (eds) 2003, Markets in Early Medieval Europe. Trading and ‘Productive’ Sites, 650-850 (Windgather Press, Macclesfield), 20-36. Blackburn, M. 2005, ‘Coin finds as primary historical evidence for medieval Europe’, in S. Sakuraki 18

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Septentrionale’ in Schatzmann and MatinKilcher, 2011, 235-46. Craster, H. H. E. 1912, ‘Hoards of Roman gold coins found in Britain. Part I. Second and fourth century hoards found at Corbridge 1908 1911’, Numismatic Chronicle (4th Series) 12, 265-312. Creighton, J. 1994, ‘A time of change: the Iron Age to Roman monetary transition in East Anglia’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 13(3), 325-34. Creighton, J. 2005, ‘Gold, ritual and kingship’ in Haselgrove and Wigg-Wolf 2005, 69-83. De Jersey, P. forthcoming, Coin Hoards in Iron Age Britain, British Numismatic Society Special Publication (British Numismatic Society, London). Dennis, M. and Faulkner, N. 2005, The Sedgeford hoard (The History Press, Stroud). DCMS 2003, The Treasure Act 1996 Code of Practice (Revised), England and Wales (DCMS, London). DCMS 2004, Treasure Annual Report 2002, (DCMS, London). Evans, J. 1881, The Ancient Bronze Implements, Weapons, and Ornaments of Great Britain and Ireland (Longmans, London). Garmonsway, G. N. 1972, The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, 2nd ed. (Dent, London). Graham-Campbell, J. and Ager, B. 2011, The Cuerdale hoard and related Viking-age silver and gold from Britain and Ireland in the British Museum, British Museum Research Publication 185 (British Museum, London). Graham-Campbell, J. and Philpott, R. 2010, The Huxley Viking Hoard. Scandinavian Settlement in the North West (National Museums Liverpool, Liverpool). Gricourt, D. 1988, ‘Les incursions de pirates de 268 en Gaule septentrionale et leurs incidences sur la politique de Postume’, Trésors Monétaires 10, 9-43. Grierson, P. 1975, Numismatics (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Guest, P. 1994, A Comparative Study of Coin Hoards from the Western Roman Empire, unpublished PhD thesis, University of London. Guest, P. 2005, The Late Roman Gold and Silver Coins from the Hoxne Treasure (British Museum, London). Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds) 2005, Iron Age Coinage and Ritual Practices, Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike 20 (Von Zabern, Mainz). Kendrick, T. D. and Hawkes, C. F. C. 1932, Archaeology in England and Wales: 1913-1931 (Methuen, London). Hill, G. F. 1936, Treasure Trove in Law and Practice (The Clarendon Press, Oxford). Hill, J. D. 1995, Ritual and Rubbish in the Iron Age of Wessex: A Study of Formation of a Specific Archaeological Record, British Archaeological Reports British Series 242 (Tempus Reparatum, Oxford).

Hobbs, R. 2006, Late Roman Precious Metal Deposits, c. AD200-700: changes over time and space, British Archaeological Reports International Series S1504 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Hobbs, R. 2012, The Mildenhall Treasure (British Museum, London). Jackson, R. and Burleigh, G. 2007, ‘The Senuna treasure and shrine at Ashwell (Herts.)’ in Heussler, R. and King, A. C. (eds), Continuity and Innovation in Religion in the Roman West, Volume 1 (Journal of Roman Archaeology Supplementary Series 67) (Journal of Roman Archaeology, Portsmouth RI), 37-54. Johns, C. M. 1994, ‘Romano-British precious-metal hoards: some comments on Martin Millett’s paper’ in Cottam, S., Dungworth D., Scott, S. and Taylor, J. (eds), TRAC 94. Proceedings of the 4th Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, Durham, 1994 (Oxbow, Oxford), 107-17. Johns, C. M. 2010, The Hoxne Late Roman Treasure. Gold Jewellery and Silver Plate (British Museum, London). Johnson, S. 1983, Late Roman Fortifications (Batsford, London). Jones, B. and Mattingly, D. 1990, An Atlas of Roman Britain (Blackwell, Oxford). Kent, J. P. C. 1974, ‘Interpreting coin finds’ in Casey, P. J. and Reece, R. (eds), Coins and the Archaeologist, British Archaeological Reports British Series 4 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford), 184-200. Laing, L. 1969, Coins and Archaeology (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London). Leahy, K. and Bland, R. F. 2009, The Staffordshire hoard (British Museum, London). Leins, I. 2007, ‘Coins in context: coinage and deposition in Iron Age south-east Leicestershire’, British Numismatic Journal 77, 22-48. Macdonald, G. 1912, ‘The Corbridge gold find of 1911’, Journal of Roman Studies 2, 1-20. Millett, M. 1994, ‘Treasure: interpreting Roman hoards’ in Cottam, S., Dungworth D., Scott, S. and Taylor, J. (eds) 1994, TRAC 94. Proceedings of the 4th Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, Durham, 1994 (Oxbow, Oxford), 99-106. Moorhead, S., Bland, R. F. and Pett, D. 2010, ‘Hoarding in Ancient Britain’, Current Archaeology 248, Nov. 2010, 12-15. Moorhead, S., Booth, A. and Bland, R. F. 2010, The Frome hoard, British Museum, London. Needham, S. 1988, ‘Selective deposition in the British Early Bronze Age’, World Archaeology 20(2), 229-48. Needham, S., Parfitt, K. and Varndell, G. (eds) 2006, The Ringlemere Cup: Precious Cups and the Beginning of the Channel Bronze Age, British Museum Research Publication 163 (British Museum, London). 19

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O’Connell, M G and Bird, J 1994, ‘The Roman temple at Wanborough, excavation 1985-1986’, Surrey Archaeological Collections 82, 1-168. Ottaway, P. 2009, ‘The Flixborough tool hoard’ in Evans, D. H. and Loveluck, C. 2009, Life and Economy at Early Medieval Flixborough, c.AD 600-1000: the artefact evidence, Excavations at Flixborough Volume 2 (Oxbow, Oxford), 25667. Painter, K. S. 1977, The Water Newton Early Christian silver (British Museum, London). Painter, K. S. 1999, ‘The Water Newton silver: votive or liturgical?’, Journal of the British Archaeological Association 152, 1-23. Painter, K. S. 2006, ‘The Traprain Law treasure’ in Hartley, E., Hawkes, J., Henig, M. and Mee, F. (eds) 2006, Constantine the Great: York’s Roman Emperor (York Museums and Galleries Trust, York), 229-46, nos. 234-66. Painter, K. S. and Künzl, E. 1997, ‘Two documented hoards of treasure’, Antiquaries Journal 77, 291325. Percival, J. 1976, The Roman Villa: an historical introduction (Batsford, London). Petts, D. 2003, ‘Votive deposits and Christian practice in Late Roman Britain’, in Carver, M. (ed.) 2003, The Cross Goes North. Processes of conversion in Northern Europe, AD 300-1300, (Boydell, Woodbridge), 109-18. Reece, R. 1979, ‘Roman monetary impact’ in Burnham, B. C. and Johnson, H. B. (eds) 1979, Invasion and Response. The Case of Roman Britain, British Archaeological Reports British Series 73 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford), 21117. Reece, R. 1987, Coinage in Roman Britain, Batsford, London. Reece, R. 2002, The Coinage of Roman Britain (Tempus, Stroud). Richardson, I. 2013, ‘Stoke Newington’s double eagles: the story of the “Hackney hoard”’ Hackney History 17, 38-46. Robertson, A. S. 2000, An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards (Royal Numismatic Society, London).

Salway, P. 1981, Roman Britain (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Schatzmann, R. and Martin-Kilcher, S. (eds) 2011, L’Empire romain en mutation. Répercussions sur les villes dans la deuxième moitié du IIIe siècle (Éditions Monique Mergoil, Montagnac). Score, V. 2011, Hoards, Hounds and Helmets. A conquest-period ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire, Leicester Archaeology Monograph 21 (University of Leicester Archaeology Services, Leicester). Stead, I. M. 1991, ‘The Snettisham excavations in 1990’, Antiquity 65, 447-64. Stead, I. M. 1998, The Salisbury hoard (Tempus, Stroud). Thomas, G. 2008, ‘The symbolic lives of Late AngloSaxon settlements: a cellared structure and iron hoard from Bishopstone, East Sussex’, Archaeological Journal 165, 334-98. Thordemann, B. 1948, ‘The Lohe Hoard: a contribution to the methodology of numismatics’, Numismatic Chronicle (6th Series) 18, 1882049a. Walker, D. R. 1988, ‘The Roman coins’ in Cunliffe, B. (ed.) 1988, The Temple of Sulis Minerva at Bath, Volume 2: the finds from the sacred spring, Oxford University Committee for Archaeology Monograph 16 (Oxford University Committee for Archaeology, Oxford), 281-358. Walton, P. 2008, ‘Finds from the River Tees at Piercebridge, County Durham’ in Cool, H. and Mason, D. (eds) 2008, Roman Piercebridge: Excavations by D W Harding and Peter Scott, 1969-81 (Architectural and Archaeological Society of Durham and Northumberland, Durham), 286-93. Wightman, E. 1985, Gallia Belgica (Batsford, London). Williams, G. and Ager, B. 2010, The Vale of York hoard (British Museum, London). Yates, D. and Bradley, R. 2010a, ‘The siting of metalwork hoards in the Bronze Age of South East England’, Antiquaries Journal 90, 1-32. Yates, D. and Bradley, R. 2010b, ‘Still water, hidden depths: the deposition of Bronze Age metalwork in the English Fenland’, Antiquity 84, 405–15.

20

Hoards as Places: the example of Bronze Age archaeology Richard Bradley The hoard as a category

that a small number of hoards did include objects that were already old (Stead 1998). For that reason it needed radiocarbon dating to check the conventional chronology against an absolute time scale. It is ironic that this method required objects whose wooden hafts survived. For the most part they were found in rivers rather than the hoards on dry land (Needham et al 1997).

The term hoard has been used in different ways by different groups of specialists. Either it has lost its meaning, or it has gained too many. What are hoards? Why were they created? How have they been studied in the past? And what paths could their investigation take in the future? This paper argues that the contents of these collections have dominated the discussion to an unnecessary extent. It is time to pay more attention to the places where they were found.

A second reason why Bronze Age hoards were studied was to identify regional styles of artefacts and their associations (Burgess 1980). Again it was a logical procedure and, in combination with metal analysis, it achieved some useful results. But even that method has brought problems in its wake. The identification of clay moulds for producing bronze objects shows that certain types were made in one region but represented by hoards in another. Thus most of the ‘South Welsh socketed axes’ were actually produced outside Wales, and in areas where fewer of the finished products are known (Needham 1981). It emphasises the point that the presence of hoards should not be taken for granted in Bronze Age studies. Nor can their contents be treated as an accurate cross section of the artefacts in circulation.

Bronze Age hoards occupy a particular position in nearly all these discussions, but they are not the earliest deposits characterised by this term. In Britain it has also been applied to groups of stone axes. The Bronze Age hoards are the first collections to consist of metal artefacts (although they can include other elements including human and animal bones), yet scholars working in Central Europe have identified a separate class of ‘ceramic hoards’. They consist of groups of fine vessels which had been buried together. From the outset, this terminology is confusing. Metalwork hoards were originally investigated because they contained more than one object. This evidence could suggest which types of artefact had circulated together. By comparing such ‘closed’ groups with one another, it would be possible to work out a chronology. That has been the practice in Britain and Ireland since the second half of the 19th century AD (Evans 1881), and in 1908 the great Swedish scholar Oscar Montelius divided the insular Bronze Age into five separate periods (Montelius 1908). He compared their material assemblages with those in Continental Europe and proposed an absolute chronology. It was rejected by most of his successors but has proved to be remarkably prescient. The scheme developed by Montelius also drew on the evidence of burials, for they were another kind of closed deposit. His argument supposed that the objects found in graves must have been used simultaneously.

Both kinds of analysis seem to end where they should have begun. There have been other approaches to understanding Bronze Age hoards. One considers the identities of the people who deposited them, whilst the other asks the more difficult question of why they were buried in the first place. Hoarding as a process The first approach was essentially a classification of the contents of metalwork hoards. Thus groups of finished objects were sometimes considered as the equipment of one individual, usually a metalworker (Childe 1958). Where the objects were newly made, they were interpreted as the stock of a smith who had yet to distribute them to the customer. Similarly, collections of broken or half melted objects were commonly regarded as scrap metal, assembled as raw material for making new products (Evans 1881). At times the contents of individual hoards suggested that they were the property of someone else: a set of personal ornaments belonging to a wealthy woman; the tool kit of a craft worker; or the weapons carried by a warrior (Hodges 1957; Coombs 1975; Roberts 2007). Such schemes described only part of the archaeological assemblage, and, as many authorities agreed, there were plenty of exceptions.

Problems with this approach have become apparent during recent years. It is obvious that a number of Early Bronze Age graves had been reopened and that some objects could have been removed and others added to the original assemblage (Bradley and Fraser 2011). Analysis of the artefacts buried with the dead suggests that certain items may have been of considerable age when they were committed to the ground. They were probably heirlooms (Woodward 2002).

A second approach considered the circumstances in which these collections were deposited and the reasons why their contents were never recovered. Influenced by thinking in historical archaeology, it was common to suppose that they were valuables hidden at a time of crisis and never recovered (Burgess and Coombs 1979).

In principle, the same problems could apply to hoards of metalwork. It is possible that objects might have been added and others removed from these deposits (Needham 2001), but that is difficult to establish when few of these collections have been excavated. On other hand, it is clear 21

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But there was a problem in applying such an approach to the Bronze Age, for the crises that precipitated this practice remained entirely hypothetical. They could even be inferred from an increase in the rate of hoarding. That was a circular argument.

Most researchers agree that the weapons found in rivers were put there as offerings: swords and spears were the appropriate items to deposit in this kind of environment (Torbrügge 1971). But there is another way of expressing this relationship. Rivers, lakes and bogs were appropriate places for prehistoric weapons to end their lives. The change of phrasing shifts the emphasis from the character of the artefacts to the geography of their deposition. Since discussions of Bronze Age hoards have been so inconclusive, is it worth considering a similar approach to the discoveries made in dry land? Instead of discussing hoards as collections, perhaps we can investigate their findspots as places. There are good reasons for taking this view. If intact (and sometimes broken) swords were appropriate offerings to make in wet environments, why should we suppose that similar items were deposited on dry land entirely for practical reasons? If such objects had a special significance in one context, would they have been treated differently in another setting?

Bronze metalwork is heavy, so a large collection of objects could be difficult to transport. For that reason it seemed logical that the smith would have stored quantities of finished items until they were required. That would explain why they were buried, but, if so, it is hard to see why quite so many examples were never recovered (Evans 1881; see also Levy 1982). Similarly, it seemed possible that bulky raw materials were assembled by the smith some time before they were needed for recycling, but metal analysis suggests that this technique was practiced long before most of the scrap hoards appear. Again a functional hypothesis had its limitations. Both approaches posed the same kinds of problem as chronologies based on grave goods. They took the associations between certain types as given and researchers paid most attention to the classification of individual objects. Less thought was given to the ways in which they had been treated. Where the items in a grave might include objects with a long history of circulation, use and repair, scrap hoards could contain objects that had been broken with extraordinary violence (Nebelsick 2000). Different kinds of fragment might be represented at different times (Turner 2010), but some of the objects whose existence is attested by finds of clay moulds might never have entered these collections in the first place (Rassmann 1996). Still more worrying, the presence of incomplete objects was taken for granted in many of these studies (Chapman 2000). What happened to the remaining pieces? Why were they retained? Sometimes local conventions dictated not only which kinds of object should be buried in hoards, but which parts of those artefacts should be deposited at the expense of others (Maraszek 2006).

A second reason for investigating the findspots of hoards arises from the growing number of discoveries made by metal detecting and large scale excavation. Early researchers had hoped that by establishing a sound chronology for Bronze Age metalwork it might be possible to extend it to the settlements of the same period. But that never happened. Few bronze artefacts have been found on living sites, even when clay moulds for their production are discovered there. The same is true of hoards; they rarely occur in the settlements of the same period. It implies that in certain cases it was not appropriate to deposit these objects in the domestic domain. It had to happen somewhere else (Fontijn 2003). By investigating the findspots of hoards we can work out how that separation was achieved A third reason for investigating hoard sites focuses on the practical implications of the models favoured by researchers in the past. Interpretations that emphasised the concealment of valuables shared one feature in common. The location should have been sufficiently distinctive to be recalled by the person who buried them. At the same time, that knowledge must not have been generally available. If those deposits were marked, they must have been indicated in a way that other people would not have recognised. To some extent the same applies to stores of raw material as they would have had a value in their own right. Their positions had to be known to the smiths, but not to anyone else. The implication of these ideas is obvious. The locations where hoards were buried should not have been predictable, because of the risk of theft. If such deposits were always located in the same kinds of places, their security could not be guaranteed.

Again there is the problem that the contents of such hoards have been treated separately from single finds of the same kinds of material. That was logical when the main object of interest was the chronology of hoards, but it posed a problem when it came to explaining why these collections were buried and why they had survived (Bradley 1998). The best known single finds consist of weapons, which are commonly discovered in rivers, bogs and lakes. At first their presence was explained in anecdotal terms. They were lost during battles at fords, they disappeared when boats overturned, or they had been eroded from dry land deposits by the water’s edge. It is more likely that these weapons were deposited there intentionally and that no-one had intended to recover them (Yates and Bradley 2010a). That is not to say that they were unused. Many of the swords from the Thames retain traces of combat damage, but they had also been disabled before they entered the water. Over the course of the Late Bronze Age an increasing proportion of swords and spears were damaged to put them beyond use before they were placed in the river (York 2002).

That suggests two alternatives. The first is that practical considerations governed the deposition and recovery of Bronze Age metalwork hoards. In that case the findspots cannot have followed any general trend. Their contents would only have been discovered by accident. The second possibility is that the deposition of dry land deposits was governed by similar conventions to the 22

Hoards as Places: the example of Bronze Age archaeology

placing of weapons in water; it would have taken place in certain prescribed places and was attended by social conventions. Hoards of metalwork were votive deposits rather than caches of valuables. In that case the separate findspots would share features in common and these can be recognised by fieldwork. That is the contention of this article.

one person, and in favourable circumstances took in more than one hoard site in a single day. Such were the lessons of a research project undertaken by David Yates and the writer in south-east England (Yates and Bradley 2010b). Its objective was to examine the locations of a hundred well provenanced metalwork hoards distributed over one continuous area, in this case the counties of Sussex, Surrey and Kent. The study had other aspects, including collaboration with the organisations undertaking excavations in the same region. It also began with a programme of field walking, coring and geophysical survey, but they proved time consuming and, with the exception of surface artefact collection, were largely uninformative. The local settings of the hoard sites proved to be more illuminating. Few relevant observations could have been made using a Geographical Information System. The topographical variations were too subtle to be captured by that method, and there was no alternative to first hand observation. Even then a third of the findspots had been visited before a common pattern was identified.

Metalwork hoards and landscape archaeology It is not a new idea to suggest that hoards were deposited in distinctive places, but this research has always been led by the accidents of discovery. Members of staff of the National Museums in Edinburgh and Cardiff have followed up finds of individual hoards with a programme of fieldwork and small scale excavation (Cowie 2002; Gwilt et al 2005). Similar projects have involved the hoards reported to the PAS, but in this case there has not been a single programme of research focusing on Bronze Age metalwork. It is not the purpose of the Scheme. Even so, such discoveries have highlighted several recurrent features: an association between collections of artefacts and conspicuous rocks, hilltops, passes, springs and streams (Cowie 2002; see also Wyss 1996). Similar features had been reported in earlier work, but such studies were limited to individual sites. There are three reasons why such observations cannot support a more ambitious synthesis. Firstly, the findspots are dispersed and follow a series of chance discoveries, often by metal detectorists. The hoards that were recorded in the field may cut across regional traditions in which metalwork was deposited according to different conventions. Secondly, the finds that have been studied span a period of over a thousand years, from the beginning of the Bronze Age until iron came into use. There is no reason to suppose that metalwork hoards retained the same characteristics for such a long time. That would certainly not be true of burial practices, settlement patterns or monument building. Thirdly, it would be misleading to overlook the very real differences between the assemblages that have already been considered. Most contained bronzes, but some were collections of goldwork. There is also the distinction between hoards in which tools, weapons or ornaments form the only category, and those in which they are combined. Finally, there is the contrast between intact and undamaged objects, and pieces that were reduced to scrap (Bradley 1998).

The results of this project have been published (Yates and Bradley 2010b) and it would not be helpful to repeat them in detail here. Several of the issues mentioned earlier soon presented themselves. In this particular area there were few Early Bronze Age finds, but the contents of the later hoards did show interesting variations. Those containing ornaments seemed to be set apart from the rest, and, in contrast to the majority of findspots, the hoards with gold artefacts occupied more remote locations than the others. Another local emphasis was on finds of tools, yet in the Thames corridor, which lay just outside the study area, more hoards included finds of weapons. For that reason our findings might not be duplicated by work in adjacent areas. Even with these qualifications, a number of striking patterns were apparent. It is worth returning to some of the questions asked in earlier parts of this paper. If metalwork hoards were rarely associated with settlements, where were they found? The results of this project suggested that they were commonly located beyond the limits of occupation sites but no great distance away. Where surface scatters of artefacts had been investigated, they were just outside them. The limited evidence of excavation indicates that they could be buried on the outer margins of those sites or on the limits of their fields. More were found close to the distinctive structures known as burnt mounds which have been shown to date from the same period. Occasionally hoards were near cremation cemeteries. These features shared a common property, as they all referred to activities that seemed to have been excluded from the settlement: the treatment of metals, the burial of the dead and the enigmatic practices associated with mounds of fired cracked stone.

In order to set recent observations in a wider context a regional study was required. It needed to consider all the hoards whose contents had been accurately recorded and whose findspots are known. It was an ambitious venture, yet it drew upon existing discoveries and was not concerned with making new ones. That removed the obligation to conserve individual collections and reduced the amount of fieldwork to a detailed scrutiny of already known findspots and their surroundings. It required the use of archives, but did not necessitate the costly process of excavation. The work could usually be undertaken by

The presence of the burnt mounds had another implication, for they were directly associated with streams where it would be possible to heat large amounts of water. That connection extended into areas which had 23

Richard Bradley

not seen any excavations. In some cases they were unsuitable for field walking. In such cases it is possible that hoards were buried outside Bronze Age settlements, but this was impossible to prove. What seemed to be a drawback proved to be an incentive to think about the findspots in another way. How were they related to the features of the natural topography? That remained an important issue whether or not people had been living nearby.

with deposits of this kind. The presence of flowing water seems to have been a more important consideration. The results of this pilot study raise some points of wider interest. The first is that the hoards investigated in southeast England were closely associated with fresh water and specifically with streams. Only a few were placed in bogs or marshes. In that respect they are very different from single deposits of weapons. That contrast is only emphasised because the hoards from dry land showed an emphasis on tributaries rather than the main watercourses and were often located on their upper reaches. Fresh water was essential, and saltwater channels were avoided.

The association with water proved to be the common element. Where settlements and burnt mounds may still await discovery, it was clear that deposits of metalwork followed the course of streams. They had certain striking characteristics. With very few exceptions, the hoards had been buried in dry ground, but in positions on the banks of those streams, and on patches of higher ground overlooking confluences or close to springs. On the West Sussex Coastal Plain deposits of metalwork were associated with fresh water streams rather than saltwater channels, and, unlike the finds of weapons recorded from other parts of the country, these hoards were related to minor tributaries rather than major rivers. Indeed a whole series of later Bronze Age hoards was found along the springline where the South Downs overlooked the Weald. Others were in valleys which might have contained streams when the water table was higher. Only a few examples were associated with dry unwatered hilltops. Four of those hills appear to have been defended in the Late Bronze Age.

A second observation is that the locations of metalwork hoards are not necessarily a guide to the positions of settlements of the same date. A few hoards, especially those with personal ornaments, were in comparatively remote places, but others were restricted to only parts of the settled landscape. Those were the regions with a dependable supply of flowing water, and, with a few exceptions, the deposits associated with ponds inside the settlements were more likely to contain animal skulls and items of agricultural equipment (Yates 2007). It is always worth investigating the periphery of occupation sites, but there is no assurance that hoards will be found there. They could be more closely associated with features of the natural topography. How do the results of this project relate to the questions raised in the first part of this paper? One observation must be apparent. If the placing of metalwork hoards followed discernable conventions, it is hard to see how hoards can be interpreted as valuables hidden for later recovery. It would have been easy for other people to have found them. Nor would an anecdotal explanation account for the consistent relationship between these deposits and freshwater streams, or the differences that were observed between the places with deposits of tools or scrap metal, and those with collections of ornaments.

The sample consisted of a hundred well provenanced hoards, but only 14% of them were impossible to characterise in relation to the local topography. It is worth summarising the dominant characteristics of the other findspots (remembering that some sites may fulfil several criteria, although to different extents). 24% of the hoards studied were associated with the course of streams, and 13% were beside springs. Another 8% were near to burnt mounds where fresh water was heated in troughs. There was only one river find, but 4% of the hoards were in marshes. A further 8% of these collections were situated on promontories which overlooked confluences or damper ground. 5% were on the watersheds between the sources of different streams and rivers, and another 5% were in what are now dry valleys. At a conservative estimate between 43% and 50% of the hoards were closely related to watercourses, and only 11% were directly linked to settlements (this figure includes the four hillforts). Another 6% may have been associated with field systems which were likely to be of the same date.

One might object that knowledge of this kind is the prerogative of prehistorians who can compare different findspots with one another in a way that would have been impossible in the past. There is an answer to this argument, and it is one that brings us back to the work of the PAS. Some of the hoards investigated in south-east England were found using metal detectors. It was easy to observe that particular people were more successful than others. They were also willing to discuss the methods that they employed in the field. Long before any archaeologist had become aware of such issues, they had worked out that collections of Bronze Age artefacts are commonly associated with streams and springs so that certain locations provide more promising targets than others. Their ability to rediscover these artefacts after three thousand years was not a matter of luck. Recovering these collections would have been even easier for people in the Bronze Age. The fact that so many collections remained undisturbed shows that certain locations must have had a special significance. It was enough to protect the deposits that lay underground. For this reason, if no

One of the most striking conclusions of this study came from fieldwork on the South Downs where later Bronze Age enclosures, houses and field systems had been investigated for nearly a hundred years. These sites contain the remains of ponds or waterholes, and yet hoards of the same date are comparatively rare in the surrounding area. Instead they are found in greater numbers along freshwater streams on the lower ground. Although some of the hoards may have been buried close to settlements, not every occupation site was associated 24

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Metals Make the World Go Round, 160-75 (Oxford, Oxbow). Needham, S. 1981, The Bulford-Helsbury Manufacturing Tradition: the Production of Socketed Axes during the Later Bronze Age in Southern Britain (London, British Museum). Needham S. 2001, ‘When expediency broaches ritual intention: the flow of metal between systemic and buried domains’, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 7, 257-78. Needham, S, Bronk Ramsay, C, Coombs, D, Cartwright, C and Petitt, P. 1997, ‘An independent chronology for British Bronze Age metalwork: the results of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Programme’, Archaeological Journal 154, 55-107. Rassmann, K. 1996, ‘Untersuchungen zu spätbronzezeitlichen Hortfunden im nördlichen Schwarzmeergebiet’, in Huth. C. (ed.), Archäologische Forschungen zum Kultgeschehen in der jüngeren Bronzezeit und frühen Eisenzeit Alteuropas, 535-55 (Bonn, Habelt). Roberts, B. 2007, ‘Adorning the living but not the dead: understanding ornaments in Britain c. 1400 – 1100 cal. BC’, Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 73, 135-67. Torbrügge, W. 1971. ‘Vor- und frühgeschichtliche Flussfunde’, Bericht der Römisch-Germanischen Kommission 52, 1-146. Stead, I. 1998, The Salisbury Hoard (Stroud, Tempus). Turner, L. 2010, A Re-interpretation of the Later Bronze Age Metalwork Hoards of Essex and Ken,. British Archaeological Reports British Series 507 (Oxford, BAR Publishing). Woodward, A. 2002, ‘Beads and Beakers: heirlooms and relics in the British Early Bronze Age’, Antiquity 76, 1140-7. Wyss, R. 1996, ‘Funde von Pässen, Höhlen, aus Quellen und Gewässern der Zentral- und Westalpen’, in Huth, C., Archäologische Forschungen zum Kultgeschehen in der jüngeren Bronzezeit und frühen Eisenzeit Alteuropas, 417-28 (Bonn, Habelt). Yates, D. 2007, Land, Power and Prestige. Bronze Age Field Systems in Southern England (Oxford, Oxbow). Yates, D. and Bradley, R. 2010a, ‘Still water, hidden depths. The deposition of Bronze Age metalwork in the English Fenland’, Antiquity 84, 405-25. Yates, D. and Bradley, R. 2010b, ‘The siting of metalwork Age hoards in the Bronze Age of south-east England’, Antiquaries Journal 90, 4172. York, J. 2002, ‘The life cycle of Bronze Age metalwork from the Thames’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21, 77-92.

other, practical explanations of Bronze Age hoards are anachronistic and unsatisfactory. Bibliography Bradley, R. 1998. The Passage of Arms (2nd edition) (Oxford, Oxbow). Bradley, R. and Fraser, E. 2011, ‘Round barrows and the boundary between the living and the dead’, in Mullin, D. (ed.), Places In Between: The Archaeology of Social, Cultural and Geographical Borders and Borderlands, 40-7 (Oxford, Oxbow). Burgess, C. 1980, ‘The Bronze Age in Wales’, in Taylor, J. (ed.), Culture and Environment in Prehistoric Wales: selected essays. British Archaeological Reports, British Series 76, 243-86 (Oxford, British Archaeological Reports). Burgess, C. and Coombs, D. 1979, ‘Preface’, in Burgess, C. and Coombs, D. (eds), Bronze Age Hoards. Some Finds Old and New, British Archaeological Reports British Series 67: i-vii (Oxford, British Archaeological Reports). Chapman, J. 2000, Fragmentation in Archaeology (London, Routledge). Childe, V. G. 1958, The Prehistory of European Society (Harmondsworth, Penguin). Coombs, D. 1975, ‘Bronze Age weapon hoards in Britain’, Archaeologia Atlantica 1, 49-81. Cowie, T. 2002, ‘Special places for special axes? Early Bronze Age metalwork from Scotland in its landscape setting’, in Shepherd, I. and Barclay, G. (eds), Scotland in Ancient Europe, 247-61 (Edinburgh, Society of Antiquaries of Scotland). Evans, J. 1881, The Ancient Bronze Implements, Weapons and Ornaments of Great Britain and Ireland (London, Longmans, Green and Co). Fontijn, D. 2003, ‘Sacrificial landscapes. Cultural biographies of persons, objects and ‘natural’ places in the Bronze Age of the southern Netherlands c. 2500 – 600 BC’. Analecta Praehistorica Leidensia 33-34, 1-392. Gwilt, A., Kucharski, K., Silvster, R. and David, M. 2005, ‘A Late Bronze Age hoard from Trevalyn Farm, Rosset, Wrexham’, Studia Celtica 39, 2761. Hodges, H. 1957, ‘Studies in the Late Bronze Age of Ireland 3: the hoards of bronze implements’, Ulster Journal of Archaeology 20, 51-63. Levy, J. 1982, Social and Religious Organisation in Bronze Age Denmark: an analysis of ritual hoard finds, British Archaeological Reports International Series 124 (Oxford, British Archaeological Reports). Maraszek, R. 2006, Spätbronzeit Hortfunde-Landschaften in atlantischer und nordischer Metalltradition, Lamdesamt für Denkmalpflege und Archäologie (Halle, Sachsen-Anhalt). Montelius, O. 1908, ‘The chronology of the British Bronze Age’, Archaeologia 61, 97-162. Nebelsick, L. 2000, ‘Rent asunder’: ritual violence in Late Bronze Age hoards’, in Pare, C. (ed.), 25

Hoarding and Other Forms of Metalwork Deposition in Iron Age Britain Colin Haselgrove Introduction

Haselgrove et al. 2001; Sharples 2010), this paper subscribes to the view that a sizeable proportion of the Iron Age material culture we recover in settlement excavations and ‘out there’ in the landscape, was deposited on purpose for what we might loosely call ritual or religious motives; the proportion lost accidentally or casually discarded was possibly quite small. This is as true of everyday, seemingly utilitarian, artefacts like pottery and quernstones as it is of metalwork, and applies to small, easily lost, objects like brooches, coins and toilet instruments (Haselgrove 1997; Hill 1997) as much as it does to larger objects like weapons or tools.

This paper examines metalwork deposition during the British Iron Age, extending from c. 800 BC until the 1st century AD in England and Wales, but continuing in Scotland without any major break throughout and beyond the Roman occupation (e.g. Harding 2004). My primary focus is on hoarding during the later pre-Roman Iron Age (c. 300 BC-100 AD) and on deposits including objects made of iron, but practices in the earlier Iron Age and other metals and materials are also discussed. I will not be drawing a rigid distinction between hoards in the sense of a ‘closed’ group of objects that were deposited together in a single act and other collections of artefacts, which accumulated over a period of time and/or have fortuitously subsequently become associated. Instances of all of these are found in later prehistoric Britain and the category to which a specific find belongs can be a matter of delicate interpretation. In this respect, the French word ‘dépôt’ has some advantages over the English word ‘hoard’, in that it superficially seems less value-laden with regard to the motives of the depositor(s), although in practice of course it often carries many of the same overtones.

That Iron Age objects of all kinds were intentionally deposited, whether alone or in groups, according to widely held cultural rules is apparent from the frequency with which they occur in certain types of contexts and from the structured character and selective composition of many assemblages. It follows that identifying such recurrent patterns should bring us closer to understanding aspects of the social principles and ideologies that underpinned such practices; equally, the degree of conformity between different regions may provide us with insights into whether discrete Iron Age societies adhered to the same overarching beliefs. Grave goods are of course another form of deliberate deposit, but as furnished burials are relatively rare in Iron Age Britain (cf. Cunliffe 2005), this is not a theme I will explore systematically, beyond noting that among some prehistoric societies the inclusion of valuable objects in graves and/or their destruction in mortuary rituals may sometimes have represented an alternative form of conspicuous consumption to votive hoarding. As we shall see below, Earlier Iron Age practices on opposite sides of the Channel offer us one potential example.

Distinguishing hoards from single finds can also be potentially misleading in a prehistoric context (Fitzpatrick 1984; Haselgrove and Hingley 2006). For example, individual finds of Iron Age gold coins often display a similar chronological and/or contextual patterns to the larger assemblages for which the term ‘hoard’ is habitually reserved (Haselgrove 1987; 2005a; Farley 2012; this volume). There is no reason why this should not also apply to other valuables such as torcs, iron bars or horse harness. In effect, in a given cultural context, the deposition of a single object and a collection of objects may simply be opposite ends of a spectrum of behaviour governed by the same beliefs or motives. Where size is generally more significant is that larger assemblages, unsurprisingly, tend to be more variable in composition, thereby providing insights that smaller finds cannot, for example into social or technological links between regions or types of objects (e.g. Garrow and Gosden 2012).

This paper has three parts. The first looks briefly at the evidence for the hoarding and deposition of metalwork during the Earlier Iron Age (c. 800-300 BC), in the case of martial equipment following the story through into later centuries. The second examines the evidence for hoarding iron, the metal that has given its name to the period. The final section assesses some of the developments at the end of the Iron Age, which witnessed a marked increase in deposition of coins and metalwork of all types both on occupation sites and in the landscape; the Claudian invasion of Britain put an end to some of these practices, but others apparently carried on with only minimal changes well into the occupation and/or beyond the boundaries of the Roman province.

As Richard Bradley (this volume) emphasised in his paper at the conference, in seeking to understand why hoards were buried or by whom, we have to examine their archaeological contexts and attempt to identify recurrent patterns. This may not lead to a definitive answer as regards the intentions of the depositor – what one group of archaeologists sees as votive offerings on a sacred site, another might interpret as objects temporarily placed under divine protection for safekeeping, as in the case of the Snettisham torcs (Stead 1991; Fitzpatrick 1992), but it can help us to narrow down the possibilities. In keeping with other research over the last 20 years (e.g. Hingley 1990; Hill 1995; Gwilt and Haselgrove 1997;

Depositional practices in the Earlier Iron Age As good a way as any to support the premise that the nature and quantity of metalwork entering the archaeological record during the Iron Age was culturally determined is the evidence from the earlier part of this 27

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period. For half a millennium from c. 800 BC onwards, metalwork of any kind is more the exception than the rule, but equally from the few glimpses we do have, in the form of weaponry and feasting equipment and personal ornaments, it is clear that a flourishing and skilled metalwork industry existed throughout Britain, albeit still with an emphasis largely on bronze artefacts rather than iron (below).

(ibid.: fig. 1); a handful of new hoards recorded since 2007 (e.g. Stockbury, Kent; Boughton 2013: 10) has not significantly altered the distribution (Fig. 1). The emphasis on bronze rather than iron in Llyn Fawr hoards finds an echo over the Channel, where the much fuller evidence available from burials and ingots indicates that the transition to iron as the primary metal for tools and weaponry was long drawn out. For several centuries, iron production on the Continent – and we may assume in Britain too – was directed primarily to weapons and other prestige goods destined for the higher echelons of society; only from the 4th-3rd centuries BC onwards was it used extensively for the wider range of agricultural and domestic implements with which we associate it today (Bauvais 2007; Berranger 2009). In other respects, Britain follows a somewhat different pattern to the Continent. After axes, bronze swords of Hallstatt C type form the next most important category of Llyn Fawr metalwork (Fig. 1), but these rarely occur in the hoards. Instead the majority of Hallstatt C swords from Britain (and Ireland) are river finds, albeit in Britain mostly from the eastern half of the island (Bradley 1990: 152; Cunliffe 2005: fig. 17.4; O’Connor 2007: fig. 5). This continued insular emphasis on depositing weapons in river contexts contrasts with the Continent, where weapons of this period (Hallstatt C), whether of bronze or iron, are found primarily in burials, in a sharp break with the previous Late Bronze Age focus on hoard and wet locations (Milcent 2004: 62-71; 108-15; 2009, figs. 1213). Swords and daggers were still sometimes deposited in the major rivers like the Seine and the Meuse, but in large parts of France and the Low Countries wet deposits were now the minority. Whether we should make too much of the distinction between Hallstatt C swords in burials and swords in rivers is another matter. In Britain, the weapons from rivers were associated with large numbers of human skulls, which when radiocarbon dated, belong to the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age, strongly suggesting that they entered the water together (e.g. Bradley 1990: 108-9). The rare discovery of two early Hallstatt C swords of Wehringen type in a dryland context with (human) bone, at Ebberston, North Yorkshire (Milcent 2012: 155-6) may be the exception that proves this rule. North-western France differs from the rest of the near continent, with bronze axes of ‘Armorican’ type being hoarded in vast quantities in Brittany and Normandy well into the Iron Age (e.g. Huth 2003: fig. 4) and no river finds, echoing the pattern in south-western Britain. It appears however that these late French axe hoards date to the seventh to 6th centuries BC (Gomez de Soto et al 2009), leaving a hiatus in the 8th century BC, when hardly any hoards were deposited in north-west France (Milcent 2012). If so, this may have implication for the dating of some British Llyn Fawr hoards containing Armorican axes (L. Webley pers. comm.).

Fig. 1: Llyn Fawr hoards in Britain and Hallstatt C swords in Britain and Ireland (after O’Connor 2007, with additions). Paradoxically, our best indicator of the adoption of iron technology is the negative evidence provided by a sharp fall in bronze hoards in compared to previous centuries. During the later Bronze Age, a vast quantity of metalwork was taken permanently out of circulation through the deposition of hoards in both dryland and wetland locations (e.g. Bradley 1988; 1990; Needham 2007). This hoarding of bronze objects peaked in the mature Ewart Park phase (c. 920-800 BC), but then fell away sharply. O’Connor’s (2007) inventory records a mere 30 hoards belonging to the succeeding Llyn Fawr horizon (c. 800-600 BC). This horizon is named after a group of metalwork found in 1911-12 in a cauldron lying in peat in the bed of lake in south Wales. A second cauldron was found in the lake 60 m north-west of the main find (ibid.: 75). The eponymous hoard included an iron sword, spearhead and sickle, but most finds belonging to this horizon contain bronze only, especially axes – many of which were of little use functionally and could even conceivably have been made purely for the act of deposition. The bulk of the hoards occur in a zone extending from south Wales through Wessex to the South coast, with outlying clusters in Cornwall and East Anglia

The pattern having been set, the low visibility of metalwork in Britain continued during the rest of the 28

Hoarding and other forms of metalwork deposition in Iron Age Britain

Earlier Iron Age, with intentional deposits focusing on the major rivers of eastern England, especially the Thames. Most are weapons, now of iron rather than bronze, but they do include objects associated with feasting such as bronze buckets and flagons (Bradley and Smith 2007: 31-2) and personal ornaments like brooches (Haselgrove 1997: 54; Adams 2013). The weapon types follow Continental fashions, with daggers replacing swords in Hallstatt D, exemplified by the imported daggers found in the Thames at Battersea and Mortlake respectively, and an antenna-handled short-sword from an unspecified stretch of the river (e.g. Cunliffe 2005: 4623). From Early La Tène, swords came back increasingly into use and gradually got longer (Stead 2006). Several are known from the river Witham in Lincolnshire, among them six swords found in the vicinity of a wooden causeway at Fiskerton, along with 11 spears and other objects such as metalworking tools; the causeway was rebuilt several times between 457-321 BC and appears to have served as an offering platform (Field and Parker Pearson 2003).

quernstones, some of them whole, but often (deliberately) fragmented. Metal objects were rarer in special deposits, especially in those of Earlier Iron Age date, but occur on settlements in greater numbers after 300 BC, at least in some areas, where they seemingly obey the same rules as artefacts made of other materials, be they agricultural implements or household tools, or personal items like brooches, nailcleaners and tweezers (Hill 1997), and even coins (Haselgrove 2005a). At Danebury hillfort, 60 of 173 iron objects (34.7%) from the second decade of excavations came from hoards or special deposits in storage pits (Cunliffe and Poole 1991: 354). Most metal items entering the record in this manner did so individually or in small groups, but larger special deposits do sometimes occur, like the assemblage collection of horse gear and associated finds from two pairs of pits in the interior of Bury Hill (Cunliffe and Poole 2000; Garrow and Gosden 2012: 280-7). For reasons that are still debated, the period from the late 1st century BC onward saw a massive increase in the number of brooches and other artefacts found on settlement sites in southern and eastern England, and has come to be known as the ‘fibula event horizon’ (Hill 1995; 1997). Some of the objects in question must have been accidental losses, reflecting the more widespread use of personal ornaments at this period to convey individual identity and status, but others were evidently intentionally discarded, continuing the existing tradition of structured deposition, even base-metal coins (e.g. Curteis 2005).

From the watery nature of the findspots and the abundant later literary evidence we possess for the religious significance for Iron Age societies of rivers and bogs and other prominent natural locations, we may reasonably deduce that the majority of weapon finds were votive offerings of one form or another (e.g. Fitzpatrick 1984; Bradley 1990). During the Later Iron Age, conspicuous consumption of martial equipment in rivers not only intensified, but also diversified to include other types of objects like the Witham shield and the Battersea helmet. At the same time, swords and other weapons appear in a wider range of wetland and dryland contexts, including formal burials, and over a much larger area of Britain (e.g. Stead 2006: fig. 1). This diversification is exemplified by the discovery in north-east England of four Late Iron Age swords in fairly close proximity but diverse contexts: in the 1843 Melsonby hoard; on the moors of Cotterdale; in a gravel pit by the river Skerne at Barmpton; and in the waterlogged entrance ditch at Stanwick (ibid.: nos. 199, 204, 207, 244).

Currency bars and other ironwork hoards in Later Iron Age Britain It was not until after c. 300 BC, and in some areas not until the 2nd to 1st centuries BC, that the metal that gave its name to the period finally became a relatively common find at settlement sites in Britain and in other types of archaeological deposit, such as the well-known square barrow cemeteries and chariot burials of East Yorkshire (Giles 2012). The same period saw the appearance of wrought iron bars of standardised form. These have long been known as ‘currency bars’ (e.g. Allen 1967), in the belief that Julius Caesar is referring to these objects when, in characterising the 1st century BC inhabitants of south-east England, when he asserts: ‘for money they use either bronze, or gold coins, or iron ingots of fixed weight’ (De Bello Gallico V, 12).{1} But even assuming Caesar is correct that the latter were used as a means of exchange and/or a standard of value, it does not follow that they were made primarily for this purpose. Their function has been much debated, but current opinion favours their interpretation as an intermediate stage in iron production and distribution, akin to other forms of trade iron such as hooked billets, which were later cut up and forged into other types of object (Crew 1994; 1995; Berranger 2009). Around 20 varieties can be distinguished, which Crew (1994) argues were the product of different workshops, a view broadly supported by chemical and metallographic analysis. The French term ‘demi-produit’ (Berranger 2009) may well be more

From around 600 BC, continuing to the end of the 1st millennium BC and beyond, a parallel cultural practice evolved on hillforts and other settlement sites of carefully placing selected objects in features like pits, ditches and house gullies, often at specific locations like the midpoint of ditches, the rear of buildings or in right-hand gully terminals (e.g. Woodward and Hughes 2007). Now generally known as ‘special deposits’, such deposits are best characterised in Wessex, where they were first recognised (Cunliffe 1995; Hill 1995; Sharples 2010), but occur in various guises throughout Iron Age Britain (e.g. Hingley 1992; 2006; Gwilt 1997; Willis 1999; Giles 2007; Chadwick 2012; Haselgrove 2009; 2015). Many of these deposits were very probably bound up with periodic social and religious rituals, feasting and sacrifices (Hill 1995). They regularly incorporated animal and human body parts as well as objects. These were most often of a domestic or agrarian character, such as pottery and 29

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appropriate, but for simplicity the established term ‘currency bar’ is retained here. The wide variety of forms and weights also militates against the older view that the bars operated as part of a single, unified currency system. That said, most varieties were based on one of two main models: the sword and the plough. In the first group, which are slightly tapered and have a tang, the use of the sword as a model was essentially symbolic (Hingley 1997). Among the second group, the distinction is not such a hard and fast one: some plough-share bars are too long to have been effective for ploughing, but others are so similar that they could even have been mistaken for actual plough-shares (Hingley 1990). What is however clear is that by drawing on the symbolism of weapons and of agricultural production, both underlying models make reference to activities that were central to the ideology and beliefs of Iron Age peoples (Hingley 1997; Haselgrove and Hingley 2006: 150-1), confirmation – if any were needed – of the value of iron and the significance that its production had acquired by this period among Iron Age communities. Indeed, Herodian of Antioch may not have got it entirely wrong when several centuries later, writing about Septimius Severus’ preparations for invading the areas beyond Roman control in northern Britain, he claimed: ‘strangers to clothing, the Britons wear ornaments of iron at their waists and throats; considering iron a symbol of wealth, they value this metal as other barbarians value gold’ (History 3, xiv, 7).{2}

Fig. 2: Iron Age currency bar hoards in Britain (after Hingley 2005). As Hingley (1990; 2005) has shown, the depositional context of the British bars differs between the two principal zones. In Wessex and the Severn-Cotswolds, most of the finds come from settlements, nearly always enclosed and including many of the region’s larger hillforts like Bredon Hill, Cadbury Castle, Danebury, Ham Hill and Hod Hill. In the ‘peripheral zone’, however, deposits of iron bars occur in much wider variety of contexts. These include settlements, but – as with Iron Age weapons – the main emphasis is on rivers and wet places; the remaining findspots include several other naturally- significant locations like caves and rocky clefts, but also culturally-significant contexts such as burials, pit-alignments and the Late Iron Age shrine at Hayling Island, Hampshire, where fragments of two bars have been found (King and Soffe 2001).

In all, 69 iron currency bar hoards are recorded from 56 different sites (Fig. 2), amounting to a minimum total of c. 1580 bars (Hingley 1990; 2005, 191; Haselgrove and Hingley 2006: 162). The vast majority were deposited between the 3rd and 1st centuries BC, but a few are later, perhaps even Roman in date (Hingley 2005: 185-6). Three-fifths of hoards contain fewer than five bars (60.1%), whereas only five (7.3%) definitely contained more than 100. Most consisted of bars only, but 13 included other iron objects (below), for example at Madmarston, Oxfordshire (Fowler 1960). The bars were often buried in bundles (ibid.) and some deposits included broken or incomplete bars. The densest concentration of finds is in Wessex and the SevernCotswolds, including all the large hoards. Outside this ‘core zone’, particularly in eastern England, is a lesser scatter of finds, but hardly any bars have been found in northern and western Britain. It seems likely, however, that the surviving distribution merely indicates where Iron Age cultural practices favoured the incorporation of whole (or cut) bars in the ground (Hingley 1990) and that similar objects were widely used in many regions where the archaeological record is blank. The same observation applies to the similarly uneven distribution of similar iron bars and other ‘demi-produits’ on the Continent (Berranger 2009).

Given the emphasis on these other kinds of provenance in the ‘peripheral zone’, we could very easily conclude that most currency bars found there were votive offerings, whereas in the ‘core zone’ they were hoards buried at settlements for safekeeping. However, detailed analysis of the contexts implies otherwise. The vast majority of finds are from site boundaries, whether the enclosure ditch, a pit in the bank, or simply near the limit of the settlement (Hingley 1990). The ritual and symbolic significance of boundaries is well known, whether natural features like caves and hilltops, or cultural ones such as ramparts and ditches. This being so, votive acts connected with the well-being of a community would seem to provide the simplest explanation for the repeated deposition of valuable symbolically-charged objects like currency bars on or near settlement boundaries. There is nothing to suggest that deposits were meant to be recovered; it may also be relevant that the few currency bars from settlements in the ‘peripheral zone’ tend to be from boundary ditches (Hingley 2005: 191).

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Hoarding and other forms of metalwork deposition in Iron Age Britain

Having argued that most British currency bar hoards were probably votive offerings, albeit buried according to different cultural rules in the different regions, we can consider other ironwork hoards. All told, 52 deposits of Iron Age date containing five or more objects made of iron, from 39 sites, are recorded in Britain (Haselgrove and Hingley 2006: 163). This compares to 12 finds listed by Manning (1972), plus three more from southern Scotland, which contain native and Roman ironwork. Manning (1981) favoured a Roman origin for the Scottish hoards, linked to the presence of the Roman army, but they were probably deposited by the indigenous inhabitants (Hunter 1997:116-17). Three main factors lie behind the much increased number of deposits: (1) the greater intensity of excavations in the last 40 years; metal-detecting has also contributed; (2) the lower size threshold adopted by Haselgrove and Hingley (2006) compared to Manning; whilst he does not define his use of the term ‘hoard’, Manning was essentially concerned with larger groups; and (3) the more recent list includes certain finds that Manning excluded, notably the socalled ‘massacre’ deposits from Bredon Hill (Hencken 1938), Cadbury Castle (Barrett et al. 2000) and Spettisbury, Wiltshire (Sharples 2010), where quantities of weaponry and personal artefacts are mixed with human remains.

Wookey Hole) and one from a ditch around a possible Late Iron Age shrine at Uley, Gloucestershire. Outside the ‘core zone’, naturally-significant findspots predominate, particularly rivers and bogs, and deposits come from a wider variety of locations, including the preRoman shrines at Harlow, Essex, and Hayling Island, whilst finds at enclosed settlements outnumber those at hillforts.

We possess a potentially complete inventory for threefifths of the 52 deposits (59.6%), but for most older finds the totals are uncertain and basic information is lacking about how the objects were deposited in relation to one another, even those contained in cauldrons, such as Santon, Norfolk, Blackburn Mill, Borders, or Carlingwark Loch, Dumfries and Galloway, As a rule, deposits – even quite small ones – contain more than one category of ironwork (84.6%), whilst three-fifths included artefacts made from other materials (59.6%), particularly bronze. As with the currency bar hoards (Hingley 2005),{3} some of these deposits include items that had been damaged deliberately before burial, whilst many more are broken; indeed, where detailed studies have been conducted, it is not unusual for a majority of artefacts to be broken, as in the three Scottish hoards (Hunter 1997: fig. 12.4). In other cases, the objects were in good condition when buried and not obviously worn.

Fig. 3: Large Iron Age ironwork deposits in Britain (after Haselgrove and Hingley 2006, with additions). These ironwork deposits contained a wide variety of object types (Fig. 4), including some made of other metals. Categories were only counted once per hoard, although obviously some finds contain multiple items in that category. Weapons are commonest, present in 30 hoards. Next are ‘domestic’ objects; this category includes knives along with items like latch-lifters, keys and hearth furniture, but if knives are removed, numbers only fall slightly. Agricultural tools are also common, followed by all-purpose tools, cart and harness fittings, and metalworking tools. As already noted, 13 of the hoards contained (parts of) iron bars and three, billets. Among the rarer objects are iron vessels or their suspension chains (bronze bowls or cauldrons are present in six hoards), shackles and gang-chains. Personal objects and ornaments are conspicuous by their absence, although six finds included bronze brooches or fingerrings. Human bone or bodies were present in 12 deposits. In the minority of deposits containing only a single identifiable category of object (15.3%), the objects are usually weapons, but two had metalworking tools.

The distribution of findspots shows close similarities to the currency bars (Fig. 3). Finds are again concentrated in Wessex and the Severn-Cotswolds, with a lesser scatter to either side of this region. Nevertheless, there are also differences, in particular the presence of finds north of the Humber, an extension that is chronological as well as geographical. Iron Age and Conquest period ironwork hoards focus on southern England, whereas those of later 1st to 2nd century AD date are most found in north central Britain. The distinctions in depositional context noted between the two zones for currency bars are maintained for other forms of ironwork deposits. Almost all the Wessex and Severn-Cotswolds finds are from hillforts and enclosed settlements. The exceptions are two finds from caves in Somerset (Burrington Combe, 31

Colin Haselgrove

The dichotomy between the ‘core zone’ and other regions extends to chronology (Fig. 5). In Wessex and the Severn-Cotswolds, the number of deposits falls away in the final century of the Iron Age. This coincides with the end of intensive hillfort occupation in this region, although some sites like Maiden Castle remained an important focus for burial and craft production, including metalworking. Around the mid-1st century AD, however, there was a resurgence of deposition in hillforts, but these new ironwork deposits tend to be quite different in character; instead of comprising largely intact items buried in a single act, many of them probably accumulated over a period of time and more of the material is deliberately broken or damaged. Most complex of all are the weapon-rich deposits from several hillfort entrances, including Cadbury Castle. The precise character of these deposits varies from site to site, but invariably included weapons (Barrett et al. 2000: 10532).

Fig 4: Numbers of Iron Age ironwork deposits containing iron objects belonging to different functional categories. Multiple hoards are confined to hillforts, mostly in the ‘core zone’, but including Bigberry, Kent, where at least six groups of ironwork were exposed between 1861-95 in quarrying (Boyd-Dawkins 1902) and Hunsbury, Northamptonshire, where a large collection of metalwork was recovered from the interior during 19th-century extraction (Fell 1936). There are some minor differences from currency bars, notably the higher proportion of finds at smaller settlements – which partly reflects the greater chronological and geographical spread of the other ironwork finds – and the avoidance of some locations where currency bars were deposited, such as rocks and pit alignments. But in both the ‘core zone’ and elsewhere, a majority of finds again come from liminal contexts, implying that many deposits were ritually motivated. On settlements, pits provide the commonest provenance, followed by ditches, but with an emphasis on locations close to the entrance or enclosure boundary (Haselgrove and Hingley 2006: fig. 5). Many pit deposits date to the 3rd or 2nd centuries BC, reflecting the heyday of structured deposition on developed hillforts (Cunliffe 1995; Hill 1995; Hamilton 1998).

In contrast, beyond the ‘core zone’, a gradual but continuous increase in iron deposition over time is apparent. The earliest finds from eastern England are clearly little more than an intensification of the existing tradition of weapon offerings in major rivers, as in the case of the swords and other objects from Fiskerton (above), from the bed of the river Nene at Orton Meadow, Cambridgeshire, and from Flag Fen, both on the Fen edges (Stead 2006: nos. 31, 56 etc.; nos. 148-9, 222). Radiocarbon dates on animal bone associated with the huge collection of Late Iron Age weapons, harness and vehicle fittings deposited at the edge of the lake at Llyn Cerrig Bach, Anglesey, suggest that offerings there might have started in the mid first millennium BC (Macdonald 2007), but if so, this is exceptional. For the most part, the broad distinction apparent in the Llyn Fawr phase holds until the final centuries BC, with dryland deposits continuing to predominate in Wessex and the south-west and an enduring emphasis on rivers and wet places in the east. Only at the end of the Iron Age does this break down. The main series of ironwork finds from Bigberry and Hunsbury are probably broadly contemporary with the Wessex hillforts, but presaged a general rise in the Late Iron Age in the number and diversity of deposits in eastern England. These included two weapon hoards: one at Essendon, Hertfordshire, where nine swords and scabbards were deposited in pond on a site, which also yielded a tubular torc, gold coins, ingots and a bronze bowl (Stead 2006: 51, no 100 etc); the other at South Cave, East Yorkshire, where five swords and perhaps eight spearheads were buried in a pit lined with Dressel 20 amphora cut into an enclosure ditch (ibid.: 68-9, nos. A276-80). In south-east England, large ironwork hoards soon disappear after the Roman invasion, only to resume in the later Roman period (Manning 1972). In north central Britain, the picture is rather different; substantial ironwork hoards only occur from around the mid-1st century AD onwards and these adhere to specific regional traditions of object deposition that developed in this zone

Fig. 5: Large Iron Age ironwork deposits in Britain by period. 32

Hoarding and other forms of metalwork deposition in Iron Age Britain

in the 1st century BC (Hunter 1997). In northern England, there is a strong emphasis on weaponry and – apart from the Melsonby hoard – deposits are small and display a relatively limited range of associations. In southern Scotland, larger deposits are more common, and usually contain a wider range of object types, more of which tend to be of non-local origin, notably at Blackburn Mill and Carlingwork Loch (Piggott 1953).

Metalwork deposition in Late Iron Age Britain The period from the late 2nd century BC onward saw a rapid increase in the deposition of hoards and single metal artefacts made of gold, silver, bronze and (from the late 1st century BC) brass, often classes of object that do not figure prominently in the depositional record prior to this date, or in a few cases were new. The former include brooches, horse gear and other forms of decorative metalwork, hitherto largely the preserve of burials, especially those in East Yorkshire (Haselgrove 1997; Garrow and Gosden 2012; Giles 2012). Chief amongst the second category is coinage, which first reached southeast England in the 3rd century BC, but is not found in any quantity until the later 2nd century BC. The enigmatic spoons, often found in pairs, also probably fall into the newly-introduced category (Fitzpatrick 2007), as may gold torcs. Torcs are known by the 6th century BC in continental Europe, but gold torcs – as opposed to bronze – remained fairly exceptional there for several centuries (Fitzpatrick 2005); it is open to question whether they were worn in Britain by prominent individuals from an early period, but never deposited, or form part of the new Late Iron Age package. Different objects were treated in different ways: bronze mirrors and mirror parts are mostly found in burials, but a minority come from wet contexts or settlements (Joy 2010: 58-73); some spoons are also from burials, but this time a higher proportion, including all the Irish finds, come from wet places – the pair from boggy ground near a spring at Crosby Ravensworth, Cumbria, is a good British example – or were buried as small ‘hoards’, sometimes in settlements (Fitzpatrick 2007: 290-7). Coins occur very rarely in burials (Haselgrove 1987), torcs not at all and horse gear largely disappears from mortuary contexts after the 2nd century BC.

If we compare the composition of ironwork finds in the ‘core zone’ and elsewhere, some interesting differences emerge (Fig. 5). In Wessex and the Severn-Cotswolds, domestic objects (54.8%) and agricultural implements (51.6%) occur in over half of deposits, but weapons are present in less than half (41.9%). Elsewhere, martial equipment predominates, occurring in four-fifths of finds (81.0%). Items relating to transport are also better represented (in 52.4% of finds as against 29.0% in the ‘core zone), as are metalworking tools (47.6% against 29.0%), bronze and iron vessels (38.1% against 22.6%). Besides currency bars, which by definition are found primarily in the ‘core zone’, only agricultural tools (42.9%) are less well represented in other regions. These variations in the composition of deposits almost certainly held meaning for the inhabitants. In the densely occupied areas of southern Britain, the arable cycle seems to have been particularly significant and communities may have drawn upon strong associations with the arable cycle in their ritual actions (Hingley 1997). In other parts of Britain, the greater emphasis on martial equipment and other objects of social display (and on metalworking, the means through which these were reproduced) implies somewhat different concerns, perhaps revolving around the identity of the community in a period when this was under increased threat, both internally and externally. It is very likely that single items and small groups of iron on occasions performed comparable roles to the larger collections of objects discussed here, both in these regions and elsewhere. A good example is the ornate iron firedog, found in a bog, weighed down with stones at Capel Garmon, Denbighshire. This elaborate object would have taken a significant investment of labour from a smith. Giles (2007) has discussed the possible meaning of a set of blacksmith’s tools, comprising a poker, a paddle and a pair of tongs, which had been packed in straw or grass and buried in a shallow scoop on the base of a former grain silo of Later Iron Age date at Garton Slack, East Yorkshire. A basketful of carbonized grain had been placed over the top of the tools. Hingley (2006) notes various other examples, such as the digging tool placed in the ditch surrounding a substantial roundhouse at Aldclune, Perth and Kinross. Such finds may indicate the use of a single ornate, or alternatively fairly mundane iron objects, to make significant offerings. At Danebury, finds of single iron objects seem to be concentrated around the hillfort periphery, mirroring the larger ironwork deposits (Haselgrove and Hingley 2006: 157).

Whilst this increased incidence of metalwork to some extent represents an extension of the earlier traditions of special deposits in central southern England and making votive offerings in watery contexts elsewhere, no one pattern prevailed across Britain. Thanks in no small measure to finds reported through the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS), we are beginning to recognise distinct regional patterns of hoarding in England and Wales to set alongside those characterised for northern Britain by Hunter (1997; above), like the emerging cluster of Iron Age horse and vehicle equipment in the English West Midlands (Worrell 2007: 377-80). It is also increasingly apparent that the uneven distributions we observe for many Late Iron Age artefact types reflects their preferential incorporation in certain regional hoarding or votive traditions, but not others. The wellknown concentration of gold torcs in East Anglia is a case in point (below). As with horse harness or iron currency bars, it seems likely that many powerful or significant individuals possessed torcs in Late Iron Age Britain and they regularly exchanged them, but outside the East Anglia ‘hotspot’ we typically see glimpses of this only when they were incorporated in deposits that break with normal ritual traditions in an area. The Blair Drummond, Stirling, and Winchester hoards are both 33

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good examples. The Blair Drummond find brought together two gold ribbon torcs of Scottish type and two imported torcs, one probably from south-west France, the other a curious hybrid of Iron Age forms and Mediterranean craft skills (Hunter 2010). The torcs were buried within a circular building set on a terrace in a boggy area, which may well have been shrine, as there was no domestic settlement refuse (ibid.). The two necklace torcs found near Winchester were probably made by classically-trained goldsmiths; conclusive evidence for the nature of the findspot is lacking, but the odds are that – along with two pairs of gold La Tène D2 brooches, which could be either British or Gaulish – the torcs had been deposited at an open-air ritual site ‘in the landscape’ (Hill et al 2004).

some ways similar find from Batheaston Down (Stead 1998: 120-2). This early horizon of activity represented by Ringstead and Middleton gave way to the deposition of gold, electrum or silver torcs and sometimes coins, dating to the late second and earlier 1st century BC, and typically on local high spots; the complex of hoards from Snettisham is by far the best known and the most extensive (Stead 1991; Hutcheson 2004: 43-8, Phase 1; 2011). The torc finds cluster in north-west Norfolk, but similar dryland deposits are known elsewhere in East Anglia, notably the Ipswich torcs. During the later 1st century BC, gold coin hoards became widespread all over East Anglia (Hutcheson 2004: 49-59, Phase 2; Leins 2012), but were now more often buried in valley floor locations and close to water, as at Sedgeford, where a hoard of imported uniface staters – 20 of them inserted in a cow front right humerus – was found in a pit in a nowwaterlogged area close to the entrance to a ditched enclosure (Dennis and Faulker 2005). The site is not far from the findspot, on nearby higher ground, of the Sedgeford torc. In the 1st century AD, the emphasis shifted to hoarding silver coins, with finds now coming from a much wider variety of topographical locations. A further shift, this time to horse equipment, such as terrets and harness fittings, occurred around the mid 1st century AD; these include some larger hoards such as Saham Toney and Santon, but what is most striking is the large number of single finds (Hutcheson 2004: 53-88, Phase 3). Like the Iron Age silver coin hoards, finds of horse gear occur in a diverse range of ‘landscape’ locations, with no sign of a marked preference for any particular kind of natural place. Nearly a third of Phase 3 terret finds come from within 200m of a Roman road, but this presumably reflects a combination of factors, including accidental losses from vehicles using these routes (ibid.: 87-8).

Occasionally we encounter the converse situation to the torcs, where a ritual tradition privileged a type of object that was only used in the region where it was deposited, such as the massive armlets of north-east Scotland (Hunter 2006a). Occasional outliers belonging to this tradition, such as the spiral bracelet found in the rich mid 1st-century AD burial at Snailwell, Cambridgeshire, are best explained as another indicator of the high-level contacts that existed between far away regions (ibid.: 148-9). The more even data provided by the PAS now allows us to evaluate metalwork deposition rates in different parts of Britain more reliably, providing of course we control our data for variations in prospecting and/or land use (see Brindle 2013; Robbins 2013). For example, far fewer Later Iron Age (and Roman) finds are recorded by the PAS for north-west England than for the north-east, whereas for Later Bronze Age objects, the numbers are more even (Haselgrove 2015). More analysis is needed, but at face value this implies that the quantity of metalwork deposited in the Late Iron Age was indeed lower in north-west England. Whether this stemmed from different cultural practices in the north-west or simply reflects a lower population density there is another matter, but the difference evidently persisted in the Roman period.

North-east Scotland and East Anglia were only two of many region of Britain that witnessed a notable increase in the Late Iron Age in the deposition of bronze (and after c. 25 BC brass) objects, both hoards and single artefacts. Many of the bronze objects were decorated, but not invariably. The nature of the deposits varies considerably, from small deposits like the two bronze bowls, a winestrainer and a near-complete wooden tankard deposited at the edge of ancient bog/lake at Langstone, Newport, to the 12 bronze and iron cauldrons buried in a pit 2 m wide and 1m deep at Chiseldon, Wiltshire (Winterburn 2008), whilst horse equipment is present in many deposits. It is not uncommon for finds to include miniature objects like the pair of terrets from Honley, West Yorkshire (MacGregor 1976), or more occasionally curated items (Hingley 2009), as at Hagbourn Hill, Berkshire, where Bronze Age weapons and axes were buried together with Iron Age horse gear and a pin, seemingly in a pit and with one or more coins (Haselgrove 1987: 467; Stead 1998: 119-20). An extreme case mixing both practices is the Netherhampton hoard of 70 miniature Iron Age cauldrons and shields along with more than 460 other objects, many of them of Bronze Age date (Stead 1998). Subsequent

Over the course of the Late Iron Age, we see significant changes in some regions in the character of the objects most frequently employed in these practices and/or in the loci selected for metalwork deposition. Among the most persuasive analyses of such changes is Hutcheson’s (2004) study of East Anglia. In the 2nd century BC, deposits were rare and took various forms, from the Ringstead hoard of horse equipment, deposited on a remote but locally high point overlooking the sea (ibid.: 62) to the excavated site at Middleton, on what was then effectively an island on the north-west Norfolk coast. The primary deposits at Middleton consisted of sets of whole pots buried in pits along a ridge, but the overlying layers yielded a spread of metalwork including two Kentish Primary potin coins and nearly 60 bronze brooches, probably deposited in ones and twos, a quite exceptional assemblage for this period (Adams et al forthcoming). But for the excavation, this would well have been interpreted as a ‘scattered hoard’ like the earlier, but in 34

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investigations suggested that the entire assemblage had been buried together in a small pit cut into the top of a larger storage pit in the middle of an Iron Age settlement; a second small group of bronzes was found nearby (ibid.: 57-71). The Iron Age miniatures suggest a date of deposition in the 2nd century BC, but the earliest item in the collection – a flat axe made of copper – was made around 2400 BC and the other bronze artefacts span much of the intervening period. The commonest single type of artefact in the Netherhampton find comprised unfinished ‘tinned’ socketed axes, contemporary with the Armorican axes found in the Llyn Fawr horizon (above) and like them, non-functional (ibid.: 113-14). Unless postdepositional mixing occurred, we have to assume that the Bronze Age objects from here and other later hoards were discovered in the Iron Age and later reburied.

differences are apparent from one region or type of deposit to another (Garrow and Gosden 2012: 172-8).

Garrow and Gosden (2012: 161-3) identified 75 finds containing decorated Iron Age metalwork that can be classified as hoards,{4} from 65 different sites – only nine of which overlap with the deposits inventoried by Haselgrove and Hingley (2006). Twenty-nine of these decorated metalwork hoards comprised between 2-4 objects, whilst only nine contained >50 artefacts (Garrow and Gosden 2012: fig. 6.3). Of the 61 finds that can be dated with reasonably accuracy, 23 belong to the 2nd or 1st centuries BC, whilst 38 date to the 1st century AD or later. It is apparent, however, that the earlier hoards are mostly of gold (including 10 from Snettisham) and are dominated by torcs, apart from two containing iron; whilst the later hoards are predominantly of copper alloy, apart from six containing a significant quantity of iron. As Garrow and Gosden (ibid.: 162) note, a significant distinction exists between the contexts of large iron deposits and those of hoards containing decorated metalwork. As we saw, most iron finds are either from settlements (in the ‘core zone’) or often from wet places elsewhere, whereas the vast majority of decorated metalwork finds were deposited in dry locations out ‘in the landscape’ (Fig. 6), a difference that suggests that these objects of gold and bronze were employed in different types of social and political discourse to those made of iron (ibid.: 163).

Fig. 6: Late Iron Age gold and bronze hoards in Britain (after Garrow and Gosden 2012, with additions). A number of hoards mixing horse gear with other objects and sometimes metalwork of Roman (often military) origin seem to have been deposited within a relatively short period in the middle decades of the 1st century AD (e.g. Davis and Gwilt 2008). In the past, they have often been associated with the Roman military advance and with historical events like the Boudiccan revolt, but in depositional terms form a rather diverse group. The Polden Hill hoard was apparently found in a pit, and the Seven Sisters hoard – which included material associated with metalworking and Roman cavalry equipment – in the bed of a stream (ibid.: 162-3). In Norfolk, the Santon hoard was found close to water, but the three Saham Toney hoards were deposited on the plateau, Ovington within a rectilinear enclosure, the two Quidney Farm finds on a metalworking site (Hutcheson 2004: 60-1). In north central Britain, the Fremington Hagg hoard of Roman military equipment was apparently found on moorland near Reeth (Webster 1971), the Middlebie hoard of horse gear in a bog (MacGregor 1976) and the Melsonby hoard within a complex of Late Iron Age enclosures (Fitts et al: 1999). Many of the Melsonby

The later horizon of decorated metalwork hoards contain a much broader range of object types than those dating to the 1st century BC or earlier. Whilst horse gear dominates to some extent, the spread of artefact types is fairly even, with nearly half of the object categories represented in 10-20% of the hoards (Garrow and Gosden 2012: 166-7). To some extent, this reflects a more general shift in the nature of decorated metalwork during the Late Iron Age, from an earlier emphasis on quality to a later one based on quantity (ibid.). Decoration also played a more limited role than it had previously in warfare and feasting, but a greater one in other areas such as transport and personal ornament (Hunter 2006b). As with ironwork finds, many hoards contained broken and incomplete objects – a substantial proportion of which were both – and most objects seem to have been used, but no clear 35

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objects are heat-damaged, suggesting that the deposit may be connected with metalworking. However the finds could also be from a burial(s), since the presence of chain mail and a large iron-bound vessel as well as horse harness has echoes of rich Late Iron Age burials in southern England (ibid.). That said, most of the Melsonby objects are equally well paralleled by the wet find from Carlingwark (Hunter 1997), emphasising our dependence on context for interpreting such deposits.

date is Wanborough, Surrey, near a spring and later the site of a Roman temple (ibid.). Regrettably this site was only excavated after systematic looting by treasure hunters destroyed any evidence that could have shown how the coins were deposited (Haselgrove 2005b: 401-9). How many coins were stolen remains a matter of debate – possibly 3000-4000 – but the profile of the 950 identified Iron Age coins recalls Hallaton: most are local (Southern) silver types, whilst the Roman denarii end with a single coin of Claudius. At the time of discovery, all the coins were thought to be a single enormous hoard buried soon after the Conquest, but the pitted nature of the looted site would clearly be consistent with multiple hoards buried within a short period of time (Haselgrove 2005b: 404-8). As Philip de Jersey (2015) has observed, many Iron Age coin hoards from high spots were deposited at the break of slope, as at Hallaton, rather than on the actual hilltop. This might imply an element of performance in the burial of coin hoards (or at the very least that the site was positioned so that rituals enacted there could be observed by individuals who were not direct participants from lower down the slope), just as many barrows and hillfort ramparts were false crested in order to be visible from below. The same argument potentially applies to the placing of currency bar hoards in hillfort ramparts (cf Bowden and McOmish 1987) and to the conspicuous consumption of weapons and other prestige metalwork in lakes and rivers.

From the 19th century account, it appears that more than one deposit was present at Melsonby (Fitts et al 1999: 1), but this has been overlooked in most subsequent studies. In this respect, an instructive parallel is offered by the Late Iron Age ritual site investigated between 2001 and 2009 at Hallaton, Leicestershire. The site, which occupies an elevated position overlooking the river Welland, is described in detail elsewhere (Score 2011). The principal archaeological feature was a north-south boundary ditch located just below the brow of the hill, broken by an entrance. Next to the entrance, 14 coin hoards had been buried in small pits, containing 2,027 coins, mostly inscribed East Midlands Iron Age silver types, but including Roman denarii up to 41/42 AD. A further deposit of >1,350 coins, again predominantly Iron Age silver types, but with Roman denarii up to Tiberius was buried in a pit cutting the ditch along with a decorated Roman cavalry helmet of 1st century AD date and at least six cheek pieces. The helmet had a scalloped brow guard, dominated by a female bust, possibly of the goddess Cybele, flanked by lions, and the bowl was ornamented by a laurel wreath (Score 2012: 104-9). The similarity of the contents implies that all 15 coin hoards were assembled and buried within a short period centred on c. 43-50 AD (Leins 2011: 40-3; Farley this volume). Apart from these multiple deposits, the key feature that Hallaton shares with Melsonby is that the ritual site lay within an organised landscape, close to a contemporary settlement, Moreover, the ritual focus was frequented for a much longer period than the intense burst of hoarding in the mid 1st century AD might suggest. Periodic feasting and occasional coin deposition clearly began there in the 1st century BC, and gathered pace in the earlier 1st century AD, when a group of coins and other objects including two ingots and a silver bowl were buried in the ditch. After the main series of hoards were deposited, offerings reverted to lower levels, continuing into the 2nd century AD in the form of brooches and Roman coins, and resuming in Late Roman times (Score 2011; Leins 2011).

Conclusion This paper has analysed patterns of metalwork deposition during the Iron Age with an emphasis on the contexts in which hoards and individual objects were discarded at different times and in different parts of Britain. The watery nature of many resting places seems to militate against any intention to recover items, as does the broken and/or incomplete state of objects in many terrestrial finds. For such deposits, the old default explanation that hoards were buried for temporary safekeeping is clearly untenable, although there will always be exceptions, where there is scope for extensive debate about the motives of depositors. For this reason it is vital that new metalwork and coin hoards continue to be reported and accurately recorded through PAS, so that their context of deposition can be investigated and as far as possible defined. On its own, the find context will rarely provide a definitive explanation for a deposit, any more than will detailed study of a hoard’s composition, but analysed together and in tandem with other discoveries, patterns may well be revealed that will bring us closer to understanding the processes at work and how these relate to other aspects of Iron Age societies.

Coin hoarding in Late Iron Age Britain is considered by Julia Farley in another chapter, but it is appropriate to conclude this paper with a few observations about coin hoards. Whether or not it has anything in common with Melsonby or other Late Iron Age metalwork finds, Hallaton is clearly a plausible model for other sites with multiple coin hoards, such as Chute, Marks Tey, Selsey, Westerham and Whaddon Chase in southern England (Haselgrove 2011: 165-6), or at Rozel and (given the new find of over 50,000 Iron Age coins there) Le Câtillon on Jersey. The find that most closely resembles Hallaton to

In the case of prehistoric metalwork and many other categories of material culture, it is now beyond serious doubt that deliberate acts of deposition, for whatever reason, have very largely shaped the form of the archaeological record that has come down to us today. During the first 500 years of the Iron Age, deposition of metalwork was the exception and when we do encounter larger deposits, in the Llyn Fawr horizon, these often 36

Hoarding and other forms of metalwork deposition in Iron Age Britain

contain non-functional axes. Otherwise deposition was essentially limited to weapons and occasional prestige objects in eastern Britain, with an emphasis on rivers and wet places and the emergent tradition of special deposits on hillforts and other settlements in Wessex and adjacent regions, but these privileged objects of a domestic or agrarian character. After 300 BC, iron deposition increased in the form of ‘currency bars’ and other objects, reflecting the role this metal had by now acquired in both the everyday activities and the ideologies of Iron Age communities. The pattern laid down in the Late Bronze Age persisted, however, manifested by the continuing focus on dry places in the Wessex and Severn-Cotswolds ‘core zone’, and on wetland deposits in eastern and central Britain, although this divide should not blind us to the underlying concern with culturally and/or naturally liminal locations that united both zones.

landscape findspots due to having been excavated and the particularly spectacular mid 1st century AD deposits, buried of course at a time when indigenous societies and their traditional ways of life were perceptibly under threat all over Britain. Endnotes {1} ‘Utuntur aere aut nummo aureo aut taleis ferreis ad certum pondus examinatis pro nummo.’ Translation: Handford (1951). {2} Translation: Echols (1961). {3} The 52 ironwork deposits listed by Haselgrove and Hingley (2006) include 13 (25%) that also feature in Hingley’s list of currency bar hoards (2005: appendix 1). {4} The approach adopted by Garrow and Gosden (2012) differs somewhat that used by Haselgrove and Hingley. Garrow and Gosden preferred to classify a number of large pit groups that include decorated metalwork from settlements as special deposits rather than hoards, e.g. from Bury Hill (above) and the Roman fort of Newstead, Borders. This simply reinforces the need to view finds of all types within a continuum of practices.

In the final centuries of the Iron Age and continuing into the Roman period, we see a sharp rise in the conspicuous consumption of metalwork, reflecting the wider social and political processes underway at this time. The quantity of material entering the record increased dramatically, both as single objects and in hoards, which now regularly featured a wider range of metals and artefact types than before. The new medium of coinage was largely confined to lowland Britain, but in other regions we find an equivalent rise in the deposition of other types of object, both in traditional and new forms. With decorated metalwork, we also see a wholesale chronological shift, from early hoards dominated by gold objects, especially torcs – albeit with a strong geographical bias to East Anglia – to later deposits, which were more diverse in composition and in which horse harness and copper alloy objects predominate, but not exclusively. Most of these later hoards are no earlier than the mid 1st century AD, whereas gold hoarding reached its peak before the mid 1st century BC. The intervening period was filled by the increase in coin hoarding; this too is particularly apparent in East Anglia, but a similar phenomenon can in fact be observed throughout the zone where coinage was in use. The hoarding of coinage and decorated metalwork also displays a new emphasis on dry locations ‘in the landscape’, even in those areas of Britain where the emphasis was previously on wetland deposits or which, like north-east Scotland seem to lack any tradition of metalwork deposition after the early part of the Iron Age.

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Hamilton, S. 1998, ‘Using elderly data bases. Iron Age pit deposits at the Caburn, East Sussex, and related sites’, Sussex Archaeological Collections 136, 23-39. Handford, S. A. 1951, Caesar. The conquest of Gaul (Penguin, London). Harding, D. W. 2004, The Iron Age in Northern Britain. Celts, Romans, natives and invaders (Routledge, London). Haselgrove, C. 1987, Iron Age Coinage in South–East England: the archaeological context, British Archaeological Reports British Series 174 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Haselgrove, C. 1997, ‘Iron Age brooch deposition and chronology’, in Gwilt, A. and Haselgrove, C. (eds), 51-72. Haselgrove, C. 2005a, ‘A new approach to analysing the circulation of Iron Age coinage’, Numismatic Chronicle 165, 129-74. Haselgrove, C. 2005b, ‘A trio of temples: a reassessment of Iron Age coin deposition at Harlow, Hayling Island, and Wanborough’, in Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds), 391-418. Haselgrove, C. 2009, The Traprain Law Environs Project: excavations and fieldwork 2000-2004 (Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, Edinburgh). Haselgrove, C. 2011, ‘Hallaton in its wider setting’, in Score, V., 165-74. Haselgrove, C. 2015, ‘Keeping up with the neighbours? Changing perceptions of later prehistoric societies in central Britain’, in Hunter, F. and Ralston. I. (eds) The Later Bronze and Iron Ages of Scotland in their European Setting, 117-35 (Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, Edinburgh). Haselgrove, C. and Hingley, R. 2006, ‘Iron deposition and its significance in pre-Roman Britain’, in Bataille, G. and Guillaumet, J.-P. (eds), Les dépôts d’objets métalliques aux âges du fer, Collection Bibracte 11, 147-63 (Bibracte, Gluxen-Glenne). Haselgrove, C. and Pope R. E. (eds) 2007, The Earlier Iron Age in Britain and the Near Continent (Oxbow Books, Oxford). Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds) 2005, Iron Age Coinage and Ritual Practices, Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike 20 (Von Zabern, Mainz). Haselgrove, C., Armit I., Champion T. C., Creighton J., Gwilt A., Hill J. D., Hunter F., Woodward A. 2001, Understanding the British Iron Age: an agenda for action (Prehistoric Society, Salisbury). Hencken, T. C. 1938, ‘The excavation of the Iron Age camp on Bredon Hill, Worcestershire’, Archaeological Journal 95, 1-111. Hill, J. D. 1995, Ritual and Rubbish in the Iron Age of Wessex, British Archaeological Report British Series 242 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Hill, J. D. 1997, ‘The end of one kind of body and the beginning of another kind of body’? Toilet

instruments and ‘Romanization’, in Gwilt, A. and Haselgrove, C. (eds), 96-108. Hill, J. D., Spence, A. J., La Niece, S., Worrell, S. 2004, ‘The Winchester hoard. A find of unique Iron Age gold jewellery from southern England’, Antiquaries Journal 84, 1-22. Hingley, R. 1990, ‘Iron Age ‘currency bars’: the archaeological and social context’, Archaeological Journal 147, 91-117. Hingley, R. 1992, ‘Society in Scotland from 700 BC to AD 200’, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 122, 7-53. Hingley, R. 1997, ‘Iron, ironworking and regeneration: a study of the symbolic meaning of metalworking in Iron Age Britain’, in Gwilt, A. and Haselgrove, C. (eds), 9-18. Hingley, R. 2005, ‘Iron Age ‘currency bars’ in Britain: items of exchange in liminal contexts?’, in Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds), 183205. Hingley R. 2006, ‘The deposition of iron objects in Britain during the later prehistoric and Roman periods: contextual analysis and the significance of iron’, Britannia 37, 213-57. Hingley, R. 2009, ‘Esoteric knowledge? Ancient bronze artefacts from Iron Age contexts’, Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 75, 143-65. Hunter, F. 1997, ‘Iron Age hoarding in Scotland and northern England’, in Gwilt, A. and Haselgrove, C. (eds), 108-33. Hunter, F. 2006a, ‘New light on massive armlets’, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 136, 135-60. Hunter, F. 2006b, ‘Art in later Iron Age society’, in Haselgrove, C. (ed.), Les mutations de la fin de l’âge du Fer (Celtes et gaulois: l’Archéologie face à l’Histoire), Collection Bibracte 12/4, 93116 (Bibracte, Glux-en-Glenne). Hunter, F. 2010, ‘A unique Iron Age gold hoard found near Stirling’, Past 65, 3-5. Hutcheson, N. 2004. Later Iron Age Norfolk. Metalwork, Landscape and Society, British Archaeological Reports British Series 361 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Hutcheson, N. 2011, ‘Excavations at Snettisham, Norfolk, 2004: reinvestigating the past’, in Davies, J. A. (ed.), The Iron Age in Northern East Anglia: new work in the land of the Iceni, British Archaeological Reports British Series 549, 41-8 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Huth, C. 2003, ‘Poor Belgium, rich Belgium. Some reflections on the nature of metalwork deposition in the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age’, in Bourgeois, J., Bourgeois, I. and Cherretté, B. (eds), Bronze Age and Iron Age Communities in North-Western Europe, 39-60 (Koninklijke Vlaamse Academie van Belgie, Brussels). Joy, J. 2010, Iron Age Mirrors. A biographical account, British Archaeological Reports British Series 518 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). 39

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King, A. and Soffe, G. 2001, ‘Internal organisation and deposition at the Iron Age temple on Hayling Island, Hampshire’, in Collis, J. R. (ed.), Society and Settlement in Iron Age Europe: Actes du XVIIIe Colloque de l’AFEAF, Winchester 1994, Sheffield Archaeological Monographs 11, 11124 (Tempus, Stroud). Leins, I. 2011, ‘The coins’, in Score, V., 39-60. Leins, I. 2012, Numismatic Data Reconsidered: coin distributions and interpretations in studies of late Iron Age Britain, unpublished Ph.D. thesis, University of Newcastle. Macdonald, P. 2007, Llyn Cerrig Bach. A study of the copper alloy artefacts from the insular La Tène assemblage (University of Wales Press, Cardiff). MacGregor, M. 1976, Early Celtic Art in North Britain (Leicester University Press, Leicester). Manning, W. H. 1972, ‘Ironwork hoards in Iron Age and Roman Britain’, Britannia 3, 224-50. Manning, W. H. 1981, ‘Native and Roman metalwork in northern Britain: A question of origins and influences’, Scottish Archaeological Forum 11, 52-61. Milcent. P. 2004, Le Premier Âge du Fer en France Central, Mémoire Société Préhistorique Française 34 (Société Préhistorique Française, Paris). Milcent, P. 2009, ‘Le passage de l’âge du bronze à l’âge du fer en gaule au miroir des élites sociales: une crise au VIIIe siècle av. J.-C.?’, in RoullièreLambert, M.-J. et al. (eds), 453-76. Milcent, P. 2012, Les Temps des Elites en Gaule Atlantique. Chronologie des mobiliers et rhythms de constitution des depots metalliques dans le contexte Européen (XIIIe – VIIe s. av. J.C) (Presses Universitaires, Rennes). Needham, S. 2007, ‘800 BC, The Great Divide’, in Haselgrove, C. and Pope, R. (eds), 39-63. O’Connor, B. 2007, ‘Llyn Fawr metalwork in Britain: a review’, in Haselgrove, C. and Pope, R. (eds), 64-79. Piggott, S. 1953, ‘Three metal-work hoards of the Roman period from southern Scotland’, Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland 87, 1-50. Robbins, K. 2013, ‘Balancing the scales: Exploring the variable effects of collection bias on data collected by the Portable Antiquities Scheme’, Landscapes 14(1), 54–72. Roullière-Lambert, M.-J. , Daubigney, A., Milcent, P.-Y., Talon, M. and Vital, J. (eds) 2009, De l'Âge du

Bronze à l'Âge du Fer en Europe Occidentale (Xe–VIIe siècle av. J.-C.). La moyenne vallée du Rhône aux âges du Fer, Revue Archéologique de l’Est Supplément 27 (Societé Archéologique de l’Est, Dijon). Score, V. 2011, Hoards, Hounds and Helmets: a conquest-period ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire, Leicester Archaeology Monograph 21 (University of Leicester Archaeological Services, Leicester). Score, V. 2012, ‘Helmets, ingots and idols: an update on the Hallaton finds’, Transactions of the Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society 86, 103-15. Sharples N. M. 2010, Social Relations in Later Prehistory. Wessex in the first millennium BC (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Stead, I. M. 1991, ‘The Snetttisham treasure: excavations in 1990’, Antiquity 65, 447-64. Stead, I. M. 1998, The Salisbury Hoard. (Tempus, Stroud). Stead, I. M. 2006, British Iron Age Swords and Scabbards (British Museum, London). Webster, G. A. 1971, ‘A hoard of Roman military equipment from Fremington Hagg’, in Butler, R. M. (ed.), Soldier and Civilian in Roman Yorkshire, 107-25 (Leicester University Press, Leicester). Willis, S. H. 1999, ‘Without and within: aspects of culture and community in the Iron Age of northeastern England’, in Bevan. B. (ed.), Northern Exposure: interpretative devolution and the Iron Ages in Britain, Leicester Archaeology Monograph 4, 81-110 (School of Archaeological Studies, University of Leicester, Leicester). Winterburn, J. 2008, ‘The Chiseldon cauldrons’, Current Archaeology 214, 25-32. Worrell, S. 2007, ‘Detecting the Later Iron Age. A view from the Portable Antiquities Scheme’, in Haselgrove, C. and Moore, T. (eds), The Later Iron Age in Britain and Beyond, 371-88 (Oxbow Books, Oxford). Woodward, A. and Hughes, G. 2007, ‘Deposits and doorways: patterns within the Iron Age settlement at Crick Covert Farm, Northamptonshire’, in Haselgrove, C. and Pope, R. (eds), 185-203.

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Coins and Conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions Julia Farley Introduction

copper-alloy) issues. By the early 1st century BC, insular issues of both types were being produced in the south, circulating alongside imported coins. From the mid-1st century BC to the mid-1st century AD, insular coin production expanded and diversified into an array of regional series.

In the late Iron Age in Britain, a new form of material culture, coinage, came into circulation and was woven into existing practices of deposition and hoarding. It is in the nature of the archaeological record that we see objects at the end of their use-lives, after they have been lost, discarded, or deposited. Nevertheless, for coinage it is possible to begin to reconstruct the patterns of production and circulation that must have underpinned the social meaning of these objects in the communities that made and used them. Only by understanding the full biographies of objects such as coins can we hope to interpret their use in depositional practices.

There are many excellent summaries of the development of the various regional types (e.g. Creighton 2000: 222227; de Jersey 2001), and several catalogues devoted to British Iron Age coins (Evans 1864, 1890; Mack 1975; Van Arsdell 1989; Hobbs 1996; Rudd 2010). For the purposes of this paper, a simplified chronology is given in Appendix 1. Whilst some writers (most notably Van Arsdell 1989) have sought to assign specific dates to each issue, most scholars subscribe to the looser system of chronological phasing developed by Haselgrove (1987; 1993), building on the work of Allen (1944; 1960), and these phases are used here.

This paper compares Iron Age and early Roman coin use and deposition in two regions: the East Midlands and the North Thames region. These areas had very different social and political structures in the late Iron Age. A hundred years before the military annexation of Britannia, communities in the North Thames region were developing close ties to the Roman world, and increasingly centralised institutions of power and authority. After Caesar’s expeditions to Britain in 55-54 BC, two Roman client kingdoms were established in southern Britain: the Commian dynasty ruled the ‘Southern Kingdom’, while the Tasciovanan dynasty established the ‘Eastern Kingdom’ north of the Thames (Creighton 2006). These connections with Rome manifested in new settlement patterns and ritual practices, increased continental imports, and changes in material culture such as the appearance of Classical imagery and inscriptions on coinage from around 20 BC.

Fig. 1 shows the approximate distribution of the regional series described in Appendix 1. Traditionally, these have been ascribed to particular Iron Age tribes, their names derived from the Roman administrative divisions of Britannia. Whilst some of these administrative regions may have had their origins in pre-Roman social organisation, the universal back-projection of a tribal model onto Late Iron Age society is problematic. The ascription of tribal identities to coinage has gradually been replaced with an emphasis on regions (Haselgrove 1987; Hobbs 1996; Creighton 2000; de Jersey 2001), and the less loaded regional terminology is used in this paper. The following sections discuss in more detail the production and circulation of Iron Age coinage in two areas: the East Midlands (home of the ‘North-Eastern’ series), and the North Thames region. The production evidence consists of coin blanks, unstruck pellets, and the ceramic trays used for bulk production of the pellets. Whilst many other implements would have been used in the production of an issue of coins, including crucibles, coin dies, and possibly the objects identified by Van Arsdell (1993) as coin-scales, these are either poorly represented in the archaeological record (only two Iron Age coin dies have been recovered from Britain, both from Hampshire), or (in the case of crucibles and coin scales) cannot by themselves be taken as evidence for coin production. For the consideration of circulation, stray and site finds of coins from each region were divided into the periods given in Appendix 2. The overlap between some of the periods is due to the difficulties of ascribing date ranges to the latest Iron Age issues. In most cases, the Iron Age dating follows Haselgrove (1987; 1993; 2006b), but for North-Eastern types, the new chronology proposed by Leins (2012a) is used. The dates are based on the production range of each coin type; many coins will have continued to circulate into later

The picture in the East Midlands was very different. Here, social hierarchies seem to have remained more fluid and competitive (Farley 2012a). In both regions, the issuing of coinage was one means through which local elites established, displayed and negotiated new forms of authority. The social role of coinage in each region, and the organisation of its production, impacted on how coins circulated, and how they were deployed in acts of deposition. Coin use and coin hoarding continued after the conquest, but the evidence suggests that Iron Age traditions may have continued to shape attitudes to Roman coinage long after the annexation of Britannia was complete. Before discussing the patterns of hoarding in the North Thames and East Midlands it is necessary first to sketch the development of Iron Age coinage in these two regions. Iron Age coins in Britain In Britain, coinage first appears in the archaeological record in the mid to late 2nd century BC. These first coins were imported Gallic gold and potin (high tin

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Fig.1: Iron Age coin production regions and mint sites. (Redrawn and adapted from de Jersey 1997; 2001). periods, and many of the earliest Roman coins may in fact have first been imported some time after they were first made. In the vast majority of cases, independent contextual dating for coins is unavailable, and so this framework is used to permit the comparison of data between the two regions. The stray and site find coin data

were compiled using the Celtic Coin Index (CCI), the PAS database, and Bland and Loriot’s (2010) corpus of Roman gold coins. There are some difficulties with this approach, which must be acknowledged from the outset.

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Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Fig. 2: Non-hoard coin finds from the North Thames region as coins per year, coins dated to the period of their production (Total: 5993 coins). 150-50 BC Quantities of coinage in circulation appear to have been lower than in subsequent phases. Gallic gold and potins were imported, most likely entering Britain through prestige exchange with Gallic elites, and some Kentish potins also made their way into the North Thames region through gifts or exchange. The first local gold coins were produced from around 80 BC, using a yellow-gold ternary alloy made up of 20-75% gold alloyed with copper and silver. This alloy was most likely produced by recycling imported Gallic gold coins and objects and debasing this metal with variable copper-silver alloys. Despite the variability in gold content, there seems to have been a concerted attempt to maintain the yellow colour of the resulting alloys (Creighton 2000, 37-40; Northover 1992). Creighton (2000) has argued that these early gold issues were recalled and re-minted around 6050 BC, as part of the creation of Roman client kingdoms and ‘dynastic mints’ in southern England after Caesar’s expeditions. The re-issued coins, known as British L and Q, are particularly well-represented in the archaeological record. These types account for the peak in gold finds from the period 80-50 BC. Towards the end of this period, local silver coins also began to be produced. Potin coins had largely dropped out of production by 50 BC, but production of gold and silver issues continued to expand.

The CCI and Bland and Loriot’s volume are intended as full corpora of Iron Age coins and Roman gold issues, whilst the PAS has only been running as a national scheme since 2003. As such, Roman silver and bronze issues are substantially underrepresented in this dataset. Nevertheless, the use of this data can still permit comparison between the two regions, even if comparison between the Iron Age and Roman periods remains challenging. The later sections compare the hoarding evidence from the late Iron Age into the early Roman period. Despite similarities in the overall patterns of Roman coin circulation, the hoard evidence shows marked differences between the regions. I argue that local patterns of production and circulation of Iron Age coinage may have affected attitudes to the adoption of Roman coinage, with the effects continuing for generations after the conquest. Coinage in the North Thames region: Production and circulation Importation and production of Iron Age coins in the North Thames region closely follows the pattern laid out in Appendix 1. Fig. 2 shows the numbers of non-hoard finds from each production period (Appendix 2). Coin production can be divided into three main phases:

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50 BC-43 AD After 50 BC, when the Eastern client kingdom was becoming established (Creighton 2000), there was a shift in the alloys used to produce gold coinage. The original yellow-gold was replaced by more copper-rich red-gold alloys. These were produced through the dilution of highpurity gold bullion with a variable copper-silver alloy, giving a final composition of 40-50% gold, and a much redder colour (Northover 1992). By 20 BC, the yellow Gallic gold had been completely replaced by these redgold alloys, alongside the first major silver issues. These were the first coins of the Tasciovanan dynasty, which incorporated both Latin inscriptions and, later, increasingly classical imagery. Like the designs of the coins themselves, the refined gold used in their production most likely derived ultimately from the Roman world (Northover 1992). Creighton (2000) argues compellingly that this gold bullion arrived directly from Rome, as gifts to client kings. It seems likely that silver coinage was also produced from bullion of Roman origin (Farley 2012a; 2012b). During the client kingdom period, a new tri-metallic system of gold, silver, and copper-alloy coinage rapidly became established in the North Thames, in line with the emergence of a similar system in the Roman world. Local copper-alloy issues made up a high proportion of North Thames coinage. Though the proportional representation of metal types did not change, production increased in scale from 20 BC to 40 AD. This expansion in minting activity was no doubt supported by diplomatic gifts of Roman bullion. Only a very small proportion of known gold coins are plated examples, suggesting that the supply of bullion was reliable and plentiful enough to satisfy local demand.

shared symbolic language of value. After the conquest, the coinage in circulation would have been made up almost exclusively of imported Roman issues, produced at continental mints. The tri-metallic system was maintained, with Roman copper-alloy, silver and gold coins represented. The sharp apparent drop in finds of post-conquest copper-alloy coinage is largely a result of the nature of the dataset, with a much longer history of recording Iron Age finds through the CCI. Nevertheless, the pattern is marked, and cannot easily be dismissed. If Iron Age copper-alloy coins were being used for marketbased exchanges before 43 AD (Haselgrove 1987), there may have been a great scarcity of ‘small change’ in the early Roman period, not rectified until the 3rd century. It is possible that some Iron Age copper-alloy issues continued to circulate to fill this shortage in supply (Haselgrove 2006a), but they do not appear alongside Roman coins in hoard contexts. Coinage in the East Midlands: Production and circulation The Iron Age coinage which was produced and circulated in the East Midlands is known as the ‘North-Eastern’ series. The first synthesis of this series was provided by Allen (1963), and its phasing was also considered by Haselgrove (1987). More recently, Leins (2007; 2012a) has proposed modifications to Haselgrove’s dating (Appendix 3). Leins’ most significant proposal is a shorter period for inscribed coinage (15-25 years). This is based on the high proportions of uninscribed coins (70-90%) at many sites occupied close to the conquest period (e.g. Dragonby, Ancaster, Old Sleaford) (May 1992: 93-111; Leins 2012a), and the relative quantities of inscribed and uninscribed coins (around 77% of the North-Eastern coins listed on the CCI are uninscribed). The shorter period allocated to inscribed coinage does not allow time for a lengthy sequence of rulers to correspond to each type (as per Van Arsdell 1989), but Leins’ (2012a) analysis of the inscribed coins from Hallaton uncovered numerous incidences of production links, suggesting that many of the inscribed types were in fact issued contemporaneously. Paired names are also common, supporting the idea of contemporary rather than sequential production. The simultaneous production and circulation of many different types suggests that rather than the centralised control evident in the North Thames region, power in the East Midlands may have been more fluid and dispersed, with several coin issuing authorities in operation simultaneously. Only the IISVPRASV coinage appears notably later (Leins 2007; 2012a; Edwards and Dennis 2006), possibly representing a postconquest issue. Some post-conquest circulation (and possibly production) of VOLISIOS issues also occurred north of the Humber (Haselgrove 2006a).

Aside from the single stray find of a blank near the Thames, all coin production debris from the North Thames region comes from the major ‘royal complexes’ at St Albans/Verulamium, Braughing-Puckeridge and Colchester/Camulodunum (Leins 2012b). Leins argues that this suggests controlled and centralised production, associated with the emergence of the institution of kingship, and the rise of powerful rulers like Cunobelin. These ‘dynastic mints’ remained in operation right up until the Roman conquest, and perhaps in some cases beyond. Roman Republican denarii may have begun to circulate in the pre-conquest period, although the arrival of many of these coins at a later date is also likely: many remained in circulation until Nero’s coinage reforms, and the lowsilver Mark Anthony legionary issues persisted until the 3rd century (Orna-Ornstein 1997). c. 43 AD onwards Local coin production ceased shortly after the military annexation of the region, although some posthumous issues of Cunobelin may be post-conquest (Haselgrove 2006a). Iron Age coins retained some aspects of their value, and appear to have remained in circulation for at least thirty years. This may have been made possible by the close connection between North Thames Iron Age issues and Roman coins, which showed to some degree a

Fig. 3 summarises the stray and site finds of Iron Age coins from the East Midlands, as coins per year. The graph is given at the same scale as Fig. 2, to allow 44

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Fig. 3: East Midlands non-hoard coin finds as coins per year, coins dated to the period of their production (Total: 2688 coins). comparison with the North Thames region. The number of finds from the two regions suggests that Iron Age coin production levels were far lower in the East Midlands, largely due to the later beginnings of local production and the absence of copper-alloy issues.

south, near Stainton and Owmby. The fact that pellets and blanks are not restricted to any single site is unusual in Britain. This may have been a dispersed and decentralised period of production, with different stages of the minting process happening at different sites, or the products of the early stages may simply not have been as closely controlled as they were in the south.

Coin production in the East Midlands can be divided into four main phases. In the earliest period of coin importation and production, coin finds are centred on northern Lincolnshire, perhaps suggesting exploitation of the Humber as a route to maritime trade. Later, the balance of power began to shift, and coin supply to the south of the region increased. Closer ties to Rome emerged in Leicestershire and southern Lincolnshire, which bordered with the Roman client kingdoms further south. Pre-50-20 BC During this early period, only gold coinage was produced. Gold and potin coins were being imported to the region, probably through prestige exchange networks with Gallic elites and British communities further south. Alloy and weight standards suggest close early ties to the continent, and most likely a partly Gallic source for the metal. Blanks and coin pellets which appear to date to this period centre on northern Lincolnshire. The only pellet tray from this area (found at Scotton) is similar to continental examples, and may date to this early phase of production. No pellets or blanks were recovered at Scotton, but there are a number of finds from further

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20 BC-20/30 AD Gold production continued in this period, and the first silver coins were introduced. Production was most likely still quite decentralised, and may have remained focused on northern and mid-Lincolnshire. The same shift to redgold and silver issues that occurs in the North Thames region is also seen here. Alloy distributions suggest that (as in the client kingdoms to the south) these coins were being made from batches of gold and silver bullion, rather than simply recycled southern coins (Farley 2012a). This implies that East Midlands communities were part of a wider bullion exchange network which linked them to the Roman world, either directly or through southern British contacts. As in the North Thames region, this period also shows an increase in the number of coins lost or deposited. More ‘gold’ staters are known than for the preceding period, but in fact around half of these are plated. There is great debate over whether these represent unofficial forgeries intended to deceive, or official issues produced when the gold supply was limited (Cottam 2001). Some combination of the two is most likely but, official issues or not, people actively

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excluded plated coins from hoards. There was clearly great pressure on gold supplies in this period. The networks through which refined gold was now sourced may have provided insufficient material to meet demand for the new red-gold coins, and in fact the number of nonhoard finds of solid gold coins per year gradually falls from 20 BC onwards.

c. 43 AD onwards After the conquest, Roman coins replaced Iron Age issues, and local production gradually ceased. The ‘dumps’ of decommissioned coin pellet trays at the late Iron Age centres at Leicester (Clay and Mellor 1985) and Old Sleaford (Elsdon and Jones 1997) are found in the peri-conquest horizon. Although it is possible that IISVPRASV (and perhaps some VOLISIOS) issues postdate the conquest horizon, by-and-large Iron Age issues appear to drop out of circulation suddenly, and permanently. As in the North Thames region, Roman silver coins may have begun circulating before the military conquest, but such coins remain rare even in immediate post-conquest contexts. Quantities increase in the late 1st century and 2nd century, mirroring national trends. Only in the 2nd century, several generations after the conquest, do copper-alloy coins appear in higher quantities than silver, perhaps reflecting the use of coins in a greater proportion of commercial transactions. Creighton (1992) argued that British regions without local copper-alloy coinage were slower to adopt Roman copper-alloy issues, favouring silver, but PAS data has changed this picture: similar proportions of early Roman silver to copper are seen in the East Midlands and North Thames region (Figs. 2 and 3).

20/30-40 AD Gold and silver coinage both remained in production and circulation right up until the period of the Roman conquest. Local copper-alloy issues were never established, presumably reflecting a rejection of this material as inappropriate to local needs. Classical imagery was not adopted, but inscriptions were introduced, perhaps indicating increasingly close ties to the southern client kingdoms. This was a very loosely structured form of inscribed coinage, and a wide variety of types circulated simultaneously. Rather than following a Roman model, inscriptions were simple and often degenerated quickly into patterns, as on the ‘TATISOM’ issues (Leins 2012a). The die-designers may have been less concerned with inscribing a certain message or name than with demonstrating access to a particular form of knowledge. Whether the North-Eastern mints were sourcing their precious metals through the southern kingdoms or the Roman world, they recycled and reissued this bullion in their own style. The process of selective engagement with Roman coinage and Roman systems of value may have been an underlying cause of the development of diverse regional coinage systems in Britain after c.20 BC. During this immediate preconquest period, new systems of power and value were being negotiated, and coinage played an important role in these changes.

Overall, the pattern of Roman non-hoard coin finds is remarkably similar in both regions, although Roman gold coins from all periods are better represented in the North Thames. Despite these similarities in overall circulation patterns, there are surprising contrasts in the hoard evidence. Coins and hoarding Archaeologists tend to assume that prehistoric hoards were largely votive in nature and not intended for recovery (Bradley 1990). This is probably true of many Iron Age hoards, particularly those from ‘shrine’ sites such as Hallaton. In contrast, many Roman hoards are thought to have been buried for safekeeping. In these circumstances, peaks in hoarding evidence might represent times of social disruption when many hoards went uncollected and were forgotten, rather than periods when more hoards were buried (Reece 2002). In fact, these assumed differences in the underlying reasons for hoard deposition in the Iron Age and Roman periods remain unproven. In many cases it is not possible to discern the reasons for the burial of hoards, and whether changes reflect levels of hoarding, levels of non-recovery or (as seems likely) a combination of the two. For this reason, in the discussion which follows, I refer to peaks in hoard evidence rather than peaks in hoarding. However, the types, locations and sizes of hoards give a fuller picture, and where contextual information is available it is sometimes possible to make more definite assertions.

Two possible southern centres of production dating to the pre-conquest period have been identified at Old Sleaford and Leicester while, further north, production apparently continued in the form of the VOLISIOS issues. The paucity of stray blanks and pellets from this period suggests closer control of minting, implying that the rise of the two southern East Midlands mints may have coincided with increased centralisation and standardisation of production techniques. By the end of the period a large volume of bullion-based silver coinage was in circulation. The quantities involved, and the association of Roman objects with this silver at Hallaton, suggest increasingly close connections with the dynastic kingdoms of southern England, and perhaps direct contact with the Roman world. Yet while the southern East Midlands adopted many of the trappings of dynastic coin production, it never came fully in line with the dynastic mints. The coin series itself remained fragmented, with many inscribed types circulating simultaneously and no close control of bullion content or standardisation of design. The lack of clear archaeological evidence for ‘Royal’ complexes (although Lincoln and Leicester remain candidates) suggests that East Midlands communities never made the shift to a more centralised coin-producing ‘kingdom’.

Whilst hoard deposition was probably never an everyday occurrence in the Iron Age, in periods of dramatic social change it appears to have become a field of discourse through which political allegiances and new systems of 46

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

value were negotiated and reinforced. Aarts (2005: 23) has argued in the case of conquest-period Batavia that ‘changing patterns of deposition may perhaps be read as changes occurring in the articulation between the shortterm [i.e. commercial] and long-term [i.e. social or religious] transactional orders as a consequence of the integration of ‘native’ societies into the Roman Empire’. Thus the introduction of a market economy, and the increased association of coinage with commercial transactions, might be expected to reduce the use of coinage in ritual hoarding. However, in Britain at least, the situation appears more complex than this, with coinage continuing to circulate in a variety of different spheres, and for many different purposes. The ability to distinguish between long-term (social or religious) and short-term (commercial) spheres also depends on discerning the motivation behind the burial of hoards. In many cases, particularly where hoards are poorly reported, it is impossible to distinguish between a savings hoard and a ritual deposit.

on the dates of the latest coins, but activity at this site probably continued until much later (Leins 2012a). The data is divided in this way to aid comparison between the regions.{1} The trends in hoarding evidence which emerge are approximated by the following model (Farley 2012a):

I view changes in depositional practices as representing shifts in indigenous systems of value, and the roles deemed appropriate for coinage. I assume only that intentional deposition of a hoard represents an ascription of value to the contents. Rarely do hoards appear to represent dumps of casually discarded coins. The value of a hoard could have been conceptualised in terms of the social prestige associated with conspicuous consumption, the spiritual benefits of votive offering, or the financial protection of concealing valuable savings. In many cases it is not possible to discern which factors were most relevant. Nevertheless, if particular coin types or metal types appear to have been deliberately included or excluded from hoarding, or are frequently found in association together, this may reveal contemporary attitudes to the value and significance of these objects. The sections which follow consider the coin hoard evidence from the East Midlands and North Thames region (see Figs. 4 and 5). The North Thames region here refers to Oxfordshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Berkshire. The East Midlands refers to Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, North and North East Lincolnshire, and Rutland. Modern county boundaries were used not because these have any significance relating to the Iron Age, but because they provide an appropriate sample area of two regions with very different Iron Age social and political systems. A coin hoard is defined as an associated group of two or more coins, found in a sealed context or in sufficient proximity to suggest that they were deposited as a single event. Each group was considered individually, since (owing to the vagaries of taphonomic processes, and varied levels of recording) it was not possible to determine fixed criteria for factors such as distance between coins. The evidence is broken down into the periods shown in Appendix 2. The hoards terminate with issues of the period to which they are assigned, but could have been buried later. For example, many of the hoards from Hallaton are placed into the period 35-45 AD, based

•

Initiation: Following the appearance of a new form of coinage (innovative in terms of source, production, materials or denomination), these coins will most likely be found only in small hoards, at a restricted number of sites, perhaps representing a limited circulation.

•

Expansion and Experimentation: As the ‘new’ coinage moves into more widespread circulation, the hoard evidence suggests an expansion in both the variety and quantity of hoards, representing a period of creativity and experiment. In this period there may be a wider range of hoard sizes and locations, and more coins appear in hoard evidence. This is particularly likely if the period coincides with wider social changes. Where social upheaval was reflected by changes in coin production, coin hoarding may have become a field of discourse through which political allegiances and attitudes to value could have been displayed, negotiated or reinforced. In this case, this phase may be related to a period of ‘peak hoarding’.

•

Disruption and peak hoarding: This stage is generally precipitated by a change in the availability or social value ascribed to a form of coinage. This disruption may take the form of a change in coin issuing authorities and possibly a recall of the coinage in question. This will be associated with a boom in non-recovered coin hoards, which may be either sporadic (associated with an increased number of medium to large hoards across a variety of sites) or massive (bulk-hoarding of extremely large numbers of coins at a single site). There may be a combination of both sporadic and massive peakhoarding.

•

Decline: The peak hoarding period will be followed by the decline of the appearance of the coin type in question in the hoard evidence, and often a decline in the number of non-recovered hoards in general.

•

Response: As the volume of non-recovered hoards once again begins to increase, the response to the disruption in coinage supply/production/value will be in one of two forms: elastic or inelastic. (i) Elastic response: This tends to follow a sporadic peak-hoarding period. In the case of an elastic response, the coinage in question remains in circulation, appearing in later hoards in association with other forms of coinage. There appears to be some continuity in the value of

47

Julia Farley

particular metal types or coinage forms, and in the nature of hoarding practices. This leads to a subsequent phase of expansion and experimentation, again demonstrating creativity and change, but with some continuity with older practices.

150-80 BC Site

Thurrock, Essex

(ii) Inelastic response: In this case, the coinage in question appears to become permanently devalued, falling out of circulation altogether. This tends to follow a period of massive peakhoarding, with very large numbers of coins being deposited at a single site. Hoards/hoard groups of over 500 coins are known from two sites: Thurrock and Hallaton, in both cases in excess of 2000 coins. These clearly represent exceptional deposits and it is possible that both were associated with the coinage represented in the hoard falling out of use. There are no wellreported exceptionally large hoards consisting primarily of issues which continued to circulate as valuable objects in later periods (one possible exception is Whaddon Chase). This suggests that the phenomenon of bulk-hoarding may be associated with removing devalued coins from circulation. This may have been (directly or indirectly) the reason for burial, or the reason for subsequent non-recovery, but the treatment of coins at Hallaton in particular suggests that the coins retained a social value in the ritual sphere, rather than merely being discarded. After a period of apparent hiatus, later hoarding evidence shows a clear break with earlier traditions in terms of both site type and location, hoard size, and coin types selected for inclusion.

No. Iron Age Potin

Hoard Type

2150

Primary Potin

Context/ Site Type

Published Reference(s)

Hillside

Haselgrove 1989: 27; Van Arsdell 1989: 542 no.92

Table 1: Potin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 150-80 BC Primary potins may have been frequently selected for votive deposition, with just 14% of known coins being site finds (Haselgrove 2006b). At Thurrock, a large spread of over 2000 Kentish Primary potins was found by a metal-detectorist. The full range of types, including the latest varieties, is represented in the hoard. The main area of circulation of these coins is further south, in Kent, but although the coins had travelled some distance, the protruding flash on one coin suggested it had only recently been cast (Van Arsdell 1989: 320). The deposition of this wide range of coins at the edge of their circulation area suggests that this hoard may coincide with the end of Primary potin production. 80-50 BC Site

Takeley, Essex

This model is explored using three case studies: • Iron Age potin in the North Thames region (inelastic response) • Iron Age precious metal and copper-alloy coinage in the North Thames region (elastic response) • Iron Age precious metal coinage in the East Midlands (inelastic response)

No. Iron Age Potin

Hoard Type

51

Flat Linear Potin

Context/ Site Type

Published Reference(s)

Settlement

Havis and Brooks 2004; Van Arsdell and Northover 2004

Table 2: Potin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 80-50 BC A hoard of 51 potins from Takeley (Table 2) was found in the fill of a roundhouse gully in a small defended settlement, thought to have been occupied c.75-25 BC (Havis and Brooks 2004: 99, 102-4). Six are known Kentish Class II varieties. The others resemble Class I issues, but are the size of Class II potins; these unique coins may have been locally produced (Haselgrove 2006b). Hoards of Flat Linear II coins are rare, with only one other known (New Addington). Whilst the majority of Primary potins were hoard coins, or found in rural areas with no evidence for occupation, the Flat Linear series are more commonly found on settlements. Flat Linear II coins in particular cluster around nucleated settlements (Haselgrove 2006b). Collis (1974) suggested that over time the value of potin may have declined from a high-value issue associated with contemporary gold coinage, to a low-value medium akin to small change. The picture is evidently complex (and may be partly due to chronological factors: Haselgrove 2006b) but it appears potin did become devalued.

Iron Age potin hoards in the North Thames region Only two potin hoards (Tables 1 and 2) are known from the North Thames, which was at the edge of the main circulation areas of many potin issues. These hoards probably represent local experimentation with the uses of these early coins. The first potins, Kentish Primaries, probably circulated as a high-value coinage, perhaps moving through the same networks of exchange as gold issues. This pattern changes after the mid-1st century BC, with the later Flat Linear potins (divided into Class I and Class II) seeming to represent a lower value coinage. The very large hoard from Thurrock is highly unusual, and may be associated with this apparent crash in the social value of potins.

48

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Fig. 4: Iron Age and Early Roman coin hoard periods for the North Thames region, as coins per year. Note the different scale to Fig. 6. (Total: 6852 coins). With only two recorded potin deposits in the North Thames region, it is not possible to untangle discrete phases in the hoard evidence. However, the massive peak-hoarding at Thurrock, near the end of Primary potin production in Kent, may have been associated with a crash in the value of potin coinage. These coins are found outside their main range of circulation and some do not seem to have been in circulation for long. Later coins are more common as site finds, and may not have circulated in the same prestige exchange sphere, although they do appear in the much smaller hoard at Takeley, perhaps representing local experimentation with the uses of early coinage.

alloy coins do not appear again in hoards until the 1st century AD, when they represent low-value issues. Iron Age precious metal & copper-alloy coinage in the North Thames region The patterns of hoard evidence seen in the North Thames region are summarised by period in Fig. 4. In the main periods of circulation of Iron Age coinage, there are two peaks in the hoard evidence. The first is towards the end of the period 80-50 BC, around the time the Eastern client kingdom was being established in the region. The 2nd is around the time of the conquest, 35-45 AD. In both of these periods, coins from hoards terminating in the period outnumber stray and site finds of coins produced in the same date range (Fig. 5). This suggests that hoarding was an important form of social engagement with coinage during these periods, which were times of major social upheaval. The use of coins in hoarding practices continued in the early Roman period, and I will argue below that similarities in depositional practices suggest an elastic response to the conquest, with Roman coins taking on many of the functions of their Iron Age predecessors.

The nature of the disruption which triggered the crash in potin value is unclear, but a candidate may be found in the beginnings of insular gold production. This began around 80 BC, just as the high-value Primary potin coins favoured for deposition were falling out of production. It is possible that, as large quantities of local gold issues became available, potins became less desirable. Whilst potins could be produced from widely available copperalloys, using traditional casting techniques, insular gold issues would have demonstrated access to quantities of Gallo-Belgic gold, and also the skill and expertise needed to work with this new material. Potin, it appears, could not compete. In this case, the response was inelastic. Potin coins fell out of circulation permanently. Copper49

Julia Farley

Initiation: 150-80 BC Site

No. Iron Age Potin

Hoard Type

Henley, Oxon 1992

3

Norton, Essex

2

Context/ Site Type

Published Reference(s)

IA Gold

Findspot unknown

IA Gold

Findspot unknown

BNJ Coin Register 1992: nos.35; Sills 2003: 364 no.29

visibly distinguishable from their predecessors, and would have reflected the social networks in which their owners were enmeshed. If coinage had become a more politically volatile material, it is unsurprising that this might be reflected in increased levels of hoarding, not just an increase in the numbers of unrecovered hoards. After this phase, red-gold coinage (probably produced from Roman gold bullion, see Northover 1992; Creighton 2000) came into circulation, alongside the first silver issues. Patterns of deposition once again shifted. Decline:

N/A

50-20 BC Only one hoard terminating in this period is known in the North Thames region: a group of eight gold staters of Commios (a southern ruler), representing some of the earliest inscribed insular issues (Table 5). The hoarding of coins issued by a Roman client king reinforces the impression of close ties between the North Thames region and the Roman world. The paucity of known hoards suggests that the earlier period of upheaval and increased hoarding (or non-recovery) had run its course. Although single finds of staters remain relatively common, the absence of hoards of local coins perhaps suggests that the new red-gold and silver coinage was not immediately incorporated into established patterns of hoarding.

Table 3: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 150-80 BC Only two small hoards terminate with Gallo-Belgic gold issues imported c.150-80 BC (Table 3). The small size of these hoards contrasts with the vast contemporary potin deposit from Thurrock, emphasising the value and rarity of gold. Nevertheless, the paucity of known hoards suggests that gold coins did not yet function as an important medium for wealth storage or conspicuous consumption. Expansion and experimentation; peak hoarding: 80-50 BC As in the preceding phase, the earliest hoards (Shefford, Great Baddow and St. Lawrence Bay) are all small hoards of gold staters. A much larger number of hoards are known from during or shortly after the mid-1st century BC, when the earliest local gold coins were perhaps being recalled and reminted as the first dynastic issues (Table 4). This period also shows a peak in the number of single gold coin finds (compare Figs. 2 and 4). The later hoards are more varied in their composition and landscape locations, and cover a broader geographic range, suggesting an expansion in the nature of hoarding practices. All are gold hoards, with quarter staters represented for the first time. The hoards vary in size, from just two coins at Clapham to over 400 at Whaddon Chase. Whaddon Chase may in fact have been a much larger find; Evans (1864: 75) suggests as many as 2000 coins, but this may be too high (de Jersey, pers. comm.).

Elastic response; Second phase of expansion and experimentation: 20 BC-10 AD Seven hoards terminate with the first North Thames inscribed issues of Dubnovellaunos, Addedomarus, Tasciovanus and Rues (Table 6). The variety of types, sizes and locations is almost comparable to the mid-1st century BC, and six are hoards of British gold staters (generally small to medium in size). This suggests that the alloy shift and the establishment of new, centrallycontrolled coin-issuing authorities had not permanently affected the value or social function of gold coinage (an elastic response). The final hoard, St. Albans, is the first hoard of copperalloy coins since the 1st century BC potins. This group of ten copper-alloy coins of Rues was found with a cremation burial at King Harry Lane cemetery (associated with the contemporary settlement at Verulamium) dated 1-40 AD (Stead and Rigby 1989: 354, 84), and may represent the contents of a purse. The evidence from this cemetery (including imported vessels and other objects) suggests close contact with Rome, so it is unsurprising to see new forms of coin-use represented.

This peak in hoarding evidence could simply be due to the fact that more hoards went unrecovered, possibly due to loss of value if they contained the earlier types which had been recalled. However, this would not explain the increased diversity of hoard sizes and locations, nor the number of hoards containing the new, reissued gold coinage (British L and Q), which continued to circulate after this period. Hoarding patterns may have shifted partly in response to changes in the meaning and value of coinage. The rise of new issuing authorities with the power to recall and remint earlier issues suggests major upheaval in local power structures. In this period of rapid social change, hoarding may have provided a field of discourse through which political allegiances and new systems of value could be negotiated, challenged or reinforced. The new coins issued by this mint were

The new metal, silver, may not yet have been incorporated into traditional hoarding practices, perhaps not being considered suitable for wealth storage or votive offerings. Silver may at first have occupied an ambiguous position in the new systems of value which were being created through the colonial encounter. 50

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Site

No. GalloBelgic (A-D)

Shefford, Beds

2

No. Early British Gold (A-K)

No. GalloBelgic E

No. Later British Gold (Q, L)

TOTAL IRON AGE GOLD

Context/ Site Type

Published Reference(s)

2

Findspot unknown

Sills 2003: 250 no.51

Great Baddow, Essex

4

4

Findspot unknown

N/A

St Lawrence Bay, Essex

3

3

Coastal

N/A

1

118

Just off brow of low hill near stream/river

Sills 2003: 361-2, no.24

34

128

Coastal

33

40

Just off brow of low hill near stream/river

16

17

Low ground, near river (concealed in flint nodule)

Clapham, Beds

2

2

Low ground, near river

Southend Sea, Essex

33

33

Settlement

4

4

Coastal

Great Waltham 1996 / Great Dunmow, Essex

117

Clacton, Essex 1898

5

Great Essex

7

Leighs,

Harpsden, Oxon

West Essex

89

1

on

Mersea,

Marks Tey, Essex 1803

1

Low ground, less than 10km west of large settlement at Colchester Low ground, near river

1

5

4

2

6

33

25

58

Hillside

394+

398+

Just off brow of moderate hill

32

32

Hillside

Hampstead Norreys, Berks

3

3

Findspot unknown

Maidenhead, Bucks

5

5

Findspot unknown

Westbury, Bucks

41

41

Just off brow of low hill near stream/river

Whaddon Chase, Bucks Henley, 2003

4+

Oxon

Sills 2003: 363, no.25 Haselgrove 1987: 282 no.38; Burnett and Cowell 1988: 4-6, no.1; Van Arsdell 1989: 540 no.80; Sills 2003: 363 no.27 Burnett and Cowell 1988: 6, no.2; Haselgrove 1989: 12 Cowell et al. 1987: 2, no.1; Haselgrove 1989: 12; Van Arsdell 1989: 541 no.33 N/A

3

Sulhamstead, Berks Bracknell, Berks

Allen 1960: 287 no.13; Haselgrove 1987: 272 no.6; Van Arsdell 1989: 535 no.45; Sills 2003: 357 no.14

Allen 1960: 288 no.14; Haselgrove 1987: 274 no.12; Van Arsdell 1989: 528 no.6 N/A TAR 1997-98: 26 no.112 Allen 1960: 288 no.16; Haselgrove 1987: 271 no.4; Van Arsdell 1989: 530 no.21; NC 167 (2007): 244 no.5; NC 168 (2008): 383 no.2 PAS Annual Report 2003/04: 48; TAR 2003: 150-1 no.349 Haselgrove 1989: 25; Bean 2000: 278 no.30 Haselgrove 1987: 269 no.1; Bean 2000: 268 no.7 TAR 1997-1998: 24 no.108; TAR 1998-99: 100-1 no.266; TAR 2001: 90 no.175

Table 4: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 80-50 BC, all are hoards of Iron Age gold coins Site Faringdon, Oxon

No. Iron Age Potin 8

Hoard Type IA Gold

Context/ Site Type Hillside

Table 5: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 50-20 BC

51

Published Reference(s) N/A

Julia Farley

Site

No. IA Gold

Clacton, Essex 1905 Heybridge (near Maldon), Essex Little Bromley, Essex Little Totham, Essex High Wycombe, Bucks

Hoard Type

Context/ Site Type

6

IA Gold

Coastal

5

IA Gold

By a spring

19

IA Gold

Low ground, 10km east of large settlement - Colchester

2

IA Gold

Just off brow of low hill

11

St. Albans, Herts Marks Tey, Essex 1807

No. IA Copper-alloy

10

?

IA Gold

Hillside (concealed in flint nodule)

IA Copper-alloy

Cremation burial, immediately adjacent to Verulamium

IA Gold

Low ground, less than 10km west of large settlement at Colchester

Published Reference(s) Allen 1960: 291 no.21a; Haselgrove 1987: 272 no.7; Sills 2003: 358 no.15 TAR 1998-99: 101-2 no.269; TAR 2003: 151 no.350 NC 166 (2006): 365 no.4 N/A Allen 1960: 292 no.26; Haselgrove 1987: 270-271 no.3; Van Arsdell 1989: 529 no.10 Haselgrove 1987: 277 no.21; Stead and Rigby 1989: 354, fig. 154 Haselgrove 1987: 273 no.9

Table 6: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 20 BC-10 AD Further expansion and experimentation; Disruption; Peak hoarding:

consist predominantly of Iron Age gold issues but terminate with

10-40 AD This was a period of further expansion and experimentation in the coin types selected for inclusion in hoards (Table 7). Precious metals predominate. Six gold hoards range from small to large, and the first mixed gold-silver groups appear: five hoards, again varying in size. The Grove hoard contained a single Roman Republican denarius alongside nine gold staters of Cunobelin, highlighting ties to Rome. There is also one copper-alloy hoard from Sheepen (Colchester 1930), and a mixture of copper-alloy, silver and gold coins from close to the Balkerne Lane Temple site (Colchester 1835). The very mixed nature of the latter assemblage suggests it may represent an accumulated deposit at a temple rather than a single hoard. Again a variety of areas, site types and landscape locations are represented, with a total of four hoards from at or near the major centre at Colchester (Marks Tey 1843, Colchester 1835, 1930 and 1980). The two Hertfordshire hoards (Berkhamstead, Wheathampstead) are both located on hillsides or just below the brow of a hill close to a river.

Roman denarii. Weeley is a small hoard of just seven coins, whereas a total of over 250 have been unearthed at Essendon. Both have unusually varied compositions. Essendon, in particular, probably consists of at least three separate hoards, perhaps as many as nine (BM records; Stead et al. 2006), and may represent a long-lived shrine site. It is included here because of the nature of the Iron Age composition. Iron Age silver coins, which had previously been hoarded alongside gold, are notably absent from these later hoards. This suggests that some of their social functions may already have been supplanted by Roman silver issues. The 18 hoards terminating 10-45 AD represent an expansion of hoarding practices, both in the types represented and the range of locations, with an increasing focus on areas around the settlement centres (and minting sites) at Colchester and Verulamium. This increase in the level of hoarding evidence may reflect the disruption of the Roman conquest. Coinage once again became a politically charged material, which would have represented not only personal or communal wealth, but also the social networks in which individuals and communities were enmeshed. However, despite the increasing predominance of Roman issues, there is no sea-change in hoarding practices. This peak-hoarding period is sporadic, characterised by increasing numbers of medium to large hoards, rather than vast hoards at single sites.

30-45 AD All hoards terminating in this period close with preClaudian Roman imperial coins (Table 8). It should be noted that in some cases these hoards could in fact have been buried later, since denarii were not struck again in significant quantities until Nero’s reform of 64 AD (Orna-Ornstein 1997). This is particularly true of the hoards from Ayot St. Lawrence, Woodham Mortimer and Mersea Island, which do not include Iron Age issues and instead consist purely of Roman silver. The other two hoards (Weeley and Essendon), both hillside locations, 52

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Site

No. Roman Silver

No. Iron Age Coins

Total

Hoard Type

Context/ Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published Reference(s)

Wallingford. Oxon

21 (gold)

21

IA Gold

Findspot unknown

N/A

Wheathampstead Herts

5 (gold); 6 (silver)

11

IA Gold/ Silver

Hillside near river, north of oppidum

Allen 1960: 290 no.18a; Haselgrove 1987: 282-3 no.39; Bean 2000: 269 no.13

N/A

N/A

N/A

Allen 1960: 292 no.27; Haselgrove 1987: 274-5 no.13; Van Arsdell 1989: 530 no.19

Marks Tey, Essex 1843

9 (gold)

9

IA Gold

Less than 10km west of large settlement Colchester

Berkhamsted, Herts

71 (gold); 48 (silver)

119

IA Gold/ Silver

On ridge below brow of hill, above river

N/A

TAR 1998-99: 102 no. 271

Colchester, Essex 1980

6 (gold)

6

IA Gold

Large settlement Colchester

N/A

N/A

Epping Forest, Essex

12 (gold)

12

IA Gold

On or near hillfort

N/A

Great Waltham, Essex 1999

36 (gold)

36

IA Gold

Low ground, near stream

N/A

92 (gold) 1 (gold); 1 (silver) 25 (gold); 15 (silver); 10 (copper alloy)

92

IA Gold IA Gold/ Silver

Findspot unknown

N/A

Findspot unknown

N/A

50

IA Gold/ Silver/ Copper-alloy

Large settlement at Colchester. Temple site?

N/A

Allen 1960: 292 no.28; Haselgrove 1987: 272-3 no.8

Large settlement, Colchester (Sheepen)

N/A

Hawkes and Hull 1947: 101, 140; Haselgrove 1987: 370 no.37; ibid.: 273-4 no.10

Reading, Berks Ardleigh, Essex Colchester, Essex 1835

2

Haselgrove 1987: 274 no.11 TAR 2001: 90 no.178; de Jersey and Wickenden 2004 Bean 2000: 279 no.33 NC 165 (2005): 305 no.21

Colchester, Essex 1930

10 (copper alloy)

10

IA Copperalloy

Winslow, Bucks

17 (gold); 9 (silver)

26

IA Gold/ Silver

Findspot unknown

N/A

NC 169 (2009): 333 no.10

Grove, Oxon

9 (gold)

10

IA Gold/ Roman Silver

Low ground, near stream

Mark Anthony

NC 166 (2006): 304 no.15

1

Table 7: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 10-40 AD

Weeley, Essex

4

3

7

Essendon, Herts

254

4

258

Ayot St. Lawrence, Herts

230

230

Roman Silver

Mersea Island, Essex

5

5

Roman Silver

Coastal

Tiberius

NC 160 (2000): 312 no.19

Woodham Mortimer, Berks

189

189

Roman Silver

Low ground, near stream

Gaius

Robertson 2000: 3, no.14A

Silver

No. Roman

Site

No. Iron Age Gold

Total

Hoard Type IA Gold/ Roman Silver IA Gold/ Roman Silver

Context/ Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published Reference(s)

Hillside

Tiberius

NC 165 (2005): 303, no.11

Unknown

Sills 2003: 360 no.21

Tiberius

Robertson 2000: 3, no.11

Hillside- shrine site? Low ground, 10km north-east of large settlement at Verulamium

Table 8: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 30-45 AD 53

Julia Farley

Site

No. Roman Copperalloy

Hoard Type

Context/ Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published Reference(s)

Colchester, Essex 1866

36

Roman Copper-alloy

Cemetery, Colchester

Claudius

Robertson 2000, 5, no. 18

Colchester, Essex 1926

27

Roman Copper-alloy

Large settlement - Colchester

Claudius

Robertson 2000: 5, no. 19

Colchester, Essex 1965

4

Roman Copper-alloy

Large settlement - Colchester

Claudius

Robertson 2000: 5-6, no. 20

Minster Lovell. Oxon

24

Roman Copper-alloy

Low ground, adjacent to river

Claudius

Robertson 2000: 7, no. 26

Table 9: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 41-54 AD

Site

Waltham St. Lawrence, Berks

No. Iron Age Gold

56

No. Iron Age Silver

119

No. Roman Silver

21

Total

Hoard Type

Context/ Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published Reference(s)

196

IA Gold/ IA Silver/ Roman Silver

Hillside shrine? Near Roman Temple site

Civil War, 69 AD

Van Arsdell 1989: 545 no. 96; Burnett 1990; Robertson 2000: 37 no. 186A; Sills 2003: 386 no. 65

Table 10: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 54-69 AD Decline in precious metal hoard evidence; Elastic response with copper-alloy issues:

Roman Temple at Weycock Hill. The burial of preciousmetal coinage at a possible temple site has echoes of Iron Age hoards such as those from Essendon. The hoard mixes earlier Iron Age types with later inscribed types, predominantly Verica and Epaticcus, and Roman coins. The Iron Age composition is not unprecedented; a similar (although much smaller) group of Iron Age coins was recovered on the coast of Selsey, West Sussex, in 1986 (Bone and Burnett 1986), and a similar group including Roman issues has been reported from a temple site at Wanborough, Surrey (Haselgrove 2005b; Cheesman 1994). At both Waltham St. Lawrence and Wanborough, it is possible that these represent a sequence of deposits at long-lived ritual sites. For the first time in any North Thames hoard, silver issues predominate. Gold had always made up the bulk of Iron Age hoards, and this new emphasis on silver may represent a shift towards a more ‘Roman’ system of value. This idea is strengthened when it is considered that some of the silver hoards terminating with issues of Gauis and Tiberius were, as noted above, possibly buried as late as the Neronian period.

41-54 AD Included here are hoards which close with Roman Claudian issues (Table 9). Again, there is some overlap with the preceding period. All four examples are small to medium copper-alloy hoards. The apparent hiatus in precious-metal hoarding is potentially deceptive. Claudian silver is rare in Britain, and the hoards closing with pre-Claudian denarii (included in the previous phase) could have been deposited at any time up to the Flavian period (Orna-Ornstein 1997). Three copper-alloy hoards (Colchester 1826, 1926, 1965) are settlement or cemetery finds from Colchester. This represents continuity with Iron Age practices: the two known Iron Age copper-alloy hoards were also small deposits at large settlement centres (Sheepen: Hawkes and Hull 1947: 101, 140; St. Albans: Stead and Rigby 1989: 354). This suggests an elastic response to the introduction of a new form of low-value copper-alloy coinage, with copper-alloy coins retaining a similar value and social role across the conquest period.

The association of Iron Age and Roman coins at Waltham St. Lawrence is suggestive. Across the client kingdoms and East Anglia, Iron Age coins (particularly preciousmetal issues) may have remained in circulation (or at least safekeeping) for more than a generation after the Claudian invasion (Dennis 2006; Creighton 1992). These coins continued to be deployed in similar social contexts, in this case possibly as a votive offering. The association with Roman coins at several sites suggests that these

Elastic response in precious metal hoarding evidence: 54-69 AD Only one hoard from the North Thames region closes with Neronian issues (Table 10). It is a very unusual case, and comes from the south-western edge of the study region. This is the hoard from Waltham St. Lawrence (Burnett 1990), discovered slightly to the west of the 54

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Site

Roman Gold

Shillington A, Beds

127

Roman Silver

Roman Copperalloy

Total

Type

Context/ Site Type

127

Roman Gold

Shrine site? On springline below scarp Findspot unknown

Hemel Hempstead, Herts

19

19

Roman Silver

St. Albans, Herts

4?

4?

Roman Silver(?)

Bedford, Beds

2

2

Verulamium 1957, Herts

3

3

Roman Silver Roman Copperalloy

Cemetery, adjacent to Verulamium Low ground, near river Large settlement Verulamium

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published Reference(s)

Domitian

CHRB XI, 65

Vespasian

Robertson 2000: 13-14, no. 67

Domitian

Robertson 2000: 18, no. 93

Titus

Robertson 2000: 17, no. 87

Titus

Robertson 2000: 17, no. 88

Table 11: Coin hoards from the North Thames region terminating 69-96 AD deposits represent the meaningful deposition of valuable objects, rather than merely disposing of coinage that was no longer ‘legal tender’. Continuity in hoarding practices in southern Britain also implies that here some of the social functions of Iron Age precious metal coinage were transferred to Roman issues.

The early Roman period in the North Thames region shows continuity in precious-metal and copper-alloy hoarding practices in terms of both the metal types and locations selected for acts of deposition. As in other parts of southern Britain, Iron Age coins remained in circulation long after the region was annexed. Even after Iron Age coins ceased to be deposited alongside Roman issues, Roman coins themselves were incorporated into practices reminiscent of Iron Age hoarding, as at Shillington. This suggests that the values associated with particular types of coin remained constant, an elastic response to the upheaval of the conquest and the introduction of Roman coinage. This is perhaps to be expected in a region which had been using a tri-metallic system of coinage, incorporating Classical imagery and inscriptions, for over half a century. Although Roman coins were not local products, they were probably not unfamiliar in appearance. North Thames issues had been centrally produced at the two mints at Verulamium and Colchester since the beginnings of the Tasciovanan dynasty, c. 50 BC. Coin supply was probably already controlled by a Roman-oriented elite, even in the late 1st century BC, and there seems to have been a high degree of continuity in symbolic languages of power across the conquest (Creighton 2006). The response was very different in the East Midlands.

69-96 AD Hoards terminating in the Flavian period and beyond contain only Roman issues (Table 11). However, continuity in hoarding practices remains. The small Flavian copper-alloy hoard from Verulamium fits with established patterns of copper-alloy deposition (small groups at urban sites). Silver is also represented, with three small to medium hoards of denarii (at Hemel Hempstead, Bedford and St. Albans). With silver there is a greater degree of experiment and expansion in hoard contexts and types. The 19 denarii from Hemel Hempstead are an unremarkable deposit, in keeping with earlier traditions. The small hoard from St. Albans, however, contained at least one denarius, and was found in a child’s grave at St. Stephen’s cemetery near King Harry Lane (Frere et al. 1985: 293). This represents the first time that silver coinage appears in such a context, where previously only copper-alloy was used. This may reflect the incorporation of silver into the same sphere of day-to-day transactions that most likely characterised the use of copper-alloy coins (although the first definite example of a mixed hoard is in the Hadrianic period, at Wendlebury, Oxon). The third and final silver hoard, two Flavian coins from near Bedford, was found in association with a possibly 2nd-century gold ring, so may in fact have been deposited slightly later. There is also a Flavian gold hoard of 127 Roman aurei from Shillington (Curteis and Burleigh 2002, 65). This appears to be a hillside shrine site, perhaps comparable to Waltham St. Lawrence. The site also produced an Iron Age mirror, and a later hoard (or hoards) of Roman denarii, terminating in the Hadrianic period. It appears that in this region gold as well as silver (now in the form of Roman aurei and denarii), remained suitable as a form of wealth storage and votive offering.

Iron Age precious metal coinage in the East Midlands As in the North Thames region, hoarding and deposition was an important form of engagement with Iron Age coinage in the East Midlands. Peaks in the hoard evidence seem to coincide with times when coinage became a socially and politically weighted material. The first small peak (Figs. 5 and 6) is around the mid-1st century BC, when local gold coin production begins. This most likely post-dates the first peak in coin hoard evidence in the North Thames region, which there seems to be associated with the creation of a client kingdom. East Midlands coin production appears to have been particularly dispersed in this early period, and production and consumption of coinage may have become a vehicle for elite competition. This small early peak in the hoard 55

Julia Farley

evidence is dwarfed by the dramatic peak around the time of the conquest, with hoard coins accounting for the vast majority of all coin finds. Many of these hoards are from the hilltop shrine site at Hallaton. The hoard coins from Hallaton are considered in terms of broad groups: the ditch deposits, the helmet deposits, and the entranceway deposits. Unstratified coins post-dating the latest securely provenanced hoard coin (an 41/2 AD issue of Claudius) were excluded. This grouping of the hoards is an attempt to make the site at Hallaton comparable to other less well recorded groups such as Essendon and Waltham St. Lawrence, without losing all of the nuances of the evidence. The immediate post-conquest period sees a sharp post-conquest drop-off in the hoard evidence. This is in stark contrast to the North Thames region, where coin hoarding continues in a similar form into the Roman period. The evidence from the two regions only begins to come into closer line in the 2nd century AD (Fig. 5, and compare Figs. 4, 6 and 7).

finds of earlier imports. This expansion in deposition may be due to changes in hoarding practices, or simply the wider availability of gold coinage. Whatever the case, it appears that locally-produced coinage was preferred for deposition. In this earliest period of decentralised production, it is possible that both coin production and consumption of coins through hoarding became a field of competition between local elites, perhaps explaining the increased number of coins entering the archaeological record.

Site

Scartho, Lincs

No. Iron Age Gold

6

Hoard Type

Context/ Site Type

Published reference(s)

IA Gold

Low ground, near South Humber shore

Allen 1960: 288 no. 15; Haselgrove 1987: 323 no. 67; Van Arsdell 1989: 532 no. 31

Initiation: 80-50 BC Site

Bonby, Lincs Peatling, Leics

Grimsby, Lincs

No. Iron Age Gold

Hoard Type

17

IA Gold

10

6

IA Gold

IA Gold

Context/Site Type Western edge of Wolds, findspot unknown. Low ground near stream/river

Low ground, near South Humber shore

Published reference(s)

Broadholme Lincs

4

IA Gold

Kirmington, Lincs

8

IA Gold

Nettleton, Lincs

10

IA Gold

South Carlton, Lincs

39

IA Gold

N/A

N/A Allen 1960: 287 no. 7; Haselgrove 1987: 323 no. 63; Van Arsdell 1989, 539 no. 68

Table 12: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 80-50 BC

Low ground near stream/ri ver, just west of Lincoln Low ground in Wolds, findspot unknown Hillside? Wolds, findspot unknown Low ground near stream/ri ver, just north of Lincoln

NC 168 (2008): 383, no. 1

N/A

N/A

TAR 19971998: 24-6 no. 109

Table 13: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 50-20 BC

While in the North Thames region we see a period of expansion and peak-hoarding in the mid-1st century BC, in the East Midlands this is a period of initiation, with only three small to medium hoards, consisting exclusively of imported Gallo-Belgic E staters, a total of 33 coins (Table 12). This represents around 70% of gold coins known from this period, suggesting that deposition was an important aspect of early coin-use.

20 BC-10 AD The paucity of hoards from this period (Table 14) may reflect a period of disruption surrounding the introduction of the new metals (red-gold and silver), although it seems that both were subsequently incorporated into existing hoarding practices. The hoard from Stixwould and Woodhall is the first bi-metallic group. The increased number of single and site finds in comparison to the preceding period suggests that the use and circulation of coins may have been expanding at this time, even if this is not reflected in the hoard evidence: over two hundred single gold staters are known from this period, some of which may represent intentional deposits.

Expansion and Experimentation: 50-20 BC Five East Midlands hoards terminate with issues dated to 50-20 BC (Table 13). All are small to medium hoards of gold staters. Scartho combines North Thames L and Q issues with Gallo-Belgic E; the other hoards consist exclusively of local issues. In addition to these hoards, there are around 150 single finds of early North-Eastern gold staters, which are much more common than single 56

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Site

No. Iron Age Gold

No. Iron Age Silver

Total

Hoard Type

Context/Site Type

Published reference(s)

Stixwould and Woodhall, Lincs

14

2

16

IA Gold/ IA Silver

Near river, Clay Vale

NC 169 (2009): 332, no. 8

Ludborough, Lincs

2

2

IA Gold

Low ground near stream/river, eastern edge of Wolds

N/A

Table 14: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 20 BC-10 AD

Site

No. Iron Age Gold

Sibsey/ Box, Lincs hoard

No. Iron Age Silver

No. Iron Age Copperalloy

Total

Hoard Type

Context/Site Type

Published reference(s)

131

131

IA Gold

Hillside, near fen edge

N/A

Meden Vale, Notts

2

2

IA Gold

Langworth, Lincs

1

5

IA Gold/ IA Silver

Whaplode Drove, Lincs

20

20

IA Gold

Hallaton, Lincs – Ditch

2

139

IA Gold/ IA Silver/ IA Copperalloy/

4

136

1

Hillside/ low ground near river, findspot unknown Low ground near stream/river, just east of Lincoln Low ground, near fen edge Shrine site, just off brow of hill.

N/A N/A TAR 2000: 109 no. 234 Leins 2012a

Table 15: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 10-40 AD

Site

No. Iron Age Gold

No. Iron Age Silver

Partney, Lincs

7

South Ferriby, Lincs

81

Kirmond Le Mire, Lincs

1

Total

Hoard Type

Context/Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published reference(s)

75

82

IA Gold/ IA Silver

Hillside, possible shrine site

N/A

Chadburn 2006: Appendix H, hoard 7

86

167

IA Gold/ IA Silver

Riverside (S. Humberside)

N/A

35

IA Gold/ IA Silver

Hillside? Wolds. Findspot unknown

Allen 1960: 293 no. 32; Allen 1963: 45; Van Arsdell 1989: 536 no. 48

N/A

N/A

Shrine site, just off brow of hill

Tiberius

Leins 2012a

Shrine site, just off brow of hill

Tiberius

Leins 2012a

Shrine site, just off brow of hill

Claudius (41/42)

Leins 2012a

Low ground near stream/river

Tiberius

NC 168 (2008): 385, no. 9

No. Roman Silver

34

Hallaton, Leics: Helmet

22

1120

26

1168

Hallaton, Leics: Other, unstratified

53

1616

91

1760

Hallaton, Leics: Entranceway

42

1956

29

2027

22

22

Warsop, Notts

IA Gold/ IA Silver/ Roman silver IA Gold/ IA Silver/ Roman silver IA Gold/ IA Silver/ Roman silver Roman Silver

Table 16: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 30-45 AD

57

Julia Farley

Fig. 5: The % of coin finds from hoards. This graph compares the numbers of coins from hoards terminating in each period to the number stray and site finds produced over the same date range. This is a highly simplified scheme designed merely for comparative purposes. Many of the non-hoard coins will inevitably have been deposited long after their production, but evidence for date of deposition is often unavailable for single finds.

Fig. 6: Iron Age and Early Roman coin hoard periods for the East Midlands, as coins per year. Note the different scale to Fig. 4. (Total: 7684 coins).

58

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Massive peak hoarding around the conquest

suggests that the dramatic deposition events may have been a way to celebrate (or attempt to control) new social connections and sources of power and wealth. Objects such as the Roman silver-plated cavalry helmet and cheek pieces may represent diplomatic gifts from envoys to local elites. Incorporating these objects into an exaggerated form of existing hoarding practices was perhaps a way of neutralising, as well as publically recognising, the foreign influence of these exotic objects. The complex relationship between precious metals and power networks appears to have been coming to a head as people struggled to adjust to the massive social upheaval around the time of the conquest. Power-bases were shifting, and the role played by local coinage in negotiating power and authority in fluid and competitive Iron Age social structures peaked and then rapidly receded as Roman authority took hold.

10-40 AD Five hoards terminate with issues of this period (Table 15). Two of the three gold hoards (Sibsey and Meden Vale) terminate early, containing only uninscribed issues. The other hoards terminate with inscribed coins. By the time inscriptions were introduced, silver was a wellestablished medium of value and wealth storage, predominating in both of the mixed-metal hoards. These include the ditch deposits at Hallaton (assigned to this period due to the absence of denarii and ISSVPRASV issues; the two republican denarii of Mark Anthony reported from one of the ditch fills at Hallaton are not certainly associated with the other ditch deposits (Leins 2012a: 41), and so have been omitted here). Only one gold hoard (Whaplode Drove) terminates with inscribed issues. This is very different to the North Thames region, where gold predominated in all Iron Age hoards.

Beyond Hallaton, four hoards terminate in this period (Table 16). Three (Partney, South Ferriby and Kirmond Le Mire) are mixed Iron Age silver and gold hoards, in which silver predominates. There is also a medium-sized Roman hoard from Warsop in Nottinghamshire, containing 22 Republican and early Imperial denarii, closing with issues of Tiberius (14-37 AD). This is comparable to contemporary and later hoards of Roman silver in the North Thames region, and it is significant that it occurs in Nottinghamshire, which lay outside the main area of Iron Age coin circulation (only one small Iron Age hoard is recorded). Whilst Roman coinage was perhaps readily accepted in Nottinghamshire as a medium of value and wealth storage, this was not the case in Lincolnshire and Leicestershire (areas where Iron Age coinage was produced and deposited in large quantities).

30-45 AD This latest Iron Age period (Table 16) is dominated by Hallaton, although Fig. 7 shows that a similar pattern of coins per year is apparent even with Hallaton removed from the dataset, albeit at a smaller scale. The vast majority of the Hallaton coins were probably buried around 43-50 AD (Leins 2012a), on the cusp of the Roman conquest. After this period, Iron Age coinage appears to have fallen out of use in the East Midlands. The huge quantity of coins deposited at Hallaton represents an unprecedented increase in hoard evidence compared to previous periods. Removing these coins from circulation may have been associated with periconquest changes in the value and social role of silver. The incorporation of Roman silver objects at Hallaton

Fig. 7: Iron Age and Early Roman coin hoard periods for the East Midlands, as coins per year, excluding the deposits from Hallaton. (Total: 2589 coins). 59

Julia Farley

Decline:

evidence that Roman coins were treated in the same way, particularly in Lincolnshire and Leicestershire.

41-69 AD Aside from the single hoard group from Hallaton closing with a 41/2 AD issue of Claudius (included in the previous phase), there are no recorded hoards terminating in the Claudio- Neronian period. To a certain extent this mirrors national trends. Roman silver issues from this period are rare even as single finds, suggesting that few reached Britain. However, the East Midlands would need four or five additional hoards from the period to bring it in line with the British mean (Farley 2012a), suggesting that this does reflect a significant local pattern. After 15 years or so of apparently intense hoarding (albeit largely represented at one site), there is a hiatus in hoard evidence (Figs. 5 and 6).

Inelastic response: 69-96 AD Levels of recovered hoards remain low in the Flavian period (Table 17). Although the East Midlands is now roughly in line with the North Thames and the British mean in terms of the number, types and sizes of hoards, these are predominantly from Nottinghamshire. Only one hoard of this period is known in Lincolnshire, a group of 11 bronzes from a military context, which may represent a lost purse. If we exclude this military bronze purse assemblage from Lincoln, there are no recorded hoards from Lincolnshire until the Hadrianic period. In Leicestershire (aside from a possible hoard of 2-3 denarii of Trajan, reported in 1607) there are no known hoards until the reign of Marcus Aurelius (161-180 AD). In the heartland of competitive Iron Age coin production and conspicuous consumption through hoarding, there is a hiatus in the hoard evidence for a period of 60-100 years.

Hoarding, including the deposition of votive hoards which were not intended for recovery, was a large part of Iron Age engagement with coinage, but suddenly this seems to stop. Indeed, the complete absence of known precious-metal hoards over at least a twenty year period suggests that precious-metal coinage may no longer have been considered a viable form of religious offering or wealth storage.

This is a peculiarity of the hoard record rather than merely an issue of supply. Roman copper-alloy and silver from the Flavian period onwards are quite common site finds, suggesting that they became incorporated into the sphere of everyday exchanges, but evidence for their use in hoarding practices is lacking. This disjuncture between pre- and post-conquest coin-use practices may be connected to the lack of a shared symbolic language of value between North-Eastern issues and Roman coins. In contrast to the North Thames region, local Iron Age coins did not articulate directly with Roman issues, nor did they incorporate classical imagery. The stark differences in hoarding patterns between these two areas (compare Figs. 4 and 6) suggest very different reactions to the introduction of Roman coinage, perhaps related to the dissimilar systems of Iron Age coin production in place before the conquest.

There is no reason why Romano-British hoarders in the East Midlands should have been inherently more likely to return for a savings hoard than their Iron Age forebears, or their counterparts in the North Thames region, particularly during this unstable period. Yet the patterns are strikingly different, especially considering the similarity in Roman single coin find profiles (Figs. 2 and 3). This hiatus in hoarding evidence foreshadows an inelastic response to the disruption of the conquest and the introduction of Roman issues. Unlike the North Thames, where many of the social and religious functions of Iron Age coinage were transferred to Roman coins, in the East Midlands precious metals (especially gold) do not appear to retain many of their previous associations. Some Iron Age hoards terminating with late issues could of course have been buried post-conquest, but there is no

Site

No. Roman Silver

Lincoln, Lincs

No. Roman Copperalloy

Total

11

11

Annesley, Notts

4

4

Upton, Notts

20

20

Hoveringham, Notts

4

4

Askham, Notts

14+

?

14+

Hoard Type

Context/Site Type

Latest Roman coin in hoard

Published reference(s)

Roman Copperalloy Roman Silver Roman Silver Roman Silver Roman Silver/ Roman Copperalloy

Roman military fortpurse?

Vespasian

Robertson 2000: 11, no. 53

Hillside?

Vespasian

NC 168 (2008): 385, no. 10

Hillside

Domitian (under Vespasian)

Robertson 2000: 16, no. 79

Vespasian

CHRB XI: 59-60

Domitian

Robertson 2000, 19: no. 100

Riverside (Trent) In an urn, accompanied by bonesburial?

Table 17: Coin hoards from the East Midlands terminating 69-96 AD 60

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Discussion and Conclusions

would have demonstrated the ability of individuals and communities to tap into prestige exchange networks, and make heavy investments in terms of local labour and resources. It appears that the Roman conquest in the decades after 43 AD caused this system of elite competition, collaboration, negotiation, and display to collapse, leading to a decline and transformation in the social role of coinage. A period of massive peak hoarding around the time of the conquest gives way to a subsequent hiatus in hoard evidence.

This paper has considered the evidence for Iron Age and early Roman coin circulation and hoarding practices across two British regions. The differences highlight the importance of considering hoard evidence alongside wider patterns of production and circulation. I have argued that in periods of dramatic social change, particularly when coinage became a socially charged medium which reflected social connections and power networks, hoard deposition was a mechanism through which political allegiances and new systems of value were negotiated and reinforced.

In the post-conquest period, Nottinghamshire, at the edge of Iron Age coinage networks, displays a pattern similar to the North Thames in terms of numbers and types of hoards, incorporating both silver and copper-alloy issues. However, there was a much longer apparent hiatus in hoarding in Leicestershire and Lincolnshire, lasting into the 2nd century. It is not until the Antonine period that a significant number of non-recovered hoards are known from these counties. Iron Age hoarding practices would by this time have been well beyond living memory, and hoard patterns seem to owe more to surrounding regions such as the North Thames and Nottinghamshire than they do to continuation with Iron Age traditions. Neither gold nor silver appear (from the hoard evidence) to have been used as a form of wealth storage or votive offering until the Antonine period, when silver hoards reappear in the archaeological record. Gold, in particular, remains absent. There are just 15 single finds of 1st and 2nd century Roman gold coins from the East Midlands (Bland and Loriot 2010, and PAS data to April 2012), compared to 33 stray finds and 285 hoard coins from the North Thames region.

In the North Thames client kingdom, Iron Age coin production was centrally controlled by a Romanised elite during the pre-conquest dynastic period, with ‘royal’ mints producing a tri-metallic coinage, complete with Classical imagery and complex inscriptions. Here, the role of Iron Age coins in wealth storage and votive offerings appears to have been readily transferred to Roman coinage. There is a peak in hoarding evidence around the time the client kingdom was established, and a second peak in the peri-conquest period. In both cases hoarding patterns settle down relatively quickly and the response to the upheaval seems to be elastic. Postconquest hoarding practices incorporate many aspects of Iron Age traditions, with a continuation in the appearance of small copper-alloy assemblages in grave deposits and at urban sites, and precious-metal hoards on hillsides and at shrine sites. Iron Age coins continue to be integrated into these practices until near the end of the 1st century, suggesting these objects remained in circulation or safekeeping for several generations. After Iron Age issues disappear from hoards, Roman coins are used in similar practices, as at Shillington, a hillside shrine site where a hoard of aurei terminating with issues of Domitian (8196 AD) was accompanied by a separate denarii hoard terminating with Hadrianic coins (117-138 AD). Deposition of gold also occurred in the 2nd century: a hoard of 126 aurei terminating with Marcus Aurelius (161-180 AD) has been recovered from Didcot in Oxfordshire. Whilst these gold hoards could have been savings hoards intended for recovery, the continuation of Iron Age practices at Shillington is clear, and both demonstrate that gold continued to be valued as a form of wealth storage, and possibly even in votive offerings. Silver issues were rare in Iron Age hoards, but began to become more dominant after the Roman conquest, taking on some of the social functions (in terms of wealth storage and use in depositional practices) previously ascribed to gold. Overall, the picture suggests that Roman coins took on many of the functions of their predecessors, a shift made easier by a shared symbolic language of value.

The hoard evidence suggests that the disruption of the conquest to indigenous systems of value was far greater in the East Midlands than in the North Thames region. Just as peaks in hoarding evidence seem to correspond to periods of social upheaval north of the Thames, here the impact of the conquest is revealed by a phase of intensive deposition followed by a hiatus in the hoarding evidence of up to a hundred years. In the new post-conquest political sphere, status was established through engagement with Roman systems for achieving wealth and power, such as service in the military, amassing personal wealth, or securing the favour of an elite patron. Production, distribution and consumption of precious metal objects may no longer have been a suitable vehicle for elite competition. With the collapse of this system, Iron Age symbols of value and prestige lost their power. The malleable power structures of the immediate preconquest period were now crystallised in a new form: political subservience to Rome. Acknowledgements

Communities in the East Midlands, whilst certainly in the Roman orbit, appear in some ways to have resisted direct Roman influence. Coin production remained fluid and dispersed, only coming into closer line with the dynastic mints of the southern client kingdoms around 20 AD. Competitive production and consumption of coinage

This paper is based on research carried out for my PhD thesis, and many people have given generous assistance. I would particularly like to thank Colin Haselgrove for reading earlier versions of this work, and Philip de Jersey for kindly providing copies of his unpublished Iron Age 61

Julia Farley

coin hoard data. Any mistakes, of course, remain my own.

Chadburn, A. 2006, Aspects of the Iron Age Coinages of Northern East Anglia with Especial Reference to Hoards, Unpublished PhD thesis (University of Nottingham). Cheesman, C. 1994, ‘The coins’, in O'Connell, M. G. and Bird, J. ‘The Roman temple at Wanborough, excavation 1985-1986’, Surrey Archaeological Collections 82, 1-168. Clay, P. and Mellor, J. 1985, Excavations in Bath Lane, Leicester, Leicestershire Museums, Art Galleries and Record Service Archaeological Report No. 10 (Leicestershire Museums, Art Galleries and Record Service, Leicester). Collis, J. 1974, ‘A functionalist approach to pre-Roman coinage’, in Casey, P. J. and Reece, R. (eds), Coins and the archaeologist, British Archaeological Report British Series 4, 97-104 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Cottam, G. 2001, ‘Plated Iron Age coins: official issues or contemporary forgeries?’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 20, 377-390. Cowell, M., Oddy, W. and Burnett, A. 1987, ‘Celtic coinage in Britain: new hoards and recent analyses’, British Numismatic Journal 57, 1-23. Creighton, J. 1992, The Circulation of Money in Roman Britain From the First to Third Century, Unpublished PhD. thesis (University of Durham). Creighton, J. 2000, Coins and Power in Late Iron Age Britain, (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Creighton, J. 2006, Britannia: the creation of a Roman province, (Routledge, London). Curteis, M. and Burleigh, G. 2002, ‘Shillington A and B, Bedfordshire’, in Abdy, R. , Leins, I. and Williams, J. (eds), Coin Hoards from Roman Britain, Volume XI, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication No. 36, 65-74 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). De Jersey, P. 1997, ‘Mint sites of Celtic Britain’, Chris Rudd list 28, 1-2. De Jersey, P. 2001, ‘Where and when?’, Chris Rudd list 56, 2-7. De Jersey, P. and Wickenden, N. 2004, ‘A hoard of staters of Cunobelin and Dubnovellaunos from Great Waltham, Essex’, British Numismatic Journal 74, 175-78. Dennis, M. 2006, Silver in Late Iron Age and Early Roman East Anglia, Unpublished PhD Thesis (University of Oxford). Edwards, G. and Dennis, M. 2006, ‘The Silsden hoard: Discovery, investigation and new interpretations’, in de Jersey, P. (ed.), Celtic Coinage: New discoveries, new discussion, British Archaeological Report International Series 1532, 249-260 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Elsdon, S. M. and Jones, M. 1997, Old Sleaford Revealed: a Lincolnshire settlement in Iron Age, Roman, Saxon and Medieval times; excavations, 1882-1995 (Oxbow, Oxford). Evans, J. S. and Fairholt, F. W. 1864, The Coins of the Ancient Britons (J. R. Smith, London).

Endnotes {1} The main sources used to compile the hoard lists were: Robertson (2000), Bland and Orna-Ornstein (1997), Abdy et al. (2002), Treasure Annual Reports, and listings in the Numismatic Chronicle. Where no published reference is given, or where the composition differs from that in the published sources, the hoard information is based on unpublished hoard data kindly provided by Philip de Jersey and the British Museum. Full details are given in Farley (2012a). (Abbreviations used in the tables: NC: Numismatic Chronicle; BNJ: British Numismatic Journal; TAR: Treasure Annual Report; CHRB: Coin Hoards of Roman Britain series). Bibliography Aarts, J. 2005, ‘Coins, money and exchange in the Roman world: A cultural-economic perspective’, Archaeological Dialogues 12, 1-28. Abdy, R., Leins, I. and Williams, J. (eds ) 2002, Coin Hoards from Roman Britain, Vol. XI, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication No. 36 (RNS, London). Allen, D. F. 1944, ‘The Belgic dynasties of Britain and their coins’, Archaeologia 90, 1-46. Allen, D. F. 1960, ‘The origins of coinage in Britain: a reappraisal’, in S. S. Frere (ed. ), Problems of the Iron Age in Southern Britain, Institute of Archaeology occasional paper 11, 97-308 (University of London, Institute of Archaeology, London). Allen, D. F. 1963, The Coins of the Coritani (Oxford University Press for the British Academy, London). Bean, S. C. 2000, The Coinage of the Atrebates and Regni, Oxford University School of Archaeology Monograph 50, Studies in Celtic Coinage 4 (Institute of Archaeology, Oxford). Bland, R. and Loriot, X. 2010, Roman and Early Byzantine Gold Coins Found in Britain and Ireland, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication No. 46 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Bland, R. and Orna-Ornstein, J. 1997, Coin Hoards From Roman Britain, Volume X , Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication No. 36 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Bone, A. and Burnett. A. M. 1986, ‘The 1986 Selsey treasure trove’, British Numismatic Journal 56, 178-180. Bradley, R. 1990, The Passage of Arms: an archaeological analysis of prehistoric hoards and votive deposits (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Burnett, A. M. 1990, ‘Celtic coinage in Britain III: The Waltham St. Lawrence treasure trove’, British Numismatic Journal 60, 13-28. Burnett, A. and Cowell, M. 1988, ‘Celtic coinage in Britain II’, British Numismatic Journal 58, 1-10.

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Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Evans, J. S., Fairholt, F. W. and Sellier, P. 1890, The Coins of the Ancient Britons (B. Quaritch, London). Farley, J. 2012a, At the Edge of Empire: Iron Age and Early Roman Metalwork in the East Midlands, Unpublished PhD thesis (University of Leicester). http://hdl. handle. net/2381/10840 Farley, J. 2012b, ‘Analysis of silver and other metal objects’, in Score, V. (ed.), Hoards, Hounds and Helmets: a conquest period ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire, Leicester Archaeological Monograph 21, 88-99 (University of Leicester Archaeological Services, Leicester). Frere, S. S., Hassall, M. W. C. and Tomlin, R. S. O. 1985, ‘Roman Britain in 1984’, Britannia 16, 252-332. Haselgrove, C. 1987, Iron Age Coinage in South-East England: the archaeological context, British Archaeological Report British Series 174 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Haselgrove, C. 1988, ‘The archaeology of British potin coinage’, Archaeological Journal 145, 99-122. Haselgrove, C. 1989, ‘Celtic coins found in Britain, 1982-7’, Bulletin of the Institute of Archaeology, London, 26, 1-75. Haselgrove, C. 1993, ‘The development of British Iron Age coinage’, Numismatic Chronicle 153, 3163. Haselgrove, C. 2005a, ‘A new approach to analysing the circulation of Iron Age coinage’, Numismatic Chronicle 165, 1-45. Haselgrove, C. 2005b, ‘A trio of temples: A reassessment of Iron Age coin deposition at Harlow, Hayling Island, and Wanborough’, in Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds), Iron Age Coinage and Ritual Practices, 381-418 (Von Zabern, Mainz am Rhein). Haselgrove, C. 2006a, ‘The impact of the Roman conquest on indigenous coinages in Belgic Gaul and Southern Britain’, in de Jersey P. (ed.), Celtic Coinage: New discoveries, new discussion, British Archaeological Report International Series 1532, 97-115 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Haselgrove, C. 2006b, ‘Early potin coinage in Britain: An update’, in de Jersey, P. (ed.), Celtic Coinage: new discoveries, new discussion. British Archaeological Report International Series 1532, 17-27 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Havis, R. and Brooks, H. 2004, Excavations at Stansted Airport, 1986-1991, East Anglian Archaeology Monograph No. 107 (Essex County Council, Chelmsford). Hawkes, C. F. C. and Hull, M. R. 1947, Camulodunum: first report on the excavations at Colchester, 1930-39, Reports of the Research Committee of the Society of Antiquaries of London No. 14 (Society of Antiquaries, London). Hobbs, R. 1996, British Iron Age Coins in the British Museum (British Museum Press, London).

Leins, I. 2007, ‘East Leicestershire: Coinage, ritual and society in the Iron Age East Midlands’, British Numismatic Journal 77, 22-48. Leins, I. 2012a, ‘The coins’, in Score, V. (ed.), Hoards, Hounds and Helmets: a conquest period ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire, Leicester Archaeological Monograph 21, 39-60 (University of Leicester Archaeological Services, Leicester). Leins, I. 2012b, A Reassessment of the Use of Coinage in the Reconstruction of the Societies in Late Iron Age Britain, Unpublished PhD thesis (British Museum/Newcastle University). Mack, R. P. 1975, The Coinage of Ancient Britain, 3rd ed. (Spink, London). May, J. 1992, ‘Iron Age coins in Yorkshire’, in Mays, M. (ed.), Celtic Coinage: Britain and beyond, British Archaeological Report British Series 222, 93-111 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Northover, J. P. 1992, ‘Material issues in the Celtic coinage’, in Mays, M. (ed.), Celtic Coinage: Britain and beyond, British Archaeological Report British Series 222, 235-299 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Orna-Ornstein, J. 1997, ‘Early hoards of denarii from Britain’, in Bland, R. and Orna-Ornstein, J. (eds), Coin Hoards from Roman Britain Volume. 10, 23-29 (British Museum Press, London). Reece, R. 2002, The Coinage of Roman Britain (Tempus, Stroud). Robertson, A. S. 2000, An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Rudd, C. , Cottam, E. , de Jersey, P. and Sills, J. 2010, Ancient British Coins (Chris Rudd, Aylsham). Score, V. (ed.) 2012, Hoards, Hounds and Helmets: a conquest period ritual site at Hallaton, Leicestershire, Leicester Archaeological Monograph 21 (University of Leicester Archaeological Services, Leicester). Sill, J. 2003, Gaulish and Early British Gold Coinage (Spink, London). Stead, I. M. , Lang, J. and Cartwright, C. R. 2006, British Iron Age Swords and Scabbards (British Museum Press, London). Stead, I. M. and Rigby, V. 1989, Verulamium: The King Harry Lane site, English Heritage Archaeological Report No. 12 (English Heritage, London). Van Arsdell, R. D. 1989, Celtic Coinage of Britain (Spink, London). Van Arsdell, R. D. 1993, ‘Coin scales in late pre-Roman Iron Age Britain’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 12, 361-365. Van Arsdell, R. D. and Northover, P. 2004, ‘Ancient British coins’, in Havis, R. and Brooks, H. (eds), Excavations at Stansted Airport, 1986-1991, Vol. 1: Prehistoric and Romano-British. East Anglian Archaeology Report 107, 115-120 (Essex County Council, Chelmsford). 63

Julia Farley

Appendices Appendix 1: Phasing of British Iron Age coins, based on Haselgrove (1993) and Creighton (2000) Haselgrove Period

I

II

III

Duration

Coin types

1

Mid/ Late C2 BC

Earliest systematically imported gold coinages; Gallo-Belgic A and B.

2

Late C2 BC

3

Early C1 BC

4

c. 80-60 BC

Later Gallo-Belgic A gold imported. First insular production (cast copper-alloy potins). British Class I flat linear potins. Latest GalloBelgic A and Gallo-Belgic C gold imports, but overall little gold imported. Class I/II Flat linear potins. Gallo-Belgic C and DC gold imports. First British gold, e. g. British A, B, C, D, F, G.

5

c. 60-50 BC

6

c. 50-20 BC

7

c. 20 BC-10 AD

8

c. 10-40 AD

9

c. 30-45 AD

Phase

Overview

Class II Flat linear potins. Gallo-Belgic E and F, and British gold derivatives Qa and La. Earliest British struck copper-alloy and limited silver. Latest British potins. Legends rare (e. g. Commios). Inscribed coins in the SE, ST, NT, e. g. Tasciovanus, Addemomaros, Dubnovellaunos, Tincomarus. Inscribed coins in the SE, ST, NT, e. g. Cunobelinus, Eppillus and Verica. Also inscriptions in NE and EA. Some overlap with phase 8. ST issues including Epaticcus and Cara, also some EA and NE issues.

64

Imported Gallic gold and potins, and the earliest British potin production.

Later potins. Gallic imports and first British gold. Early gold recalled and reminted as British L and Q in the ST/SE and NT. Creighton’s ‘dynastic’ period, with Roman client kingdoms in the south of England (ST, NT) issuing inscribed coinage with Classical imagery in copperalloy, silver and gold. Systems differ in the WE, SW, NE, and EA (Fig. 1).

Coins and conquest: Coin hoarding in the late Iron Age and early Roman period in the North Thames and East Midlands regions

Appendix 2: Coin production periods used in this paper Date Range

Haselgrove Phase/ Reece Period

150-80 BC

Haselgrove 1-3

80-50 BC

Haselgrove 4-5

50-20 BC

Haselgrove 6

20 BC-10 AD

Haselgrove 7

10-40 AD

Haselgrove 8/ Reece 0

30-45 AD

Haselgrove 9/ Reece 1

41-54 AD 54-69 AD 69-96 AD 96-117 AD 117-138 AD 138-161 AD 161-180 AD

Reece 2 Reece 3 Reece 4 Reece 5 Reece 6 Reece 7 Reece 8

Coinage in North Thames region Gallo-Belgic A and B gold imports. Kentish Primary potins (imported from southeast England). Flat linear potins Gallo-Belgic C, D, E and F gold imports. First local gold (British G, Clacton type) and later issues British L (and Q in Southern kingdom) First red-gold and silver issues (LbLx) (first inscribed coinage in southern Kingdom- COMMIOS) First inscribed coins of Tasciovanan dynasty: TASCIOVANVS, RVES, DIAS. (Southern dynasty: ADDEDOMARVS, TINCOMARVS, DVBNOVELLAVNOS) Roman Republican issues; later dynastic issues: CVNOBELINVS, EPPILLUS, VERICA Roman pre-Claudian imperial issues; latest southern dynastic issues of EPATICCVS and CARA Roman coins: Claudian Roman coins: Neronian Roman coins: Flavian Roman coins: Trajanic Roman coins: Hadrianic Roman coins: Antonine I Roman coins: Antonine II

Coinage in the East Midlands

Gallo-Belgic E gold imports.

Local gold prototypes (British H and I, Northeast coast types)

First local red-gold and silver issues (South Ferriby gold and prototype silver Boar/Horse issues) Roman Republican issues; later uninscribed bimetallic coinage (Kite, domino and later Boar/Horse). c. 20-45 AD, inscribed issues: AVN, VEP, TATISOM, VOLISIOS, DVMNOCO Roman pre-Claudian imperial issues; Latest inscribed issues: IISVPRASV

Appendix 3: Revised chronology for the North-Eastern series coins, adapted from Leins (2007; 2012a) [additions in square brackets]. Correlation with Haselgrove’s phases suggested to allow wider comparison. Date

Haselgrove Phase

Pre-c. 50 BC

4/5

c. 50-20 BC

6

20 BC-10 AD

7

10-20/30 AD 8 20/30-45 AD

Post-40 AD

9

Coinage in the East Midlands [IMPORTS ONLY Gallo-Belgic B, D (rare) and E imports. Also rare southern British imports e. g. potins, British G. ] Local yellow-gold prototypes (British H and I). [Scyphates (dish-shaped quarter staters)] First local bimetallic (red-gold and silver) issues: Gold: South Ferriby; Silver: Prototype Boar/Horse issues. Later uninscribed bimetallic coinage: Gold: Kite, domino; Silver: later South Ferriby Boar/Horse and Kite/Domino types. Inscribed issues. Leins divides these into three groups: Southern- TATISOM; Central- AVN COST, VEP/ VEP CORF; Northern- VOLISIOS DVNOCOVEROS, VOLISIOS DVBNOVELLAVNOS (VDV/C), VOLISIOS CARTIVELAVNOS, and DVMNOC TIGIR SENO. Latest inscribed issues: IISVPRASV.

65

Emergency or Votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards Kenneth S. Painter There is a long list of hoards of Roman silver which are usually described as ‘religious’ (Baratte 1992: passim). Most are pagan, and a smaller number are Christian. The key identifying characteristics in these cases are inscriptions, symbols, and particular forms of object (Johns 1996; E. Künzl 1997). Secular objects can be accepted as part of an offering to the gods, as in the case of the treasure weighing about 25 kg, found near Berthouville (c. Brionne, Eure, France), not because they were found on the site of a temple to Mercury Canetonensis, but because they have votive inscriptions (Babelon 1916; Nuber 1977; Baratte 1989: 79-97; Baratte 1992: 113; Hobbs 2006: 258-60, no. 1947); but the complete absence of overtly votive inscriptions in a hoard of objects should make one very cautious about defining it as religious. Conversely, the presence of votive inscriptions does not always prove that their findplace is religious. Inscriptions on the plaques in the 3rd-century treasure from Barkway demonstrate that the hoard was dedicated to Mars (Fig. 1), while inscriptions on objects in the 4th-century Water Newton Christian treasure (Water Newton II) were dedicated to Christ (Fig. 2); but in neither case is there evidence that the burial took place in sacred ground.{1}

The sacred nature of a findplace does not on its own prove that the deposition of a hoard was ‘religious’. The objects in the Berthouville hoard, provide an example (Baratte 1989: esp. 79-80). First, they fall into two groups, separated in date by a century or more, the first offered to the god by a Roman, the others by Gauls, and no objects bridge the chronological gap.{2} Second, the inscriptions show that the objects were all meant to be on show. The surviving objects, therefore, are likely to have been deposited in the ground not for religious reasons but in some emergency. On other occasions valuables could be placed under the protection of the gods without any intention of the depositor giving up ownership (E. Künzl 1997: 60). The most famous location of such deposits is the Temple of Peace in Rome, which was burned down in 192. Herodian (I, 14, 2) reported that it was ‘the richest of all the temples, and, because it was a safe place … every man deposited his possessions there; but the fire … made paupers of many rich men … and each man lamented his own personal loss.’

Fig. 1: The Barkway treasure. Probably 3rd century. Part of a group of seven silver plaques, a bronze statuette of Mars and part of a bronze religious rattle found at Barkway in Hertfordshire in about 1743. Five plaques (including the large one to the left) have representations of or dedications to Mars, and two (top right and centre) have representations of Vulcan, one with a dedicatory inscription. Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory, British Museum. Image: © British Museum. 67

Kenneth S. Painter

Fig. 2: The Water Newton early Christian treasure (Water Newton II). Late 4th century. A group of silver vessels, implements and plaques found at Water Newton (Roman Durobrivae) in Cambridgeshire (in what was previously the county of Huntingdonshire). The plaques strongly resemble those from Barkway but have Christian inscriptions, which, together with those on the vessels, show that the objects were part of the furnishings of a church before being buried. Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory, British Museum. Image: © British Museum.

In contrast to these regular Roman religious finds, some Roman deposits without the usual characteristics, in particular inscriptions, have also been described as religious by extending the theory that many prehistoric deposits were religiously motivated, engendering some sharp exchanges.{3} A difficulty with theories of this sort is that their proponents suggest that certain types of locations were ‘religious’, that acts of deposition there were ‘religious’, and that objects found in such places are ‘religious’. Any investigation, however, must examine closely the content of a hoard, search for strictly comparable hoards, and then question whether there are common factors not only for the composition but for the burial and non-recovery of the hoards. Two groups of hoards of the 3rd and 4th centuries, which have been linked to religious interpretations, are therefore discussed here.

The finds date from the middle of the 3rd century (Petrovszky 2006b, 2009; E. Künzl 2009: 207-8). {5} The two largest groups come from Neupotz (Fig. 4) and Hagenbach (Table 1), and smaller groups of objects have come from sites such as Lingenfeld/Mechtersheim and Otterstadt-Angelhof. It is mostly metal objects which have survived; but there are traces of textiles (Mitschke 2006) and of wood (Tegtmeier 2006), and in 1999 three Roman-period skeletons were found (Petrovszky 2009: 213, and 412-13, n. 8). Both the Neupotz and the Hagenbach groups include Hacksilber, 14 pieces from Neupotz and 7 pieces from Hagenbach (Neupotz: S. Künzl 1993. Neupotz and Hagenbach: Bernhard et al 1990: 6-8, 44-6, 28-34; Stupperich 2006; Petrovszky 2009: 212-14). The silver consists of pieces cut from vessels. In spite of the fact that in each case the silver forms a very small proportion of the metals found, some scholars have based two different interpretations of the whole of the deposits from the Rhine on the hacked nature of the silver. One has been that the silver was cut into pieces by German raiders because they were dividing up their booty (Stupperich 2006). Recent research, however, has suggested that cutting-up or ‘hacking’ silver plate at this time may initially be a Roman practice, carried out within the Empire from the 2nd to the 6th centuries, and that most Hacksilber outside the frontiers was probably exported in that state, even if it was later divided further (Painter 2013).

The Neupotz group and related finds Until about 1840 the River Rhine meandered for much of its course.{4} Much of the river was then canalised, leaving stretches of the old river bed abandoned. In the 1980s excavation of many of the stretches of the old river were excavated for gravel, and a huge number of Roman objects was found, between 4 m and 6 m below the surface of the water, at about 20 sites between Seltz (near modern Karlsruhe) in the south and Worms in the north (E. Künzl 1993; Stadler et al. 2006; Hobbs 2006: 209-10, no. 1186). (Fig. 3)

68

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

Fig. 3: Map showing the old course of the Rhine and the places between Karlsruhe and Worms where Roman objects of the mid-3rd century were found during dredging: 1. Hagenbach; 2. ‘Rhein’ near Karlsruhe; 3. Wörth; 4. Eggenstein; 5. Leopoldshafen; 6. Rheinzabern; 7. Neupotz; 8. Linkenheim; 9. Germersheim; 10. Lingenfeld; 11. RömerbergBerghausen; 12. Rheinhausen; 13. Otterstadt ‘Angelhof’; 14. Brühl; 15. Altrip; 16. Mannheim; 17. BobenheimRoxheim; 18. Between Neupotz and Germersheim – exact findplace unclear. Large dot: Neupotz; smaller dots: large groups; smallest dots: 1-3 objects. Map previously published as Petrovszky 2006: 190, Abb. 246. Image: © Historisches Museum der Pfalz Speyer. 69

Kenneth S. Painter

Fig. 4: Selection of finds of silver, bronze and iron from Neupotz. Image previously published as Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006: 203, Abb. 267. Image: © Historisches Museum der Pfalz Speyer.

Neupotz

No. of objects 1100+

Hagenbach

400

Iron

Bronze

Silver

Tin

530 kg 55kg

200 kg

5 kg

1.54

54 kg

4 kg

century found in water as votives or sacrifices given in the context of a cult.’{8} Ernst Künzl, however, in a detailed examination of significant groups of finds, however, has undermined their conclusions (1996: 43866, ‘Anhang: Die Mainzer Gladii als Flussfundproblem’; 1999/2000, 2001, 2009).{9} One of the most important groups, for example, consists of 10 decorated sheaths of gladii found in the River Rhine at Mainz – almost half of the 24 gladii and cingula found in rivers across the Empire (E. Künzl 1996: 439-40, and 451-2, nos. OI 1119 and M9). It is inherently unlikely, as Künzl has pointed out, that offerings were made at the mouth of a river, rather than at its source, whether in prehistoric or Roman times (pers. comm.). While it is true that a few types of weapon, dating from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age, have been found over the whole length of the River Main, in most cases the finds are always either more frequent the nearer one gets to the mouth of the Main, or they are only found at the mouth, simply because the deeper the water the more difficult it was to cross.{10} As far as the Roman gladii are concerned, their presence is clearly explained by the fact that a double legionary camp was located at Mainz, at the point where the river Main joins the Rhine, in order to allow the soldiers to cross the Rhine in order to control the Main valley (E. Künzl 1996: 339-40; 1999/2000: 549-50).{11} Moreover, all of the swords were made earlier than the probable date of construction of the bridge, for which the timber was felled in 27 or just afterwards, and there are no examples of subsequent types.{12} There is therefore a good case to be made that several or most of the gladii fell into the

Table 1: Comparison of the number and weights of objects recovered from the Rhine at Neupotz and Hagenbach. A second explanation has been based on the theory that objects deposited in water at Neupotz and the related sites must have been put there for religious reasons.{6} Millett (1994: 99, 104) described the Neupotz deposit as an example of ‘the continuation of a long tradition of votive deposition [in rivers] into the Roman world’. In 1998 Ton Derks (1998: 140) interpreted the objects from Neupotz and the related sites both as pieces of booty and also as offerings made by warriors on crossing the river. In 2006, Martin Schönfelder, explicitly offering a prehistorian’s point of view, argued that Gauls and Romanised Gauls offered coins, bronze vessels, cult objects and weapons in water, and that the finds from Neupotz and the associated sites are evidence of this practice.{7} In 1994 Thiel and Zanier supported this conclusion with a study of the contexts of Roman 1st-century daggers. They argued that only a few daggers and other weapons and pieces of military equipment were lost in water by accident, and they concluded, ‘Our preference is to interpret the majority of Roman weapons of the first 70

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

river at various places where the water was deep and when the crossing was difficult, and that they were losses caused by accidents, battles or shipwrecks, not offerings dedicated to the gods.{13} If any of the daggers or the gladii had been offerings, it might have been expected that some at least would have been ritually ‘killed’; but the surveys by Thiel and Zanier (1994) and by Künzl do not record that this has happened to any of their examples.{14} The finds of daggers and gladii in rivers, therefore, do not support the hypothesis that the 20 hoards from the Rhine at and near Neupotz are the gradual accumulation of gifts offered to the gods over years or generations.

their respective colleagues (E. Künzl and S. Künzl 1992; Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006; Petrovszky 2009). There are marked similarities in the dates and contents of the hoards, which consist of bronze vessels, iron tools, cartfittings, weapons, and silver vessels and implements, and it is inconceivable that they can be anything but transported from their areas of origin in central and southern Gaul at the same time (Petrovszky 2009: 21214) (Table 2).{21} Similarly, 34 graffiti inscriptions on 129 votive silver leaves from Hagenbach are from one shrine, to Dominus Mars Augustus, and the names of those who dedicated them are not Roman but AuscoAquitanian, matched only on the northern slopes of the Pyrenees (Engels 1990).

The custom of dedicating objects, particularly coins, in springs and pools or lakes, is of course attested in the Roman period, though only proved conclusively by the presence of votive inscriptions; but the evidence does not support Thiel and Zanier’s (1994) theory of a widespread Roman-period custom of dedicating weapons and armour in water, and votive inscriptions are totally lacking.{15} Indeed, weapons are in general very rare even in treasures from temples, from the 1st to the 4th century (E. Künzl 1999/2000: 564), and no war-booty deposits like the Scandinavian examples have been found south of the Jutish peninsula, the most southerly being the find at Thorsberg in Schleswig-Holstein (E. Künzl 2009: 209).{16}

Objects Bronze vessels Small knives with curved blades Battle-axes Iron roasting-pans Carts (iron fittings) Boats (fragments)

Place made Upper Rhine Limousin district Aquitania Centre et Bourgogne NW Switzerland Upper Rhine

Table 2: Places of origin of objects in the hoards from Neupotz and other places on the Rhine. The distinct nature and origins of these various groups of objects suggests that they mark the route of an Alamannic war-party who travelled through central and southern Gaul and back. (Fig. 5) As Ernst Künzl (2009: 207-8) has shown, the Germans did not plunder at random but were looking in particular for large quantities of metal, particularly iron and bronze, which they could take from the Empire back to their homelands in middle Germany which were poor in metals.{22} That is why the Neupotz deposit, for example, contains iron products of every sort, from fragments of scrap to freshly made tools and parts of wagons, including an impressive number of nave-rings and tyres (Hanemann 2006a).

A third explanation of the deposit of this material in the Rhine would once have been that the finds must be evidence of an incident during the Germanic invasions between 233 and 274 (in particular in 250, 259-60 and 275-6), which are attested by literary and epigraphic evidence, of Gaul and Italy by the Alamanni and of Rhaetia and north Italy by the Juthungi.{17} The hypothesis seemed to be supported by Adrien Blanchet’s interpretation in 1900 of the many hoards of coins of this period as buried because of German invasions of Gaul and Germany (Blanchet 1900: 1936). Subsequently, much archaeological evidence, particularly in the cities of Gaul and Germany, which seemed to indicate ‘destruction’ or ‘fires’, has been attributed additionally to the same cause and has been used to explain the apparent decline of the towns and cities in this area during the second half of the 3rd century.{18} In reaction to these ideas it is now realised that hoards of coins were buried and not recovered for all sorts of reasons apart from invasions, such as the absence of safes and banks, or monetary reasons such as devaluation.{19} Similarly, many, though not all, towns and cities show no traces of general destruction in the second half of the 3rd century, and in individual cases it is very difficult to link signs of destruction or fire and hoards of objects of coins with a particular historical event (Bernhard 2006: 21).{20}

The objects lost in the Rhine are the result of a raid by warriors, who on their return would have completed a round trip of about six months and of at least 2500 km (Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006: 205). They began by going west from their east-German homeland on the Elbe, via central Gaul, to Aquitania, and back homewards via the stretch of river Rhine north and south of Neupotz.{23} The location of the finds in the Rhine shows that they were trying to reach the junction of the Rhine with the valley of the River Neckar, which was the major route back to their home territory in the east of Germany, in the area around the river Elbe. The journey will have been fraught with difficulties, not least because of the huge amount of booty which they were transporting. The risks are demonstrated by events during the so-called Great Conspiracy of 367. When Count Theodosius, father of Theodosius I, arrived in Britain in 368 to deal with the situation, he found marauding bands round London. He was able to deal with them quickly because, Ammianus Marcellinus records,

Solving the nature of the Neupotz deposit, however, is not a matter of disproving theories based on the coins or the prehistoric objects or the weapons, but of setting out the overwhelming evidence of the nature of the whole deposit, as has been done by Ernst and Susanna Künzl and by Helmut Bernhard and Richard Petrovszky and 71

Kenneth S. Painter

the enemy, in wandering bands, were ‘weighed down with heavy packs and driving prisoners and cattle.’{24} Similarly, the Alamanni, on their journey down the Rhine a century earlier, would, in addition to the weight of their loads, have found it impossible to proceed overland. This area retained its ancient form until the 19th century.{25} The Rhine crossed the very flat floodplain in extreme meanders, many of which changed during the annual high

waters, which also deposited gravel and formed changing shallows; the land to either side was wet and muddy, covered with bogs and pools; and this marshy ground was infested with mosquitoes carrying malaria (Höckmann 1986: 385-9; Höckmann 1993a: 26). The only practicable way for the Alamanni to transport their great weight of booty was on the Rhine itself (Fig. 3).

Fig. 5: Routes of German invasions into Gaul and northern Italy, probably in 259/60. The hatched area shows the route of the attack by the Alamanni (via the valley of the River Main); the dotted line shows their presumed route back into the Decumates and the Barbaricum (via the valley of the River Neckar); ‘I’ shows the area of origin of the plunder found at Hagenbach; and ‘II’ shows the area of origin of the plunder found at Neupotz. Image previously published as Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006: 204, Abb. 268. Image: © Historisches Museum der Pfalz Speyer.

72

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

A number of finds in the Neupotz group testify to the existence of the boats used by the Alamanni (Höckmann 1993a, 1993b). Because of the shallows, they will have had to use boats which had a shallow draft; but their exact form has been interpreted in two ways. They may have been either like dug-out canoes used as fishing-boats in the 19th and early 20th centuries, which were fastened together with a platform in order to carry a cart, a horse and a load of peat, or, perhaps more probably, like the cargo boats with a shallow draft such as that of the 270s which was found at Wantzenau in Alsace in 1903, or like those known to have been in use on the Rhine at Speyer in 1683.{26} These cargo boats employed a steering-oar about 2.5 m long with a double-pronged iron end, above which the oar widened out into a rudder blade, which could be used for steering or punting (Höckmann 1993a: 49). Examples of such double prongs were found in the Wantzenau ship, which sank in the 270s, and have been found at Neupotz and at other sites on the Rhine, such as Strasbourg.{27}

In the case of the finds from Neupotz and other sites on that stretch of the Rhine, therefore, the inclination of prehistorians, or of Romanists influenced by prehistorians, to interpret these finds in water as evidence of a continuation of religious customs handed down from the pre-Roman past is unnecessary and should be viewed with great caution. The Lengerich treasure A treasure of the middle of the 4th century was found outside the Roman frontiers, in 1847, at Lengerich, near Hannover, in open countryside.{29} (Fig. 6) Some of the objects survive in the Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum Hannover.{30} They can be supplemented by detailed reports published not long after the discovery.{31} There were three deposits, close together, each covered by a large stone, which may be summarised as follows (with surviving objects marked with an asterisk):

The finds of objects at 20 sites north and south of Neupotz, however, suggest that that number or more of the boats of the Alamanni sank in the Rhine, perhaps by accident during a storm, or perhaps when surprised by Postumus’ newly designed, fast patrol boats, the naves lusoriae, from the fleet based at Mainz.{28} Great quantities of their booty sank; but an even greater quantity will have been taken back to their homeland after their long, six-month raid. There is no evidence to justify invoking religious beliefs in order to explain the presence of the objects in the river.

Stone 1 Small bronze bowl (lost) More than a thousand 2nd-century denarii, dating from Trajan to Septimius Severus or perhaps to Alexander Severus, all lost except for *18 denarii, dating from Trajan to Commodus (Zedelius 1987: 262; Schmauder 1999: 94-5; Bland 1997: 48, no. 215; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1347).

Fig. 6: The treasure found at Lengerich, near Hannover; buried in or within a few years after 350. Image: ©Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum Hannover. 73

Kenneth S. Painter

Stone 2 Gold objects weighing 200 g (Zedelius 1974: 29): *a crossbow brooch (dated to about 350: Schmauder:1999, 96-8), *2 arm-rings (ibid.: 98-102) *3 finger-rings (ibid.: 102) *a spiral ring (ibid.: 102-3.) *4 tutulus-shaped pendants (perhaps implying the existence of a neck ornament) (ibid.: 103) 10 solidi, including three of Constantine and his sons, one of which survives - *a solidus of Constantine I for Constantius II, struck in 327 in Thessalonike (Kent 1981: 168)

separate hoard of a different date.{38} Jacob-Friesen’s (1939) theory, therefore, that the repetition of burials at the same spot showed that they were religious, does not stand, and it is generally agreed that there is no need to postulate the existence of a shrine. A second theory that the Lengerich treasure was a religious deposit was proposed by Böhme (1999: 54-7), who suggested that the treasure is related to a group of nine hoards from the right bank of the lower Rhine and mostly of the early 5th century, consisting of solidi and gold torcs of the Velp type, as published by Heidinga (1990).{39} Heidinga, relying on Geisslinger’s (1967) theory that treasures including torcs, of the 5th to 8th centuries, found in the Baltic area, were religious because the places of deposit were typically holy places, such as marshes, claimed the nine Velp-type hoards as votive offerings because at least three of them were buried in ‘wet’ contexts.{40}

Stone 3 Silver dish, lost (Schmauder 1999: 95-6; Guggisberg 2003b: 281, n. 1106, 282, n. 1121, 283, n. 1123). c. 70 mint-fresh silver coins, probably siliquae (and perhaps miliarenses?), of Constantine and his sons, and siliquae of Magnentius.{32} *a siliqua of Magnentius, struck in 350 in Trier (Kent 1981: 256). a silver medallion of Constantius II, struck in 327 in Thessalonike (ibid.: 168); ‘Four small silver medals’ (trans. author).

The strongest objection to Heidinga’s interpretation has been raised by Max Martin (2010: 16-17), who has demonstrated, by analysis of the solidi which they all contain, that it is difficult to accept the nine Velp-type hoards as votive offerings because the deposits are part of a larger group, date from a very short time span and come from a very limited area. The Velp-type deposits are part of a group of about 19 hoards including solidi, which were buried for safety by upper-class Germans, apparently Franks, on both sides of the lower Rhine frontier, using money which they had received as pay in the Roman army or as political donatives.{41} The solidi in these hoards have a terminus post quem of 426, and the silver coins hoarded with them are dated to the later 420s (M. Martin 2010: 10-14, 24-5). They were therefore buried early in the second quarter of the 5th century, most probably because of a military crisis, perhaps during Roman retaliatory attacks across the border of the lower Rhine amidst the chaos following the death of Honorius in 423 (M. Martin 1997: 54-5; M. Martin 2010: 17-18). It might be argued, as Max Martin (2010: 15-16, 43-6) has pointed out, that some of the individual decorated torcs are ‘religious’ because they are too light and therefore too fragile to have been worn by a human; but, even if this argument were valid, it would not follow that a religious object in a hoard makes the hoard ‘religious’, or that that the act of burial of the hoard was a ‘religious’ act and not an attempt to safeguard valuables.

Two theories have been put forward to suggest that the treasure was deposited for religious reasons. In 1854 Hahn reported that no traces of a burial or of habitation were to be seen.{33} In 1939 Jacob-Friesen suggested that the fact that the three treasures were found next to each other demonstrated that they were located in a shrine.{34} The theory was developed with the argument that the coins fall into three groups with different enddates (one about 195 or later, another about 350, and a third buried after 353 but before 361, the year of the death of Constantius II), that this demonstrates a repetition of the act of burial at the same spot which can only have been for religious reasons, and that these religious acts imply the presence of a shrine or temple of some sort (Genrich 1965: 59).{35} A variant of the theory, proposed by Stupperich (1980: 76), explained the treasure as being a single deposit, but still a religious offering. This theory does not take account of the fact that outside the Roman frontiers denarii with a high silver content remained in use long after Septimius Severus in about 194-5 reduced the fineness of denarii circulating within the Roman Empire.{36} Many 4th- and 5th-century hoards in the Barbaricum contain denarii, one of the most famous groups being the more than 200 denarii, mostly of the 2nd century, buried with the Frankish king Childerich, who died in 481 (Mommsen 1873: 132; Bastien in Bastien and Metzger 1977: 207-8; M. Martin 2004). As a result Zedelius (1974) was able to show that the three Lengerich deposits were part of a single hoard, buried in three separate containers, an unusual but well documented practice, both for coins and other precious objects.{37} The Lengerich deposits, therefore, were not made at different times, and the denarii were not a

There are, therefore, several arguments against the Lengerich treasure being a religious deposit. First, the evidence does not support the theory that the Velp-type hoards are part of a long-lived, continuing religious custom (M. Martin 2010: 16). Second, the inclusion of the Lengerich treasure in the group is unjustified because it is outside the area of the Velp-type hoards. Third, it is of a different date and must have been deposited not in the second quarter of the 5th century but much earlier, in or shortly after 350, and, fourth, the marks of rank and prestige in the treasure are not Germanic but Roman prestige objects indicating rank, a silver dish which had contained an imperial donative, a gold crossbow brooch, 74

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

Fig. 7: Distribution of precious metal hoards, including hoards consisting only of coin, deposited after years between 340 and 353: 1. Water Newton GB (AR objects and solidi); 2. Nielles-lès-Calais F (solidi); 3. Vaulx-Vraucourt F (solidi); 4. Saint-Ouen-du-Breuil F (AR and AV objects, solidi and AR coins); 5. Helleville F (solidi); 6. Paris F (solidi and AR coins); 7. Lengerich D (AV and AR objects; solidi and AR coins)); 8. Kessel D (AV object, solidi)); 9. Duisburg-Grosssenbaum D (AV scrap and solidi); 10. Wanne-Eickel D (solidi and AR object); 11. Belke- Steinbeck D (solidi); 12. Bonn D (solidi); 13. Trier, Neutor 1635 D (solidi and AR coins); 14. Moosch F (solidi); 15. Kaiseraugst CH (AR objects and coins); 16. Chalon-sur-Saône F (silvered bust of Magnentius); 17. Giacomo in Paludo I (solidi)); 18. Emona/Ljubljana 1910 Slovenia (solidi, AR ingots); 18 bis Ljubljana 1956 Slovenia (AR ingots); 19. Kostolac/Viminacium Serbia (AR ingot). Image previously published as Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265. Image: © Martin Guggisberg and Stiftung Pro Augusta Raurica. two gold armrings, and the two pendants from a lost neck-ornament.{42} The argument that the Lengerich treasure belongs in the context of the Velp type of hoard and that its deposition must be religious fails.

marks of rank within the Roman army (Schmauder 1999: 95-103). The owner, therefore, given the richness of the hoard, may be concluded to have been a high-ranking Roman officer of German origin, presumably, given the location of the hoard in north Germany, a Frank (Böhme 1999: 47, n. 7).{43}

The real significance of the Lengerich treasure and the identity of its owner are shown by its location and contents. The findplace, being outside the Empire, shows that the owner of the treasure was a German, and this is confirmed by the hoard of denarii (Schmauder 1999: 94). The rest of the objects, on the other hand, including the uncirculated solidi and the stamped silver dish, and all the gold objects, including the crossbow brooch, the armrings and two nielloed finger-rings, and the pendants probably from a neck-ring, are all certainly or probably

The date of burial of the hoard suggests a reason why this man might have buried his most valuable possessions. A mint-fresh siliqua of Magnentius under stone 3 and the gold crossbow brooch show clearly that the triple hoard was buried in or within a few years after 350, in other words during or soon after the reign of Magnentius (3503). 75

Kenneth S. Painter

Magnentius’ reign was a dangerous time (Drinkwater 2000, 138-45). After the death of Constantine the Great in 337 his three sons divided the Empire between them. Of the three, Constantine II was killed in 340 when trying to invade the territory of his brother Constans in northern Italy. Constans was left to rule the west, and Constantius II the east. In 350, however, Constans was killed in a coup at Autun. The coup was led by Magnentius, who had been born in Amiens, perhaps of a British father and a Frankish mother,{44} and who rose to a senior military post as commander of two units of the field army, the Ioviani and the Herculiani. Magnentius was declared Augustus on 18th January 350, at Autun, and in 350-351 he rapidly won over most of the western provinces and north Africa.

silver coins, and silver plate or ingots, of which the latest objects date between 340 and 353, and were probably all deposited in the ground in the years immediately after 350. These hoards are concentrated in three regions. One group is in the zone west and east of the middle and lower Rhine. Among this group, the Lengerich treasure is the northernmost. The largest of any of the treasures of this date is that found at Kaiseraugst, on the middle Rhine near Basel in Switzerland. The second group is in the Balkans in the area of Ljubljana (Emona/Slovenia) and in northern Italy. A third group can be seen in the smaller number of finds in Normandy and in Britain. Some examples will illustrate the significance of these deposits. Four hoards from Slovenia (Emona, modern Ljubljana), Serbia (Viminacium, Kostolac, Serbia) and northern Italy (Giacomo in Paludo) can be connected with the clashes between Constantius II and Magnentius which led up to Magnentius’ defeat at Mursa in 351.{45} The hoard known now as Emona II included two silver ingots, weighing one and two Roman pounds, and stamped with a coin-like portrait of Magnentius (Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. HF 24) (Figs. 9 and 10). The ingots, issued in 351, must have been given to a highranking officer or civilian in the service of Magnentius when the usurper occupied Emona in that year. There are two other hoards from Emona, of which one (Emona I), including unmarked silver ingots, 49 solidi and a gold multiplum of 1¼ solidi, is dated to 353, and the other, containing 13 gold multipla and dated to 352, which must have belonged to office-holders in the service of Constantius II after the city had been recovered by the emperor in 352.

This was not Constantius II’s only problem. His father Constantine the Great had left him a legacy of war with Sassanian Persia in the east, and so he was in Edessa when Constans was killed by supporters of Magnentius (Drinkwater 2000: 146; Szidat 2003c: 329; Szidat 2003a: 212). But then Constantius II reacted. In the east of the Empire, he moved to check Magnentius by bringing the Balkan and frontier territories of his dead brother Constans under his control. His efforts succeeded, with Magnentius being defeated on 28th September, 351, at the epic battle of Mursa (Osijek, Croatia); but the war dragged on for another two years. The Lengerich treasure is one of about 20 hoards which reflect these and subsequent events (Table 3) (Fig. 7). As Martin Guggisberg (2003b: 281-2, esp. Tab. 6) and Max Martin (2010) have pointed out, they contain gold and

1

Site Britain Water Newton I

Contents and date

Select references

AR objects and solidi; t.p.q. c. 350

Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 16; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 1; Guggisberg 2003c: 335, no. HF12; Hobbs 2006: 222, no. 1375.

2

France Nielles-lès-Calais

Aurei, Solidus; t.p.q. 350-3

Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 10; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 2; Hobbs 2006: 221, no. 1359. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 15; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 3; Hobbs 2006: 222, no. 1372. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 13; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 4; Guggisberg 2003c: 334, no. HF10; Hobbs 2006: 221-2, no. 1369; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 4; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 5; Hobbs 2006: 217, no. 1307. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 11; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, 6; Hobbs 2006: 217, no. 1313. Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 16; Guggisberg 2003c: 334, no. HF8. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 9; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 14.

3

Vaulx-Vraucourt

Solidi; t.p.q. 350

4

Saint-Ouen-du-Breuil, dép. Seine-Maritime

AR and AV objects; solidi and AR coins; t.p.q. 345-50

5

Helleville

Solidi; t.p.q. 340

6

Paris 1626

Solidi and AR coins; t.p.q. 346?

7

Chalon-sur-Saône

8

Moosch

Silvered bust of Magnentius; t.p.q. 350 Solidi; t.p.q. 350-3 76

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

9 10

Germany Belke-Steinbeck

Solidi; t.p.q. 353

Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. No. 1; Guggisberg 2003b, 282, Abb. 2645, no. 11; Hobbs 2006: 218, no. 1321.. Martin 2010: 5, n. 19

Solidi; t.p.q. c 350

11

BeuelSchwarzrheindorf Bonn

12

Deudesfeld, Kr. Daun

Solidi; t.p.q. c 355

13

DuisburgGrossenbaum

AV scrap and solidi; t.p.q. 353

14

Fläsch-‘Lüzisteig’, Kt. Graubünden Kessel, Kr. Kleve

Solidi; t.p.q. c. 350

16

Lengerich, Kr. Hannover

AV and AR objects; solidi and AR coins; t.p.q. 350

17

Niederingelheim

Solidi; t.p.q. 348

18

Trier, Neutor 1635

Solidi and AR spur; t.p.q. 342-3

19

Wanne-Eickel

Solidi and AR object; t.p.q. 353

20

Italy Giacomo in Paludo

Solidi; t.p.q. 350

21

Serbia Viminacium/Kostolac

Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 17; Guggisberg 2003c: 335, no. HF13.

AR ingot; t.p.q. 350

22

Slovenia Emona/Ljubljana 1910

Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 19; Guggisberg 2003c: 335, no. HF14; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1344.

Solidi and AR ingots; t.p.q. 342-3

23

Emona/Ljubljana 1956

AR ingots; t.p.q. 350

24

Switzerland Kaiseraugst

Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 7; Guggisberg 2003: 282, Abb. 265, no. 18; Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. HF23; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1348. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Abb. 265, no. 8; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 18; Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. HF24; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1349.

25

‘Portugal’ ?

15

Solidi; t.p.q. 353

AV object; solidi; t.p.q. 350

Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 2; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 12; Hobbs 2006: 218, no. 1322; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Hobbs 2006: 218, no. 1331; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 3; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 9; Hobbs 2006: 219, no. 1333; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 5; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 8; Guggisberg 2003c: 334, no. HF5; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1342; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 6; Guggisberg 2003b: Abb. 265, 282, no. 7; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1347; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Hobbs 2006: 221, no. 1358; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: Tab. 6, no. 14; Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 13; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19. Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, no. 17; Guggisberg 2003b: Abb. 265, no. 10; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19.

AR objects, ingots and coins; dep. 351-2

Guggisberg 2003b: 282, Abb. 265, no. 15; Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. 22; Hobbs 2006: 219-20, no. 1341; Martin 2010: 5, n. 19.

1360 gold coins; t.p.q. c. 349

Kent 1981: 72-3; Guggisberg 2003: 281, no. 12.

Table 3: Precious metal deposits (including purely coin hoards) c. 340-353 After Guggisberg 2003b: 281, Tab. 6, and Martin 2010, 8, caption to Abb. 4. 77

Kenneth S. Painter

Figs. 8 and 9: Two silver ingots, 8.5 x 8.1 cm, and 9.7 x 5.9 cm, found in 1911 in House XV, Emona, the Roman city of Ljubljana. The ingots weigh one and two Roman pounds (319 g. and 640 g.), and were stamped at Aquileia in 351. The lighter ingot carries a round stamp with the portrait of Magnentius and an inscription round the edge reading DN MAGNEN/TIVS PF AVG (‘d[ominus] n[oster] Magnen-tius p[ius] f[elix] Aug[ustus]’), and, above , a rectangular stamp inscribed CAQPS, probably ‘C[olonia] Aq[uileia] p[u]s[ulatum]. The heavier ingot has a round stamp with a portrait of Magnentius and an inscription of which only the second half can be read: GNEN/TIVS PF AVG. Directly below is a rectangular stamp, of which the only legible letters are FLA. The letters are probably part of a name, Flavus, Flavius, or Flavianus. It is uncertain whether this was the official Flavius Flavianus who in 367-8 had gold bars from Sirmium (Sremska Mitrovica) stamped to show their purity. The silver ingots may have been issued in summer 351, on the occasion of Magnentius’ consulate, to be issued as donatives to his soldiers. The ingots probably reached Emona when Magnentius retreated there after his defeat by Constanius II at Mursa. Image: © Schatzkammer und Museum des Deutschen Ordens, Vienna. To deal with the situation on the upper Rhine in February 350, and in order to open a front against Magnentius and his forces, which included many Franks, Constantius II, who was preoccupied in the east, invited the tribe of the Alamanni to enter the Empire, to cross the frontier of Gaul, and to attack Magnentius’ territory in return for permission to settle.{46} In 351-2 the Alamanni attacked the fortress at Kaiseraugst and its treasure was buried (Peter 2003: 220-2).

that time (Peter 2003: 220-2). The treasure contains 84 silver objects and 186 silver coins and weighs 58.6 kg. It is famous as a dinner service; but a remarkably large number of the objects and coins have now been recognised as political gifts (Cahn 1984; Szidat 2003b: 225-36.). These show that the owner, even though his gold coins have not come down to us, was an officer in the Roman army, like the owner of the Lengerich hoard, but most probably a Roman and of a higher rank (Szidat 2003b: 237-40).

The treasure found at Kaiseraugst, the late-Roman fortress of Castrum Rauracense, is the largest of any of the hoards of the 350s (Cahn and Kaufmann-Heinimann 1984; Guggisberg and Kaufmann-Heinimann 2003; Hobbs 2006: 219-20, no. 1341) (Fig. 10). It must have been buried in 351-2, as other coin-hoards in the fortress show that deliveries of coins were still arriving there at

The sources of the coins and objects which formed the donatives in the treasure show where the owner had served, with concentrations in the Balkans in 337-40 and in Gaul in 342-3 (Tables 4a, 4b).{47} The mints where the coins were struck and the objects were made correspond to the places where the comitatus of Constans 78

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

resided. They show that between 337 and 350 the owner of the treasure spent a substantial part of his military career in the service of Constans, from whom he received a large dish, 55.8 cm in diameter, celebrating Constans’ decennalia in 342/3 (Kaufmann-Heinimann 2003) (Fig. 11). There are no coins celebrating Constans’ decennalia of 347-8, which may be because part of the Kaiseraugst

treasure is missing; but it is also possible that the owner had already fallen out of favour with Constans. He had certainly defected to Magnentius by 350, as the latest objects in the Kaiseraugst hoard are three ingots, similar to those from Emona, and dated by stamps to the early period of Magnentius’ reign.

Fig. 11: The Constans dish from the Kaiseraugst treasure. D. 55.8 cm. Wt. 3096.9 g. The inscription encircling the central roundel reads: AVGVSTVS XCONSTANS DAT LAETA DECENNIA VICTOR SPONDENS OMNIBVS TER TRICENNALIA FAVSTIS , ‘Constans, Caesar Augustus, victorious, celebrates his joyful decennalia, with thrice-happy omens for his tricennalia’ (trans. by Alan Cameron). The owner spent part of his career in the service of Constans, from whom he received this dish, celebrating Constans’ decennalia in 342-3. Image: © Stiftung Pro Augusta Raurica. 79

Kenneth S. Painter

Fig. 10: The Kaiseraugst treasure, the largest of any of the hoards of the 350s, contains 84 silver objects and 186 silver coins. Buried in the fortress of Castrum Rauracense in 351-2. Many of the objects and coins have been recognised as political gifts. Image: © Stiftung Pro Augusta Raurica.

Fig. 12: The treasure of Water Newton I was buried in the Roman town of Durobrivae in Cambridgeshire in about 350. The contents include 30 gold solidi and two pieces of folded plate, which – like the ingots from Emona – weigh 642 g. (2 Roman pounds) and 321 g. (1 Roman pound). The objects were donatives, and the owner is likely to have been a soldier in the service of Magnentius. Image: © British Museum. 80

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

Mint / Date Antioch Nicomedia Constantinople Thessalonica Siscia Aquileia Ticinum Rome Arles Lyon Trier

294305

329-7

337-40

1 1 2 4 1

2 5 15

3 1

2 1

40

coin hoards were buried by men who wanted to safeguard their wealth in the face of these attacks by the Alamanni (M. Martin 2010: 5). Those to the east of the Rhine are most probably the property of German officers from the Roman army, who went back to their homeland, for example to Lengerich, after service in the Roman army. Constantius II had many German officers on his staff, mainly from the tribe of the Alamanni, while Magnentius, similarly, had German officers, but from the tribe of the Franks, and it is in their territory that the hoards to the east of the lower Rhine have been found.{49}

34050

11 14 8 6

The finds to the west of the lower Rhine, the hoards of both bronze coinage and of solidi, were hidden either by provincial Romans or by German officers in the Roman army (M. Martin 2010: 5). They will have been prompted to do so either by the threat from the Alamanni or by the persecution of Magnentius’ supporters by Constantius II after Magnentius was defeated decisively in 353 by Constantius II at Mons Seleuci in Gaul, after which, on 10th August, he committed suicide (Szidat 2003a: 21314).{50} Constantius II had the large number of Magnentius’ supporters arrested, especially the richer ones, and their property confiscated (Ammianus Marcellinus xiv v, 6-9). Some of his opponents, of course, hid their property, and the treasures for which the owners did not return probably number amongst those inside the frontier, to the west of the Rhine.

62

Table 4a: Mints where the Kaiseraugst silver coins were struck, showing two concentrations, one in the Balkans in the years 337-40, and the other in Gaul after 340 (After Cahn 1984: 348). Kaiseraugst Catalogue no.

Donatives

63 76-9

Achilles dish Hemispherical bowls Bowl Hemispherical bowl Euticius dish Decennalium dish of Constans 342/343

80 81 60 59 a.b

66-8 82 65 66-8 59 a.b

60 63 80 85

3 ingots Fluted bowl Hacksilber 3 ingots Decennalium dish of Constans 342/343 Probable donatives Euticius dish Achilles dish Bowl Big plate with niello medallion

Place of production Vessels from the eastern Empire Thessalonike Thessalonike Serdica Nicomedia

A treasure of this sort, but from the west of Gaul, and nowhere near the Rhine, was deposited by a German veteran at St-Ouen-du-Breuil (Haute-Normandie, France, between Rouen and Dieppe) (Gonzalez et al 2001; Gonzalez et al 2004; Guggisberg 2003c: 334, no. 10; Hobbs 2006: 221-2, no. 1369; Reinert 2008). The site consists of a large Germanic settlement laid out about the middle of the 4th century, before 350, and abandoned at the beginning of the 5th century (Gonzalez et al. 2001: 51-6; Gonzalez et al. 2004: 150). The character of the buildings and the finds connect them not to any known settlement in Gaul but to Germanic settlements outside the frontier, in the area of the lower Rhine and therefore presumably Frankish. The excavators explored several interpretations, but preferred a model in which a group of coloni was given land in the Litus Saxonicum in return for helping to defend military establishments in the area (Gonzalez et al. 2001: 56-60; Gonzalez et al. 2004: 1501).

Naissus Balkans or Gaul Vessels from the western Empire Trier Trier Mainz Trier

Naissus Thessalonike Serdica Western Empire?

The treasure was found in a pottery beaker in the filling of a pit (Gonzalez et al 2001: 48, and 47, Abb. 4). It consisted of a gold ring, three silver spoons wrapped in linen, 16 solidi, and 23 silver multipla, dated between 345 and 350 (Gonzalez et al 2001). The coins represent one or more official donatives, showing that the owner had been a soldier in the Roman army. Given the date of deposition and the fact that the owner did not reclaim his property, it seems most likely that he had served under Magnentius and was purged in the aftermath.

Table 4b: Donatives and probable donatives and their places of production in the Kaiseraugst treasure, showing two concentrations, one in the east and the other in the west. The fall of the fortress in 351-2 was not an isolated event, and hoards of coinage ending with coins of Magnentius show the northwards track of the Alamanni down the Rhine into the areas around Mainz and Cologne from 351-2 to 355.{48} On either side of the lower Rhine the

Another treasure for which the owner did not return is that known as Water Newton Ib, from the Roman town of 81

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Durobrivae, now in Cambridgeshire.{51} (Fig. 12) The hoard was found inside a pottery bowl, covered by a lid, and inside that was a bronze bowl, with two detached handles.{52} The contents were two pieces of folded silver plate weighing respectively 642 g (2 Roman pounds) and 321 g (1 Roman pound), the remains of a linen-lined leather purse, and 30 solidi of the mid-4th century. The fact that the large pieces of folded silver plate are combined with 30 gold solidi shows that in this case, as in Gaul, the owner was a retired Roman soldier, presumably British in origin.

bronze military ‘dolphin’-type buckle, dating from the period 350-80, which was also found there.{56} This type of buckle has a distribution not only in England but in northern Gaul and the Danubian provinces (Böhme 1986: 480-1). The Water Newton Ib solidi and the fragmentary bronze buckle are part of the evidence for the presence, in the second half of the 4th century, of units of the late-Roman army. This was demonstrated by Böhme, in his study of all this military metalwork of the middle and later 4th century, which demonstrated how thickly units of the late-Roman army were stationed in the towns and countryside of the south-eastern half of the province of Britain, not only in the coastal areas but also inland.{57} Böhme’s conclusions are supported by the more recent study of gold solidi from Britain by Bland and Loriot (2010: 54, and fig. 43), who have shown that the towns in Britain have a higher proportion of 4th-century gold coins than military sites, and who note that Sam Moorhead has observed that this could reflect the fact that increasingly in the 4th century soldiers were based in towns .

Among the Water Newton Ib coins, the first group, of 4 coins, represents mints not only of the west but of the Balkans and the east, and the second group, of 6 solidi, also represents mints from a wide area, in Gaul, Italy and the Balkans, and as far east as Constantinople (Table 5). The largest group, of 19 solidi, is the most numerous but represents a more restricted group of mints, Trier (9 coins), Aquileia (4 coins), and Siscia in the Balkans (6 coins). The pattern of mints at which the Water Newton Ib solidi were struck is similar to that of the coins in the Kaiseraugst treasure, which show two different clusters, the first in the Balkans in the years 337-40, and the second in Gaul in the period after 340. The Water Newton Ib coins, however, do not include multipla, and so they may reflect the general pool of circulation available at that time rather than a bounty.{53} Nevertheless, the coins do suggest that their owner was in the army and a connection with Magnentius seems reasonable. Mint / Date Nicomedia Constantinople Thessalonica Siscia Aquileia Trier

294305

3297 1 1

337 -40 1 2 1

In Britain, as in the other provinces of the Western Empire such as Gaul, items of Germanic dress show that the forces included a large number of Germanic mercenaries.{58} The evidence, however, does not reveal whether or not the owner of the Water Newton Ib treasure or of the bronze military buckle were Romans, born in Britain or elsewhere in the western Empire, or Germans from outside the frontiers. Historical evidence, on the other hand, suggests that the owners of the Water Newton treasure and the other solidi may well not have survived to recover their property from its hiding place because they were among the more influential and prosperous members of society who had supported Magnentius and who therefore felt the force of Constantius’ wrath. Ammianus Marcellinus reports the revenge wreaked by Constantius II in Gaul and Britain on former supporters of Magnentius after the latter’s suicide in 353 (Ammianus Marcellinus XIV, 5, 1-8). Ammianus (XIV, 6-7) makes particular mention of the reprisals carried out in Britain by Paulus, a secretary of state (notarius), who arrested officers who had sided with Magnentius, seized their fortunes and killed many. Paulus was nicknamed ‘the Chain’ (‘Catena’) because of the complicated web of false charges which he invented against others.{59} This evidence provides good and sufficient reason for the concealment of the Water Newton Ib hoard – and for its owner’s failure to recover it.

340-50

7 9(+1 contemporary copy)

Table 5: Mints where the Water Newton solidi were struck. In support of this theory, it may be noted that, although the Water Newton Ib hoard is not matched by hoards of multiple solidi or other precious metal about 350-3 from elsewhere in the province, five single solidi have been found within the province, two at Chester, and one each at Richborough (Kent), North Bersted (West Sussex) and Hornsea (East Yorkshire) and one more has been found, north of Hadrian’s Wall, at Falstone (Northumberland).{54} These single solidi are of such value that they need to be treated as probable hoards in their own right, even though they are single finds.{55} They are likely to represent soldiers, since three of the five from within the province (one from Richborough and two from Chester) come from military sites. This supports the identification of the owner of the Water Newton Ib treasure as a soldier, as does the fragment of a

The evidence thus demonstrates that the owner of the Lengerich treasure was German, probably Frankish, like Magnentius, and that he served in the Roman army under the sons of Constantine and subsequently under Magnentius. He hid his treasure in his homeland and failed to return for it. Hahn may have been correct, in his publication of 1854, when he suggested that the owner followed Magnentius to Pannonia and died in the defeat at Mursa on 28th September, 351 (Hahn 1854: 53-4). It is also possible, however, that the owner survived the battle or Mursa, only to fall victim, like many others, to the 82

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

defeat at Mons Seleucus or in the purges after Magnentius’ death in 353. What seems certain is that religious reasons cannot account for all 25 of these treasures, the first substantial group of treasures to have been buried for ten or twenty years, having been buried at about the same time, and that they must all be connected with disturbances during or after the reign of Magnentius.

Acknowledgements Roger Bland kindly encouraged me to write this paper. I am grateful for generous help also from many people, but in particular from François Baratte, Martin Biddle, Peter Haag-Kirchner, Annemarie Kaufmann-Heinimann, Martin Guggisberg, Fraser Hunter, Catherine Johns, Richard Hobbs, Frau Sabine Karl-Cohen, Frau Nicola Kleinecke, Ernst Künzl, Max Martin, Stefanie MartinKilcher, William Manning, John Naylor, Richard Petrovszky, Mag. Margit Seebacher, Michael Vock, and David Wigg-Wolf. The following institutions have kindly provided images for use with this paper: British Museum, Historisches Museum der Pfalz Speyer, Niedersächsisches Landesmuseum Hannover, Schatzkammer und Museum des Deutschen Ordens Wien, and Stiftung Augusta Raurica.

Conclusion There is of course no doubt that, as is shown by the Berthouville treasure (discussed above), there are Roman hoards of ‘religious’ objects, identified as such by votive inscriptions, characteristic forms of objects (such as standards or sceptres or votive leaves), and the find-place, including temples, temple-enclosures, springs and pools (Kaufmann-Heinimann 1998: 182-91, 199-202; E. Künzl 2001: 215-16).

Endnotes

Nevertheless, not every object on a sacred site is necessarily religious, and ‘religious’ objects can be present in non-religious contexts because their presence does not necessarily prove conclusively that an assemblage or its contents are ‘religious’.{60} Above all, the deposition of a hoard of silver objects in the ground is particularly hard to identify as ‘religious’. In the case of the Berthouville treasure it is clear that the objects were originally on show in the precinct, quite possibly in the temple itself, but that they were all hidden in the ground not for religious reasons but in the face of some danger, probably about 200, at a spot which may have been within the precinct but which was chosen for its security.

{1} Barkway: Walters 1921: 59-62, nos. 230-6; Lewis 1966: 46, 123-4, 138, 145; Henig 1984: 50-1, pls. 4, 12; Henig 1995: 77, 128; Kaufmann-Heinimann 1998: 202, 228, no. GF2. The Water Newton Christian treasure: Painter 1977; 1999; 2006; Guggisberg 2003c: 341, HF 69. There are three dated hoards from Water Newton: (i) A hoard found in 1974, discussed below and with a terminal date of 350, is referred to by Guggisberg and by Bland and Loriot and in this paper as Water Newton Ib. (ii) A hoard of two solidi of Valentinian II, with a terminal date of 392, is listed by Bland and Loriot (2010: 58, 75, 78, and 83, 364 and Catalogue no. 53) as Water Newton II. (iii) The third hoard, found in 1974 (Painter 1977; 1999; Guggisberg 2003c: 341, HF 69), probably to be dated to the end of the 4th century, consists of vessels and plaques with Christian inscriptions, and is referred to by Painter and by Guggisberg as Water Newton II. {2} For the date see the study of the names of the donors by Nuber (1977: 27-29). {3} Prehistorians: e.g. Geisslinger 1984: 322; Pauli 1985: 199, 857; Pauli 1986; Bradley 1990: passim. Romanists: Poulton and Scott 1993; Thiel and Zanier 1994; Petts 2003; Gerard 2009. For further references see e.g. Thiel and Zanier 1994: 79, n. 34; and E. Künzl 1997: 69, nn. 48, 53. A definitive summary of the immense bibliography in given by E. Künzl (2001: 215, n. 1). Sharp exchanges: see, for example, Millett 1994 and Johns 1994. {4} In its upper reaches the River Rhine is the border between Germany, Switzerland, and France. The Roman frontier lay to the east for most of this stretch; but in the 3rd century the territory in the angle between the Rhine and the Danube had for the most part slipped out of Roman military control. Straightening of the Rhine (known as its ‘correction’) about 1840: Höckmann 1993a: 25. {5} The date of deposit was considered by Hassel (1993) to have been in 277-8; but a study by Gorecki (2006) redated it to about 260. Bernhard (2006) has urged that exact datings should not be adopted and has argued for a general context between 233 and 274.

The problem with hoards such as those discussed above is that some scholars have supposed that one type of evidence is sufficient to characterise them as ‘religious’. They have suggested, for example, that objects found in certain types of ‘religious’ locations were religious, and they have then been inclined to suppose that the finds have been sufficiently explained. It is always necessary, however, to examine closely the content of any particular hoard, to search for strictly comparable hoards, and then to question whether there are common factors not only for the composition but for the burial and non-recovery of such hoards. Hoards hidden in times of great political crisis form one such category. Such evidence has always to be treated with great care.{61} I have tried, however, to show that, if one does not look only at the very local context but gathers evidence from a sufficiently large area, there is good reason to interpret the deposits from Neupotz and neighbouring stretches of the Rhine, and treasures such as those from Lengerich, Emona, Kaiseraugst, St-Ouen-duBreuil and Water Newton, as being not isolated phenomena but related to some of the most momentous events of the 3rd and 4th centuries within and beyond the north-western borders of the Roman Empire. The conclusion to be drawn is that it is dangerous to interpret hoards of Roman silver on the basis of general theories, and that they should each be judged on the widest available evidence. 83

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{6} For an assessment of whether the five prehistoric finds in the Neupotz assemblage were deposited in the Rhine for religious reasons see Stadler 2006. It should be noted, however, that he concludes that the prehistoric objects have nothing to do with the Roman-period deposits. {7} Schönfelder 2006. Schönfelder also suggested the possibility that the objects were lost during the crossing of a ford; but Petrovzsky (2006: 225-6) replied that – if there was a ford – heavy carts could not have been lost in water which was at most hip-deep, and that in any case geological investigations showed that the Roman-period river-bed lay at a depth of 4-6 m. {8} Thiel and Zanier 1994: 65-8, esp. 67, an opinion repeated (68) equally forcefully in their concluding paragraphs. Translation by author. Original text: ‘Wir möchten daher den Grossteil römischer Waffen des 1. Jahrhunderts aus Gewässern als Votiv- bzw. Opfergaben in kultischem Kontext interpretieren.’ {9} E. Künzl’s thesis is necessarily long and detailed, and it is shortened quite brutally here. He catalogued and discussed 165 decorated gladii and cingula found across the Roman Empire. {10} E. Künzl 1996: 442, n. 242, with detailed references to the study published by Wegner in 1976. {11} Mainz was the base, for example, where Drusus Major assembled his forces in 12 BC for his offensive against the Germans. {12} Dates of the swords: nine of the swords (nos. OI 1119) have opus interrasile decoration on the sheaths, a type introduced in the Augustan period at the same time as the military reforms of the army in the north (E. Künzl 1996: 397-8). The 10th sheath (E. Künzl 1996: 454-5, cat. no. M9) is related to a series found at Vindonissa, dated by various coin parallels to 22-3 (E. Künzl 1996: 406-15). The suggestion that the swords were lost before 27 AD and not later is supported by the fact that the group includes no swords of subsequent types. Timber: E. Künzl 1996: 440-1. {13} In support E. Künzl (1999-2000: 551) pointed out that soldiers in legionary fortresses such as those at Haltern and Oberaden on the River Lippe, or in frontier forts on the Main or at Kaiseraugst did not lose their swords or helmets in the water because there was no need for military intervention on the other side of rivers which formed the frontier – and hence little or no need to cross the water and risk loss of weapons. {14} This has kindly been confirmed by Ernst Künzl (pers. comm.). {15} Roman dedications in water: E Künzl and S Künzl 1992; E Künzl 1997: 68-71. Weapons: E. Künzl 1999/2000: 556, 558-61, 663; esp. 557: ‘es fehlen immer und überall die Votivinschriften, die letzlich der schlüssige Beweis für die Verwendung eines Objektes als Votiv sind’ (‘Votive inscriptions are in the end the conclusive evidence of an object being used as a votive; but they are lacking in all periods and at all locations.’ English translation by author). The only exception is the part of a catapult found in the springs at Bath in England (Cunliffe et al 1988: 8-9, no. 6). {16} The Scandinavian finds (Ilkjær and Lønstrup 1982) are not relevant in discussions, for example, of the 11

decorated gladii found in the river at Mainz, which is several hundred miles away from Thorsberg. {17} Germanic incursions of the middle of the 3rd century: Bernhard 2006: 19-21; Van Ossel 2011: 12-13; Witschel 2011. {18} Van Ossel (2011: 12-13, with references to the literature) notes that traces of massive fires in cities across Gaul – for example Arles, Augst, Beauvais, Chartres, Le Mans, Saint-Quentin and Tongres – have been habitually linked to the troubles of this period. {19} Loriot 1999: 170. Estiot (2006: 225, n. 44, cited by Van Ossel 2011: 15), for example, has commented, ‘La dévalorisation officielle, en 282-283, du monnayage de l’ex-empire gaulois a conduit à l’enfouissement d’un nombre considérable de dépôts de la part de propriétaires peu désireux d’échanger leurs économies dépréciées contre des aureliani post-réforme à un taux certainement dérisoire pour eux.’(‘The official devaluation, in 282-283, of the coinage of the former Gallic Empire led to the burial of a considerable number of hoards by owners very unwilling to exchange their devalued savings for the post-reform aurelianai at a rate which they considered derisory.’ English translation by author) {20} Van Ossel (2011: 13) lists cities and smaller settlements which have yielded evidence of massive fires, but also others with no general traces of destruction in the second half of the 3rd century. {21} They were previously thought to have come from Gallia Belgica (Petrovszky 2006: 202-4). Bronze vessels: Upper Rhine, perhaps Augusta Raurica; small knives with curved blades: Limousin district; battle-axes: Aquitania; iron roasting pans: Centre et Bourgogne (Hanemann 2006b). Boats: upper Rhine (Bockius 2006b; Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006: 204-5). {22} This is not to say that many objects in other materials (pottery, stone, wood, bone, textile) were not swept up by the raiders; but the overall target was metal (Petrovszky 2006a). {23} Stefanie Martin-Kilcher (pers. comm.) has kindly pointed out that it is uncertain whether the Germans went home via west Switzerland, as datable burning and destruction in that area belongs rather to the period 27080 or to the destruction which occurred about the middle of the 3rd century – and was frequently removed and repaired. {24} Ammianus Marcellinus XXVII, 7: ‘adortus est vagantes hostium vastatorias manus, graves onere sarcinarum, et propere fusis, qui vinctos hominess agebant et pecora, praedam excussit, quam tributarii perdidere miserrimi’ – ‘he attacked the predatory bands of the enemy, who were ranging about and were weighed down with heavy packs, and, having routed those who were driving along prisoners and cattle, he seized the booty which the wretched tax-payers had lost.’ {25} Höckmann 1993a: 25, and colour plates I and II, maps of 1856 and 1885, showing the meanders in the area round Neupotz, as well as the ‘correction’ of the river of about 1840. {26} Dug-out canoes, including a photograph of two used for carrying a horse and cart with a load of peat in the 1930s or 1940s: Höckmann 1993a: 29-31. Cargo boats, of a type used on the same stretches of the Rhine until the 84

Emergency or votive? Two groups of late-Roman gold and silver hoards

17th century, e.g. at Strassburg: Bockius 2006b; Bernhard and Petrovszky 2006: 204-5. {27} Bockius 2006b: 147-8, and Abb. 173. 1 example from the Wantzenau wreck and 6 from Strassburg: Höckmann 1993a: 49, and 53, Liste V, ‘Stakruderbeschläge’. {28} Double sestertii of Postumus, struck in Cologne in 260, show these ships on the reverse. For this and other evidence: Höckmann 1986: 395-6; Höckmann 1993a: 26, 32-3; Bockius 2006a: 43. Ammianus Marcellinus, 18, 2, 12, reported that the emperor Julian had 40 lusoriae that were used for his troops at Mainz. Remains of four of them were found at Mainz in 1981; one of them has a dendrochronological date of 376: Höckmann 1993c; Cüppers 2005: 468. Archaeological remains of docks and shipyards at Mainz: Höckmann 1986: 370-7, 397-8. {29} All study of this treasure should now begin with the model publication by Schmauder 1999. See also Hobbs 2006: 155, no. 59, and 220, no. 1347. {30} The following list is adapted from Zedelius 1987: 261. {31} The first publication was by von Werlhof in 1849. Subsequent bibliography includes: Hahn 1854; Mommsen 1873: 131-2; Meier 1941: 163-6; Zedelius 1974: 28-32, ‘Der Schatzfund von Lengerich, Kr. Lingen’; Stupperich 1980, with a full bibliography to that date; Zedelius 1987; Schmauder 1999, with a history of research on the treasure; Guggisberg 2003b: 281; Guggisberg 2003c, 334, no. HF6; Hobbs 2006: 220, no. 1347. {32} Zedelius 1987: 262, identifies the siliquae of Magnentius as types Kent 1981, 256 ( = Bastien 1964: 9), Kent 1981, 258 ( = Bastien 1964: 18), and Bastien 1964: 54, the majority having been struck in 350, but some possibly struck first in Trier in 353. {33} Hahn 1854: 5, ‘Keine Spuren eines Begräbnisplatzes, Kohlen oder Scherben, zu bemerken waren.’ (‘There were no noticeable traces of a burial place, of rubbish, or of broken pottery.’ English translation by author). {34} Jacob-Friesen 1939: 233, quoted verbatim by Meier 1941: 163, ‘Dass drei so wertvolle Schätze in unmittelbarer Nähe aufgefunden wurden, zeugt vielleicht dafür, dass diese Stelle in einem Heiligtum lag.’ (‘We may perhaps conclude that the discovery of three such valuable treasures in immediate proximity to each other demonstrates that this spot lay within a shrine.’ English translation by author). {35} For the history of research on the treasure see Schmauder 1999: 104. {36} This was pointed out by Mommsen (1873: 121-2, 131-2). For more recent discussion of the matter see, especially, M. Martin (2004: 242-6 and passim), and also, among others, Bastien in Bastien and Metzger 1977: 2068; Erdrich 2008: 380-1; Wigg-Wolf 2008: 38; Bursche 2008: 394-5. The later coins, on the other hand, are a reliable indicator of the general date of the deposit, in spite of the comments of Kent (1981: 72), ‘The Lengerich hoard, from ‘Free Germany’, terminates with Constantinian solidi and Magnentian ‘siliquae’; but its association with jewellery and 2nd-century denarii

suggests a purely barbarian context, perhaps much later than the date of the coins.’ {37} Zedelius 1974: passim, and esp. 31-2. Zedelius quotes scholars (e.g. Mommsen, Regling, Breitenstein, Bastien) who had previously expressed the same opinion. The deposition of single hoards in more than one container is an unusual but well documented practice: coins - Callu 1979: esp. 12, no. 57; treasure of Vidy (Lausanne), two deposits in the principal room of a house in the centre of the vicus of Lousanna, each containing unworn 35 aurei (plus 2 stray aurei), of 62 types, terminating in 144 (C. Martin 1941); silver plate and jewellery: treasure of the Place Camille-Jouffray, Vienne, two deposits in a pit inside a house, near a temple, but including secular objects with no religious dedications (Baratte 1990: esp. 101). Childerich: Erdrich 2008, 382. The treasure of Eauze (département du Gers), consisting of 28,003 coins (120 kg) and a quantity of jewellery, buried in 261, may also be compared, because, while it was buried in a single hole, it was taken to the site in other containers, probably boxes, and then transferred in equal lots to four leather sacks which were buried with two above and two below, the deposit being completed with the jewellery (Schaad et al 1992: 6-8, 323-7, 340). {38} Böhme 1999: 56, n. 2, describes the treasure as, ‘heute wohl zurecht als ein zusammenhängender, gemeinsam niedergelegter Komplex aufgefasst.’ (‘nowadays understood, probably correctly, as a coherent complex deposited together’. English translation by author). See also Zedelius 1987: 267, ‘Dass es sich bei dem Fund von Lengerich um ein einziges Depot handelt, wird heute niemand bezweifeln.’(‘Nobody now doubts that, in the Lengerich find, we are dealing with a single deposit.’ English translation by author). {39} Böhme’s comments about the Lengerich treasure were made only in a footnote (p. 56, n. 27) to a substantial article. His views, however, warrant serious attention, as always. {40} Geisslinger’s theory: Heidinga 1990: 18, citing Geisslinger 1967: 116-23. ‘Wet’ contexts for Velp-type hoards: Heidinga 1990: 16, and 16, n. 16: ‘In Achterberg [the findplace of Velp I] the treasure is buried in a somewhat higher-lying sand ridge in the middle of a marshy area, in Beilen in a marshy stream valley and in Olst in the banks of the IJssel,’ For strong, clear discussion of the history and difficulties of the dry/wet accessible/inaccessible arguments see Hedeager 1991 and Randsborg 2002. {41} Finds of solidi in the border regions as lost pay: see Werner 1958: 401-5, and comments on the stipendium and donativum by M. Martin 2010: 25-6. {42} Date of deposit: Zedelius 1987: 268. Cross-bow brooch: Schmauder 1999: 96-8. Silver dish: Schmauder 1999: 95-6; Guggisberg 2003b: 281 (n 1106), 282 (n. 1121), 283 (n. 1123). Arm-rings: Germanic – Zedelius 1987: 268; Roman - Schmauder 1999: 98-102, who points out that Germanic ‘Kolbenarmringe’ occur singly and only from the middle of the 5th century. Pendants: Schmauder 1999: 103. {43} For a different view see Zedelius 1987: 268, ‘Der Hort dokumentiert Raub und reiche Beute. Er mag durch mehrere Hände gegangen sein, bevor er zuletzt unter 85

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Steinen verwahrt wurde.’(‘The hoard is evidence of robbery and rich booty. It may have gone through several hands before it was finally placed under stones for safe keeping.’ English translation by author) {44} Original sources: Epitome de Caesaribus 42.7; Zosimus, Historia Nova, 2.46.3, 54.1; Zonaras, Epitome Historiarum, 13.6.1. Drinkwater considers (2000: 143) that Magnentius’ background ... could not have been in any way barbarian’, but that (2000: 144-5) Magnentius might have been a Gaul. {45} Emona I: Bland 1997: 45, no. 87; Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. HF 23; Emona II: Bland 1997: 45, no. 88; Guggisberg 2003c: 336, no. HF 24; Beuing 2007. Emona 1956: Szidat 2003b: 246, n. 982. Viminacium I: Guggisberg 2003b: 282-3, Abb. 266; Guggisberg 2003c: 335, no. HF 14. For the events of these years see Szidat 2003a: esp. 210, 245. {46} Zosimus, Historia Nova 2, 53.4; Sozomen, Historia Ecclesiastica, 5, 1, 2; Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica, 1.26. Szidat 2003a: 212, esp. n. 684 for ancient references and modern discussions. Franks in Magnentius’ forces: M. Martin 1998: 411. Alamanni in Constantius’ forces: M. Martin 1998: passim. In 352/3 the Germans reached the area between Mainz and Cologne. {47} For the detail of his analysis see Szidat 2003b: 230, 232-6. Hoards of the 3rd and 4th centuries in which the gold coins have been linked with imperial donatives and so with the military or official career of the recipient include: Gulf of Lava, Corsica, 268; Partinico, Sicily, 308; Beaurains, France, multiple donatives, the last being in 310; Borca, Serbia, 320s; Sirmium (Sremska Mitrovica), Serbia, c 337; Helleville, France, c 343; Ljubljana II, Slovenia, c 352. For details and bibliography see Bland 1997: 36-7. {48} Peter 2003: 222, esp. Abb. 223, a map showing convincingly that the end-dates of coin-hoards of 351-2, 352, and 352-3 progress northwards. Peter notes, about Abb. 223, ‘Dabei zeigt sich dass Schatzfunde und Münzreihen, die wie Kaiseraugst mit der 5. Prägephase des Magnentius enden, vor allem in der Nordwestschweiz vorkommen. Eine etwas spätere Phase fassen wir mit einem Horizont, der durch Schlussmünzen der 6. Phase charakterisiert wird und sich auf die Gegend von Mainz bis Belgien konzentriert. Noch später sind Funde und plötzlich abbrechende Münzreihen im Gebiet um Köln und Mainz, die Prägungen der 7. Phase enthalten. Aus diesen Indizien geht eine Abfolge der Germaneneinfälle von Süden nach Norden hervor: Die ersten Einfälle betrafen 351/352 das Gebiet der heutgen Schweiz und breiteten sich bis 353/355 rheinabwärts aus.’ (‘This shows that treasures and coin-series, which end, like that from Kaiseraugst [n.b. typo of Kaiseraaugst for Kaiseraugst], with the fifth issue of Magnentius, come to light predominantly in north-west Switzerland. We consider that there is a somewhat later seventh phase which is characterised by final issues of the sixth phase and concentrated in the area from Mainz to Belgium. An even later group, in the region around Cologne and Mainz, is formed by finds and abruptly ending coin-series which include issues of the seventh phase. This evidence indicates a series of German invasions from south to north. The first, in 351/352 they involved the area of

modern [Typo: ‘heitigen’ should be ‘heutigen’] Switzerland. In 353/355 they widened southwards from the Rhine.’ English translation by author). {49} The recruitment of Germans into the Roman army began in the time of Postumus (260-9), grew during the 4th century, and rose greatly in the reforms under Valentinian I (364-75): Böhme 1998: 33-40. Alamanni and Franks in the Roman army: M. Martin 1998. {50} Decentius, his Caesar, and brother, also took his own life, on 18th August. {51} Until 1974 Water Newton was in Huntingdonshire. In 1974, under the Local government Act 1972, Huntingdonshire and Peterborough became part of the county of Cambridgeshire. {52} Johns and Carson 1975; Johns and Carson 1977; Carson and Johns 1979; Bland 1997: 43, no. 2; Robertson 2000: 310-11, no. 1278; Guggisberg 2003c: 335, no. HF12; Hobbs 2006: 222, no. 1375; Bland and Loriot 2010: 10, 78, 91, 93, 364, Catalogue no. 52. The various hoards from Water Newton are described above, in {1}. {53} For advice on this and the following point I am very grateful to Roger Bland. It might have been thought that the coins from eastern mints in the Water Newton treasure, because of their remote origin, were rare in Britain and were therefore acquired by their owner in the east of the Empire as parts of donatives and brought by him to Britain. Bland, however, has noted (Bland and Loriot 2010: 81-2) that, for reasons at present not understood, a higher proportion of 4th-century solidi from eastern mints is found among single finds than in hoards. This means that neither the coins from eastern mints in the Water Newton treasure cannot be assumed to reflect the owner’s military service, nor, similarly, can the solidi struck in western mints. {54} Bland and Loriot 2010: 124 (no. 58 Chester), 125 (no. 63* Chester), 178 (no. 282* Reculver), 181 (no. 301 Richborough), 254 (no. 567 North Bersted), 270 (no. 623 Hornsea), and 222 (no. 469, Falstone). A further solidus has been found at Reculver (Bland and Loriot 2010:178, no. 282); but this has a suspension loop and so must have been deposited at some time later than the minting of the coin in 350-1). I am most grateful to Sam Moorhead for this information. {55} For a similar equation of single solidi with hoards of solidi, see Böhme 1999: 48-51, esp. 49, Abb. 3, where he discusses the significance of an influx into Westphalia of single solidi and hoards of solidi in the late-4th and early5th century. {56} Buckle: Chadwick Hawkes and Dunning 1963: 21218, Type II A; Böhme 1986: 476; 477, Abb. 7.5; Liste 1, no. 37. Dating of ‘dolphin buckles’ - Böhme 1986: 47682. {57} Böhme 1986: 492, and 493, Abb. 18, a map showing the distribution of this metalwork. {58} The evidence for the presence of Germans includes brooches typical of the dress of Germanic men and women (Böhme 1986: 486-91). {59} Ammianus Marcellinus XIV, 8: ‘erat in complicandis negotiis artifex dirus, unde ei Catenae indutum est cognomentum’ – ‘He was a formidable artist in devising complications, for which reason he was nicknamed ‘The Chain’’. 86

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{60} See Baratte’s exemplary discussion of the problem in relation to the treasure of Vaise (in Aubin et al 1999: 163-8). {61} Kos (1995) has put forward careful and methodical arguments against a group of coin-hoards of 259-60 in Raetia being proof of a disaster there under Gallienus, and the 3rd-century coin hoards in Britain clearly have nothing to do with Germanic invasions (E. Künzl 2001: 218; Reece 2002: 69).

Beuing, R. 2007, ‘Silberbarren des Magnentius aus Emona’ and ‘Silberbarren des Magnentius aus Emona’, in Demandt and Engemann 2007, CDROM: Katalog 1.10.38, and Abb. 78. Blanchet, A. 1900, Les trésors de monnaies romaines et les invasions germaniques (E. Leroux, Paris). Blanchet, A. 1936, ‘Les rapports entre les depots monétaires et les évènements militaires, politiques et économiques’, Revue Numismatique, 4 série, 39, 1-70 and 205-13. Bland, R. 1997, ‘The changing patterns of hoards of precious-metal coins in the Late Empire’, Antiquité Tardive 5, 29-55. Bland, R., and Loriot, X. 2010, Roman and Early Byzantine Gold Coins found in Britain and Ireland, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication 46 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Bockius, R. 2006a, ‘Zur amphibischen Grenzsicherung am Oberrhein im späten 3. Und 4. Jahrhundert’, in Stadler et al 2006, 40-3. Bockius, R. 2006b, ‘Schiffsausrüstung’, in Stadler et al 2006, 147-8. Böhme, H. W. 1986, ‘Das Ende der Römerherrschaft in Britannien und die angelsächsische Besiedlung Englands im 5. Jahrhundert‘, Jahrbuch des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums Mainz 33, 468-574. Böhme, H. W. 1998, ‘Franken und Romanen im Spiegel spätrömischer Grabfunde im nördlichen Gallien’, in Geuenich, D. 1998, 31-58. Böhme, H. W. 1999, ‘Franken oder Sachsen? Beiträge zur Siedlungs- und Bevölkerungsgeschichte in Westfalen vom 4.-7. Jahrhundert’, Studien zur Sachsenforschung, 12, 43-73. Bradley, R. 1990, The Passage of Arms: an archaeological analysis of prehistoric hoards and votive deposits (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Burmeister, S., and Derks, H. eds. 2009, 2000 Jahre Varusschlacht Konflikt (Konrad Theiss, Stuttgart). Bursche, A. 2008, ‘Function of Roman coins in the Barbaricum of later antiquity. An anthropological essay’, in Bursche, A. and Ciolek, R. (eds), 395-416. Bursche, A., and Ciolek, R. (eds) 2008, Roman Coins outside the Empire: Ways and Phases, Contexts and functions, Proceedings of the ESF/SCH Exploratory workshop, Radziwill Palace, Nieborów (Poland) 3-6 September 2005 (Collection Moneta 82, and Institute of Archaeology, University of Warsaw (Collection Moneta, Wetteren). Cahn, H. A. 1984, ‘Münzen und Medaillen’, in Cahn, H. A. and Kaufmann-Heinimann, A. (eds), 332-59 Cahn, H. A., and Kaufmann-Heinimann, A. (eds) 1984 Der spätrömische Silberschatz von Kaiseraugst, Basler Beiträge zur Ur- und Frühgeschichte (Stiftung Pro Augusta Raurica, Derendingen).

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Nuber, H. U. 1977, ‘Zum Vergrabungszeitpunkt der Silberfunde von Hildesheim und Berthouville,’ Bulletin des Musées Royaux d'Art et d'Histoire. Année 46 1974, 23-30. Painter, K. S. 1977, The Water Newton Early Christian Silver (British Museum, London). Painter, K. S. 1999, ‘The Water Newton silver: votive or liturgical?’, Journal of the British Archaeological Association 152, 1-23. Painter, K. S. 2006, ‘The Water Newton treasure’, in Hartley, E., Hawkes, J. and Henig, M. (eds), Constantine the Great: York’s Roman Emperor, 210-22, nos. 196-222 (York Museums and Gallery Trust, York). Painter, K. S. forthcoming, ‘Hacksilber. A means of exchange?’ in Hunter, F. and Painter, K. S. (eds). Pauli, L. 1985, ‘Einige Anmerkungen zum Problem der Hortfunde’, Archäologisches Korrespondenzblatt 15, 195-206. Pauli, L. 1986, ‘Einheimische Götter und Opferbräuche im Alpenraum’, Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt ii, 181, 1, 816-71 (De Gruyter, Berlin-New York). Peter, M. 2003, ‘Kaiseraugst und das Oberrheingebiet um die Mitte des 4. Jahrhunderts’, in Guggisberg, M. and Kaufmann-Heinimann, A. (eds), 215-23. Petrovszky, R. 2006, ‘Horte aus dem Rhein’, in Stadler, J et al. (eds), 189-207: (a) ‘Vom Bagger verloren – römische Funde aus dem Rhein’, 189-91; (b) ‘Der Hortfund von Hagenbach’, 192-5; (c) ‘Der Hortfund von Lingenfeld/Mechtersheim’, 196-8; (c) ‘Der Hortfund von Otterstadt ‘Angelhof’ (Rhein-Pfalz-Kreis)’, 199-201. Petrovszky, R. 2009, ‘Hortfunde im Rhein: die Plünderungsbeute von Neupotz und Hagenbach’, in Burmeister, S. and Derks, H. (eds), 212-19. Petts, D. 2003, ‘Votive deposits and Christian practice in late-Roman Britain’, in Carver, M. (ed,) The Cross Goes North: Processes of conversion in northern Europe AD 300-1300, 109-18 (York Medieval Press, York). Poulton, R., and Scott, E. 1993, ‘The hoarding, deposition and use of pewter in Roman Britain’, in Scott, E. Theoretical Roman Archaeology: first conference proceedings, Worldwide Archaeology Series 4, 115-32 (Avebury/Ashgate, Aldershot). Randsborg, K. 2002, ‘Wetland hoards’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21(4), 415-18. Reece, R. 2002, The Coinage of Roman Britain (Tempus, Stroud). Reinert, F. 2008, ‘Der Schatz von Saint-Ouen-du-Breuil’, in Reinert, F. (ed.), 219-24. Reinert, F. (ed.) 2008, Moselgold. Der römische Schatz von Machtum, en kaiserliches Geschenk (Musée National d’Histoire et d’Art, Luxembourg). Robertson, A. S., (edited by Hobbs, R., and Buttrey, T. V. B.) 2000, An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication 20 (Royal Numismatic Society London).

Schaad, D. with P. Agrinier, J.-P. Bernadou, J.-P. Bost, J. Buxeda i Garrigos, J. Daste, F. Dieulafait, H. Guiraud, J. M. Gurt, R. Lequément, J. M. Oller i Sala, J.-M. Pailler, F. Pineau, F. Popelin, J.-C. Revel, J. Schwartz, J. Teitgen, 1992, Le trésor d'Eauze (Éditions de l’Association pour la promotion du Patrimoine Archéologique et Historique en Midi-Pyrénées, Toulouse). Schatzmann, R., and Martin-Kilcher, S. (eds) 2011, L’Empire romain en mutation. Répercussions sur les villes romaines dans la deuxième motié du 3e siècle, Colloque international: Bern/Augst (Suisse), 3-5 décembre 2009 (Éditions Monique Mergoil, Montagnac). Schmauder, M. 1999, ‘Der Verwahrfund von Lengerich, Ldkr. Emsland: Spiegel innerrömischer Kämpfe?’ Die Kunde N.F. 50, 91-118. Schönfelder, M. 2006, ‘Besprechung ‘Der Barbarenschatz’ Acta Praehistorica et Archaeologica 38, 225-7. Stadler, J. 2006, ‘Raubgut oder Göttergabe? Die vorgeschichtlichen Funde aus dem Hort von Neupotz’, in Stadler, J. et al. (eds), 76-9. Stadler, J., with Hanemann, B., Kolb, M., and Petrovsky, R. (eds) 2006, Geraubt und im Rhein versunken. Der Barbarenschatz (Stuttgart: Historisches Museum der Pfalz Speyer and Konrad Theiss VerlagGmBH). Stupperich R. 1980, Römische Funde in Westfalen und Nordwest-Niedsachsen. Boreas, Münstersche Beiträge zur Archäologie, Beiheft 1, 75-6. Stupperich, R. 2006, ‘Zerhacktes Silber-Beuteteilung unter den Germanen’, in Stadler, J. et al. (eds), 210-12. Szidat, J. 2003a, ‘Die Herrschaft der Söhne Konstantins und die Usurpation des comes rei militaris Magnentius. Ein Überblick über die Geschichte der Jahre 337-353’, in Guggisberg, M. and Kaufmann-Heinimann, A. (eds), 203-14. Szidat, J. 2003b, ‘Der Silberschatz von Kaiseraugst: Gedenken zu seiner Entstehung, seinem Besitzer und seiner Funktion’, in Guggisberg, M. and Kaufmann-Heinimann, A. (eds), 225-46. Szidat, J. 2003c, ‘Chronologische Übersicht der Jahre 337-353’, in Guggisberg, M. and KaufmannHeinimann, A. (eds), 323-31. Tegtmeier, U. 2006, ‘Untersuchung an den Holzresten’, in Stadler, J. et al. (eds), 183. Thiel, A., and Zanier, W. 1994, ‘Römische Dolche – Bemerkungen zu den Fundumständen’, Journal of Military Equipment Studies 5, 59-81. Van Ossel, P. 2011, ‘Les cites de la Gaule pendant la seconde moitié du IIIe siècle. État de la recherché et des questions, in Schatzmann, R. and Martin-Kilcher, S. (eds), 9-21. von Werlhof, A. 1849, ‘Über einen Fund römischer Münzen bei Freren im Königreiche Hannover’, in Leitzmann, J. (ed.), Numismatische Zeitung, Nr. 3, 16. Jahrgang, Weissensee, Febr. 1849, 213, Taf. 1, Fig. 22. 90

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Walters, H. B. 1921, Catalogue of the Silver Plate (Greek, Etruscan and Roman) in the British Museum, (The British Museum, London). Wegner, G. 1976, Die vorgeschicchtlichen Flussfunde aus dem Main und dem Rhein bei Mainz, Materialhefte zur Bayerischer Vorgeschichte 30 (Verlag Michael Lassleben, Kallmünz). Werner, J. 1958, ‘Kriegergräber aus der ersten Hälfte des 5. Jahrhunderts zwischen Schelde und Weser’, Bonner Jahrbücher 158, 372-413, pls. 72-83. Wigg-Wolf, D. G. 2008, ‘Coinage on the periphery’, in Bursche, A and Ciolek, R. (eds), 35-45.

Witschel, C. 2011, ‘Die Provinz Germania superior im 3. Jahrhundert – ereignisgeschichtlicher Rahmen, quellenkitische Anmerkungen und die Entwicklung des Städtewesens’, in Schatzmann, R. and Martin-Kilcher, S. (eds), 23-64. Zedelius, V. 1974, Spätkaiserzeitlichvölkerwanderungszeitliche Keramik und römische Münzen von Laatzen, Ldkr. Hannover, Materialhefte zur Ur- und Frühgeschichte Niedersachsens 8, Hildesheim. Zedelius, V. 1987, ‘Zur Goldfibel von Lengerich: Romanus im Reims’, Studien zur Sachsenforschung 6, 261-8.

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The Composition of Hoards Richard Reece Coin hoards have a number of different attributes which receive very variable amounts of study. The intrinsic value most often features in newspaper and broadcast reports, closely followed by the number of coins in the hoard, provided that is substantial, but neither of these attributes attracts much academic attention. More important to the historian, archaeologist and numismatist are the find-spot and the date of the hoard. Unless someone tries to obscure the matter the find-spot can usually be firmly located but the date of the hoard is open to several interpretations.

of the hoard so that several hoards can be placed in a sequence. Where the position of a single hoard in a sequence of composition of several hoards is strongly different from the date of the latest coin the obvious suggestion must be that the latest coin, and presumably some others, was added to a hoard assembled some time before. This view has been contested and perhaps a modern example is needed to support the case. Decimalisation hit the British currency in 1971. Since then the half penny has gone out of use and new denominations, shapes and sizes have been introduced, but there have been no wholesale changes to the mass of money in circulation. Since every coin is dated the changes of module need not cause problems for the example. After shopping people often return home with a pocket or purse full of change. A well-stocked purse of 2012 could be taken, emptied out, and the owner could be asked to reconstruct the contents of the purse as it might have been in 1980. Clearly all coins struck after 1980 would have to be eliminated. The resulting mix of denominations and dates would be possible for 1980 but would almost certainly not correspond to any purses from that date which had survived intact because of the constant loss of older issues and the resulting changes in composition. In order to reconstruct the contents of that purse as it might have been in 1980 the owner needs to know the balance of denominations and dates and that can only be found either by comparison with curated examples or very detailed research.

Related to both human and academic interest is the reason for the concealment and non-recovery of the hoard but this can never be deduced from the numismatic content of the hoard itself. While hoards deposited for votive reasons will be expected to remain in place for some time, perhaps for ever, no one has yet put forward characteristics of composition that allow a hoard to be identified as votive. If the hoard was not deposited for votive reasons then the person hiding it probably intended to recover it at a later date. The contents of the hoard can therefore not explain the reasons for its non-recovery for the simple but obvious reason that when the hoard was hidden recovery was expected. So what interpretations are possible of the simpleseeming phrase 'the date of the hoard'? This is usually taken to be near the date of striking of the latest coin in the hoard. While the date of the latest coin can be found quite easily it is only one of the possible 'dates'. There are also the date at which the hoard was hidden and the date at which the majority of coins in the hoard were assembled. In sequence these might be given as a) the date of assembly, b) the date of the latest coin, and c) the date of concealment. It does not need an unlikely historical scenario to make such a sequence both credible and well spaced out. So a group of coins may be received in payment for stock taken to market – they will have been drawn from general circulation on that day and may, or may not, contain newly struck coins. That group may be stored in the roof of the cottage for some time, perhaps till a further sale of stock, and then second smaller batch of coins may be added. In the third stage the group is taken from the roof for some reason and deposited safely in the garden. The fact of non-recovery can almost never be explained unless there are very good general written sources and detailed local observations either of written or excavated sources.

This example is given because when the assembly of a hoard of 100 coins whose latest coin belongs to the reign of Marcus Aurelius (AD 161-180) is dated to the reign of Hadrian (AD 117-138) through an examination of its overall composition, disputes break out. It is objected that since all the coins in the hoard, taken one by one, were available for hoarding in the reign of Marcus that is probably the date at which the hoard was assembled. The example of the modern purse refutes this. While all the coins in the hoard were available in the reign of Marcus, to withdraw 100 coins from circulation at that date would produce a hoard very different in detailed composition from one formed by withdrawing 90 coins from circulation under Hadrian and adding ten coins later, at least one of which was minted under Marcus. Objectors might attempt a rear-guard action by making it clear that they would never date the composition of a hoard using a single isolated latest coin. This would then force them back to the necessity of considering the composition of each hoard as a whole so that a reliable sequence might be established which is exactly the position I hold.

The date of the latest coin in the hoard, which is so often the main point observed, recorded and discussed, is only of use to give the earliest date possible for the deposition of the hoard. The hoard cannot have been deposited until the latest coin found in it has been struck. But the date of the latest coin is not the same as the date at which the majority of coins in the hoard were assembled; that can only be determined by examining the overall composition

So how can this notion of 'composition' be demonstrated and investigated? This is a danger point in any discussion because I cannot see any method of comparing the compositions of two or more hoards without using numbers. But the mere mention of numbers may deter 93

Richard Reece

120 100 80 60

Fast Slow

40 20 0 start Repub- Marc lic Ant

J-Cl GaOtV VesTitus i pasian

Dom- Nerva Trajan Haditian rian

Fig. 1: Two imaginary hoards, Fast and Slow, filling up at different rates. 120 100 80 Fast Slow Ro 2 GB 5

60 40 20 0 start Repub- Marc lic Ant

J-Cl GaOtV VesTitus i pasian

Dom- Nerva Trajan Haditian rian

Fig. 2: Fast, Slow and two extreme hoards ending with Hadrian plotted as cumulative numbers. 120 100 80 Fast Slow Ro 2 GB 5

60 40 20 0 start Repub- Marc lic Ant

J-Cl GaOtV VesTitus i pasian

Dom- Nerva Trajan Haditian rian

Fig. 3: Fast, Slow and two extreme hoards ending with Hadrian plotted as cumulative percentages.

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The Composition of Hoards 80 60 40 20 0 -20start

Republic J-Cl Vespasian Domitian Trajan Marc Ant GaOtVi Titus Nerva Hadrian

Fast Slow Ro 2 GB 5

-40 -60 -80

Fig. 4: The differences of the four hoards from their average. many numismatists and historians, possibly many archaeologists, from reading further.

If we plot the four hoards together as raw numbers they look very different (Fig. 2). But if we make all the four hoards percentages as in table 2, the numbers look more directly comparable and the diagram (Fig. 3) makes much better sense. This is a rather extended way of saying that there is a very simple diagram, which can be understood as the ‘filling up’ of a hoard towards its total. If any hoard is expressed in terms of the total of a hundred coins – that is, as a percentage – then it will probably fit on the diagram between our very fast (filling up) and very slow (filling up) hoards and many hoards can then be compared at the same time in simple visual terms. Fast ‘filling up’ would be properly expressed as hoards with a bias towards older coins and slow with a bias towards newer coins. So Ro2 has many coins over 100 years old whereas GB5 has a majority of coins struck within 30 years of the latest coin in the hoard.

If we consider two hoards, both of which contain 100 coins, we can imagine the museum trays constructed to contain them with subdivisions for each reign likely to be represented. The two hoards of Hadrian may have some coins of the Republic, Marc Antony, the Julio-Claudian emperors, Nero, AD 68-9, Vespasian, Titus, Domitian, Nerva and Trajan. In fact both hoards are highly untypical – the first has 95 coins of the Republic, two of Domitian, one of Trajan and two of Hadrian so the first tray is almost full in the first period. The other hoards has 95 coins of Hadrian with just one of Marc Antony, one of Titus and three of Trajan. That tray remains almost empty until the last period. The two hoards can be represented on a diagram (Fig. 1) with the fast hoard climbing fast to its final total and the slow hoard climbing slowly.

Fast

If a wide range of nearly 30 hoards of denarii, all ending with coins of Hadrian are examined there are two hoards which are somewhat similar to Fast and Slow. One comes from Romania (Ro2) and one from Britain (GB5). Details of all the hoards mentioned are given in the appendix. The actual numbers of coins are shown in table 1. Fast Start Republic Marc Ant J-Cl GaOtVi Vespasian Titus Domitian Nerva Trajan Hadrian

Slow 0 95 95 95 95 95 95 97 97 98 100

Ro 2 0 0 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 5 100

Start Republic Marc Ant J-Cl GaOtVi Vespasian Titus Domitian Nerva Trajan Hadrian

GB 5 0 8 8 11 11 11 11 11 11 11 13

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 8 12

Slow 0 95 95 95 95 95 95 97 97 98 100

Ro 2 0 0 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 5 100

0 62 62 85 85 85 85 85 85 85 100

GB 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8 8 67 100

Table 2: The four hoards of Table 1 expressed as cumulative percentages. Since there are about 30 Hadrianic hoards to choose from it is obvious that to express them all on the same diagram would result in major complications. But from the complicated diagram hoards of extreme composition (such as Ro2 and GB5) can be picked out one by one and segregated into groups with similar compositions. This works well for the more spaced out hoards which are on the edges of any distribution, but there remain a group which are similar and therefore cluster together on the diagram. These can be separated out by one further step.

Table 1: Two theoretical hoards (Fast and Slow) and two actual hoards expressed as actual cumulative numbers of coins.

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Richard Reece

The most obvious way to do this is by calculating the average percentage of coins of each ruler in each Hadrianic hoard in the sample under investigation and finding how each hoard differs from that average. For those who are allergic to averages it would be possible to choose by eye the line for the hoard which seems to be closest to the centre of the group and to find out how each hoard differs from this chosen hoard. This selection by eye may seem to insert an unacceptably subjective element into what had seemed a relatively objective exercise but this is not the case. The hoards will space themselves out in the same order whatever comparative ‘line’ is chosen. The straight line going from 0% to 100% would work perfectly well but the best spacing, as opposed to ordering, which is always the same, is obtained by a line as near to the average as possible. The procedure is to express each hoard in terms of percentages, to take the mean (average), to sum up each hoard as is done in table 2 above, and then to find the distance between each hoard and the mean by subtracting the mean from each hoard (Fig. 4).

Looking at the numbers of coins from each reign these are hoards made up mainly of coins of Gallienus, Victorinus, Claudius II and Tetricus I and II – and these are exactly the coins that make up the majority of any group of coins from excavations in the radiate period. Corpus no.

Findspot

Date found

No. coins

732

Amlwch, Anglesey

1937

421

741

Agden, Cheshire Riby, Lincolnshire Longton, Staffordshire Much Wenlock, Shropshire Monkton Farleigh, Wiltshire Rockbourne, Hampshire Caerwent,

1957

2443

1953

Probus

1960

1373 0 1739

1977

2582

Carinus

1980

3466

Diocletian (285-6)

1967

7714

Carausius

1860

1051

Carausius

752 759 822 828

In Fig. 4 the average (mean) of the four hoards, Fast, Slow, Ro2 and GB5 is the central zero line from which all hoards start (no coins) and finish (hoard complete). Each of the hoards then deviates from the mean so that Fast and Ro2 ‘fill up ‘ quicker and so go above the mean line early, and Slow and GB5 ‘fill up ‘ slower and so go below the line early and only come up to completion late.

880 903

Date of latest coin Aurelian, prereform Probus

Probus

Monmouthshire

Table 3: Details of the radiate hoards shown in Fig. 6.

In theory, use of this method would enable further separations of large numbers of hoards into smaller groups so that the original 30 Hadrianic hoards can be seen as five or six groups each containing a few hoards which closely resemble one another.

Even if the out of date sample of hoards from which this small group is taken is emphasised the evidence taken at face value suggests a possible uniformity of coinage both in space and time. There is little evidence here of localised economies and restricted circulation throughout lowland Britain and if the end-dates of the hoards are in any way a true reflection of their date of burial that uniformity continued for several decades.

In fact the hoards of Hadrianic denarii do not separate out into neat groups very well for there is a tangle of lines (hoards) left around the average. The British hoards in the group are shown in Fig. 5. Perhaps conclusions can be drawn from such work; certainly questions can be asked. But before seeking such questions I cannot resist reworking a group of hoards of the radiate period which contrast with the British Hadrianic hoards for their similarities shown in Fig. 6 are surprising. With luck the questions arising from the similarity of the radiate hoards may suggest questions for the dissimilarities of the Hadrianic hoards. Or vice versa.

A first suggestion might be that these are all hoards assembled in the moments after the fall of Tetricus I in AD 274 to which a small number of later coins had been added. Since the numbers of later coins have little effect on the balance between the major contributors it is very strange that none of the hoards end with the Tetrici – in other words, were apparently buried soon after their putative assembly. It is of course possible that all of these hoards were buried at the moment of the fall of Carausius or Allectus. In this case the strange feature is the way that their composition is so similar while the date of their latest coins varies.

This radiate group was first published in a review on Prof Anne Robertson's great corpus of Romano-British Coin Hoards (2000) and was found by chance in an attempt to investigate the general pattern of grouping in British hoards. The details of the hoards are given in table 3. There are no obvious characteristics which could account for the remarkable similarity seen in Fig. 5. The find spots are spread from Anglesey to Lincolnshire to Hampshire with no two hoards even from the same county. The number of coins ranges from 400 to 13,000, dates of finding range over a century, and the date of the latest coin in the hoard ranges from AD 273 to AD 293.

Another possible interpretation is that these individual hoards are all parts of one original group of coins divided up and given out to a number of people who took them back to their homes and curated them until they were buried. This idea could perhaps be tested statistically but my attempts to outline a possible procedure became so uncertain that it is clear I should leave the matter to someone better qualified. Even if such a calculation

96

The Composition of Hoards 30 20 10 0 Start ReMarc public Ant -10

J-Cl

GaOt Ves- Titus Dom- Nerva Trajan HadVi pasian itian rian

-20 -30

Weston Waddingt Corb 65 Corb 11 Wrox 14b Westmes Mallerst Dews 25 Brecon Swaby

-40 -50

Fig. 5: British Hadrianic hoards showing their diversity (see appendix). 200 150 100 50 0 Gall Post Vict Quin Tet II Tacit C/C/N/M Dio/Car All Early Sala LaeMar Cl II Tet I Aurel Prob Dio Car -50

H752Pr H903Ca H822CC H828DM H741Pr H732Au H880Ca H759Pr

-100

Fig. 6: A group of radiate hoards from Britain, remarkably similar in composition (see table 3). produced a result which said that there was a 95% probability that the several hoards had individual compositions that were identical to the composite hoard formed by adding them all together this is not the same thing as proving their origin.

AD. But the time of Hadrian is usually seen as a time of relative peace and prosperity, and the later years of the 3rd century AD are often seen as a time of crisis and chaos. Uniformity of hoards ought to belong to a period of quick circulation, which ought to be prosperity, and variety and hoarding ought to belong to the uncertain times.

Different problems, or perhaps opportunities, arise when the general Hadrianic variation is compared with the small group of radiate similarities. What is the likely or possible connection between speed of circulation of coins and the comparability of hoards of roughly the same date? One suggestion might be that the quicker the speed of circulation the better mixed and therefore homogeneous the coinage would quickly become. If after their issue and supply coins went quickly into circulation and continued to move around, the circulation pool might soon attain uniformity. If, on the other hand, coins after issue and supply went quickly into hoards set aside for safe keeping there would be less likelihood of homogenisation. This seems to conflict with the current assumptions about the denarius coinage in the time of Hadrian and the radiate coinage of the later 3rd century

Two points need to be added here. Britain under the rule of Hadrian is a province in which large amounts of money were being supplied to the army and to contractors for civic and military works. While good money supply was certainly beneficial to a sector of society it did not ensure peace and prosperity for all. On the other hand Britain in the later 3rd century AD saw considerable activity in the building, extension and upgrading of villas and farms and sometimes even the change from British styles of planning and building to something more empire-generated. Assumptions of chaos and crisis are just that, assumptions, which in fact militate against the archaeological evidence.

97

Richard Reece

100 80

HM1 H Ro 2 H Be 1 H Be 2 H Hu 1 H Bu 3 H Po 1 H Af 1 H It 2 H ME 2 H Slv 1

60 40 20 0 Marc Ant -20Start

Titus GaOtVi

Hadrian Nerva

S Sever M Aurel

-40

Fig. 7: Hoards ending with coins of Hadrian from different areas of the Empire and beyond (M- Moldavia, RoRomania, Be- Belgium, Hu- Hungary, Bu- Bulgaria, Po- Poland, Af- N. Africa, It- Italy, ME- Middle East, Slv- Slovenia (also see appendix). 80

P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P

70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Republic J-Cl Vespasian Domitian Trajan A Pius Commod Sev Alex -10Start Marc Ant GaOtVi Titus Nerva Hadrian M Aurel S Sever -20

M2 M3 Ro 3 Ro 4 Ro 5 Ro 6 Ro 7 Fr 1 Fr 2 D2 Au 1 Au 2 D3 Slv 2 Po 2

Fig. 8: Hoards ending with coins of A Pius from around the Empire and beyond (M- Moldavia, Ro- Romania, FrFrance, D- Germany, Au- Austria, Slv- Slovenia, Po- Poland; and see appendix). 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Star Re- Mar J-Cl Ga Ves Tit Do Nerv Tra- Had A M Co S Sev pub- c OtVi pasi us miti a jan rian Pius Aur mm Sev Alex -10t lic Ant an an el od er -20

P P P P P P P P P P P P P

GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB GB

21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33

Fig. 9: Hoards ending with coins of A Pius from Britain showing strong similarities (for details see appendix). 98

The Composition of Hoards

If this type of analysis is applied to the general pattern of denarius hoards throughout the empire and Barbaricum it is possible at a glance to see the general pattern of coinage hoarded in any area at any time and to separate out the hoards which deviate strongly from the pattern established. Although the data-base used in this paper needs considerable updating and extension it does seem as if something approaching a ‘normal hoard’ (Reece 1981) can be demonstrated. But this ‘normality’ sometimes varies from area to area. Returning to the denarius hoards whose latest coins are of Hadrian it is no surprise that Britain is very well supplied with such hoards. If a first attempt at gathering similar hoards from around the Empire is shown on a diagram then ignoring two remarkably deviant hoards from Slovenia (Slv1) and Romania (Ro2) which contain over 60% of Republican coins, there is the general pattern shown on Fig. 7. In contrast the hoards from Britain shown in Fig. 5 vary almost as much as is possible.

scale, while written sources are more selective geographically and less complete through time, it does seem worth proceeding from the occasions of agreement of sources to use these results to try to interpret other material anomalies in historical terms. Those who tend to work outwards from the material to possible interpretations might be pleased to hear of a method of examining this question of the need and the supply of money to different regions which can be more easily applied to coin hoards, which do tend to be published, rather than site-finds, whose publication throughout the empire is still sporadic. But as yet we do not even know how or whether sitefinds and hoards relate to one another. Another subject for research. Appendix All the continental hoards used in this paper were taken, some years ago, from the comparative material gathered by Virgil Mihailescu-Birliba in his superb volume on La Monnaie Romaine chez les Daces Orientaux, Bibliotheca Historica Romaniae, Monographies XXIII, Bucharest, 1980 (MB).

When the latest coin is of Antoninus Pius the picture is reversed. Fig. 8 shows hoards of the period from around the Empire which have an organised cluster with other very varied compositions. Fig. 9 shows the hoards from Britain which all concentrate on the coherent cluster. While this paper cannot be a detailed examination of the patterns and problems, at least it can flag up interesting similarities and differences for future research such as the information to be gained from a study of the wear patterns on coins of different dates and in different hoards.

The British hoards used will all be found in the Robertson 2000 An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards (ASR).

A final point on these lines may be the behaviour of British hoards in the Severan period when compared with hoards elsewhere in the Empire. The general pattern is one in which many hoards found outside Britain, whose latest coin is of Septimius Severus or even Severus Alexander, contain only a low proportion of coins struck after Marcus Aurelius or Commodus at the latest. Clearly there are coins of Commodus, S. Severus, and Severus Alexander but they are usually a minor component of the hoard. There are two exceptions to this. In Britain many hoards whose latest coin is of S. Severus have a high proportion of his coins, and in Germany and the nearby frontier area the same is true for coins of S. Severus and Alexander. The results for S. Severus and Severus Alexander will surprise no one. New coin would almost certainly have been supplied for S. Severus' campaigns in Britain, and for Severus Alexander's campaigns against the invaders on the German frontier. Such results may even lead to the question of whether the complications were really necessary to demonstrate something so obvious. This is rather to miss the point which depends on the relationship between material evidence and written sources. Here is a good example where one set of results from a direct study of the material, coin hoards, produces results which are consistent with the information that can be derived from the written sources. But there are other results from the comparison of coin hoards which are not directly explicable by reference to written sources. Since the hoards cover many areas and run throughout the time-

Figs. 2-4 Abbreviation Lapu GB5

Site Lapusnic Weston

Reference MB ASR 130

Fig. 5 Abbreviation Weston Wadding Corb 65 Wrox 14b Westmes Mallerst Dews 25 Brecon Swaby

Site Weston Waddington Corbridge 1965 Wroxeter 1914 b Westmeston Mallerstang Dewsbury 1925 Brecon Swaby

Reference ASR 130 ASR 135A ASR 135 B ASR 139 ASR 140 ASR 141 ASR 155 ASR 160 ASR 165

Fig. 6: see Table 3 above for details. Fig. 7 (all from Mihailescu-Birliba, MB) Abbreviation Site M1 Berzunti Ro1 Lapusnic Be1 Waudrez Be2 Peer Hu1 Tiszanagyrev Bu3 Slatino Po1 Gostynin Af1 Volubilis It2 Castagnaro-Verona ME2 Eleuthereupolis Slv1 Presov 99

Richard Reece

Fig. 8 (all from Mihailescu-Birliba, MB) Abbreviation Site M2 Tansa M3 Muncelu de Sus Ro3 Dimbau Ro4 Cristetii de Mures Ro5 Visea Ro6 Covasint Ro7 Salasuri Fr1 Mont (Moselle) Fr2 Bosc Normand D2 Heddernheim Au1 Altenmark Au2 Wallern D3 Gressenich Slv2 Wyskovce Po2 Brzezing Fig. 9 Abbreviation GB21 GB22 GB23 GB24 GB25 GB26 GB27 GB28 GB29 GB30 GB31 GB32 GB33

Site Corbridge 1969 Norton Bryn Gwydion Well Street London Castleford Carlisle Pyrford Wervin Sheffield Llanymynech Chalfont St Giles Londonthorpe Lawrence Weston

Reference ASR 169A ASR170 ASR 171 ASR 172 ASR 173 ASR 187 ASR 205 ASR 207 ASR 211 ASR 212 ASR 213 ASR 214 ASR 215

Bibliography Reece, R. 1981, ‘The ‘normal’ hoard’, in Carcassonne, C. and Hackens, T. (eds), Statistique et Numismatique, PACT V, 299-308 (Strasbourg, Conseil de l’Europe). Reprinted in Reece, R. 2003. Roman Coins and Archaeology: collected papers, Collection Moneta 32, 283-8. Wetteren, Moneta. Robertson, A. S. 2000, An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards, RNS Special Publication 20 (London, Royal Numismatic Society).

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The Burial, Loss and Recovery of Roman Coin Hoards in Britain and Beyond: past, present and future Peter Guest Introduction

Chalons in 274 that brought about the demise of the final Gallic emperor Tetricus and the reunification of the Roman Empire (Clayton 1880: 264-5).

In September 1879 workmen laying water-pipes near the village of Throckley in Northumberland discovered a large ceramic jar containing just over 5,000 late 3rdcentury radiate coins close to the south face of Hadrian’s Wall. Also known as the Walbottle hoard (today this area is a suburb of Newcastle upon Tyne), the main part of the find included coins issued during the 260s and the early 270s (struck for Gallienus and Claudius II, as well as the ‘Gallic emperors’ Postumus, Victorinus and the two Tetrici), and closed with eight early issues of the emperor Aurelian (270-75). The purpose of this article is to review how Roman coin hoards have been interpreted in the past and, with this in mind, it is instructive to read how the burial of the Throckley hoard was explained after its fortuitous discovery.

W.P. Hedley reassessed the Throckley hoard in 1931 and proposed another reason for its burial and non-recovery. Based on recently published numismatic research, Hedley re-dated the last coins in the hoard to 272 rather than 270. He believed that the two-year gap between these coins and the battle of Chalons meant that Clayton’s original interpretation must be incorrect and, instead, Hedley proposed that the event that led to the hoard’s burial was more likely to have been an attack by enemies from beyond Hadrian’s Wall. Fear of these barbarians would have led to the hiding of the coins for safe-keeping and, although Hedley does not state why the hoard was never recovered, it is clear he believed that its owner must have perished or suffered some terrible fate as he did not dig up his coins once the threat had passed (Hedley 1931: 1620).

The first publication of the hoard appeared in Archaeologia Aeliana in 1880 and the author, John Clayton, used the date of the latest coins to suggest that the hoard was probably buried in 270. He then summarised the tumultuous events that almost overwhelmed the Roman Empire between the secession of the usurper Postumus in 259/260 and its reunification by Aurelian in 275. Like his contemporaries, Clayton was influenced by Edward Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (published 1776-89), and his description of the later 3rd century as a time of crisis and conflict was both vivid and dramatic. It was in this context that the ‘occasion and circumstances’ of the hoard’s concealment were considered, which led Clayton to identify the final act of the civil war as the cause for the burial of the Throckley hoard (here also influenced by Charles Roach Smith’s Collectanea Antiqua, published in 1848). He suggested that it had been hidden by a soldier who was about to depart for the continent to face Aurelian:

Such accounts explaining why coins hoards were buried and lost were common in the 19th century, at a time when changes in farming practices and the expanding population in Britain resulted in the discovery of increasing numbers of hoards under the plough or during construction work (Bland, this volume).{1} It is noticeable that Clayton and Hedley made the same assumptions about the reasons for the burial of the Throckley hoard. Even though they differed in their own versions of the imagined ‘events’ that led to its owner hiding the jar and coins in the ground, both authors believed, firstly that the 5,000 coins had been buried because of an imminent threat to the owner and presumably his property, secondly that it was the intention of the owner to return at some point in the future to recover his buried wealth, and finally that he had been unable to do so because of some unforeseen incident. The nature of the threat that resulted in the hoard’s burial and the circumstances of the owner’s demise are where the accounts differ, but otherwise they follow the same interpretative framework and make the same assumptions about why people would have buried and not recovered coins in Roman Britain.{2}

‘We arrive at the conclusion that the expectation that Aurelian would complete the task undertaken by Claudius of reuniting the "disjecta membra" of the Roman Empire; the dread pervading all classes, both civil and military, that scenes of anarchy and confusion like those which preceded the formation of the Gallic Empire by Postumus would precede or accompany its dissolution by Aurelian, induced the deposit in the soil of Northumberland of these coins, where they have rested for one thousand six hundred and nine years.’ (Clayton 1880: 265)

The evolution of hoarding as historical evidence In 1900 Adrien Blanchet published the earliest systematic discussion of Roman coin hoards, in which the incidence of large numbers of late 3rd-century hoards from the territory of modern France was associated with invasions of Gaul by ‘German’ barbarians at that time. This was one of the first occasions when historical events were used to explain not just individual finds but large numbers of hoards that appeared to concentrate in particular places at certain periods (Blanchet 1900). Blanchet was writing at a time of heightened political tension between France and the recently unified Germany

In this account the fictitious soldier-owner would have intended to recover the coins on his return. Clayton used the fact that they remained in the ground to posit that he must have died on campaign, probably at the battle of 101

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and today we can discern in his publication a more-orless obvious element of the past being used to warn of the new threat from across the Rhine. Looking back, however, Blanchet’s work contains all of the historical ingredients that had featured so prominently in the academic discussions of newly discovered Roman coin hoards in Britain. If a hoard comprised wealth that was buried in the face of a danger, and it remained in the ground because that danger had rendered the hoarder incapable of retrieving his valuables, the logical conclusion was that major disruptive events in Roman history, such as barbarian incursions into Gaul in the late 3rd century, would have produced a tangible response in the form of the mass burial and loss of coin hoards.

Koethe 1942; Werner 1950, and more recently Dembski 1977; de Greef 2002; Gricourt 1988; Haupt 2000; Kos, 1986: 81-83; Schulzki 2002; Wigg 1991). In Britain too, the idea that the hoarding of coins was a natural response by people fearful for their lives and the security of their valuables remained the prevailing interpretative model to explain why hoards were buried. It also continued to be assumed that hoards remained ‘lost’ in the ground because, for some reason, their owners were physically unable to recover their buried wealth (Mattingly, 1932: 88; O’Neil 1936: 64; Sutherland 1937: 154; Robertson 1956: 262; Laing 1969: 65).{3} From the 1970s several scholars began to consider the different types of hoards that Gerov and others had predicted must have existed in the Roman period. The most important of these new discussions in the English language were published by Anne Robertson and Philip Grierson, both of whom suggested that as hoards from periods of peace and economic stability are unlikely to have been buried because of what we might call ‘the fear factor’, there must have been more than one motive for the hoarding of coins (Robertson 1974: 13-15; Grierson 1975: 124-59). Those it was believed were a reaction to threat and insecurity became known as ‘emergency hoards’, while other categories that were devised to explain non-emergency hoarding included ‘savings hoards’, ‘purse hoards’ or ‘accidental losses’, and ‘abandoned hoards’. ‘Emergency’ and ‘savings’ hoards became the classes of coin hoards most commonly referred to and, although it was explained that these were collected for different reasons, both types were held to be similar because it was assumed that their owners must have intended to return the coins back into circulation at some future point in time.{4}

Blanchet’s work was very influential in the development of Roman hoard studies in the 20th century and the observations and ideas he outlined can be traced in the writings of numerous European and North American numismatists and historians. On occasion what we might think of as Blanchet’s ‘principles of hoarding’ were carried to extreme lengths, so that in some instances almost every hoard has been used to demonstrate the effects of a threat on a population, even if that threat was not recorded in the historical sources. Early Roman coin hoards from the former Yugoslavia and Romania, for example, have been used to chart the progress of Roman armies as they conquered these lands between the 1st century BC and the early 2nd century AD (for example, Mirnik 1981; Mitrea 1945; Berciu and Mitrea 1978), while early Byzantine coin hoards from Bulgaria and Greece have been interpreted exclusively as an effect of the Slav invasions into the Balkans in the 6th century (Jurukova 1970; Popović 1975; Vladimirova-Aladzova 1995-1997).

The existence of ‘emergency’ hoards was justified by citing specific instances of this type of hoarding from ancient literary sources and more recent events. Robertson, for example, used a passage in Appian’s Historia Romana (iv, 73), in which the 2nd-century historian from Egypt describes how the inhabitants of Rhodes had concealed their wealth before the city was besieged by Cassius in 42 BC. After capturing the city, Cassius demanded the surrender of all valuables and Appian describes how the citizens were forced to retrieve their hidden treasures from holes in the ground, the bottom of wells and even from graves (Robertson 1974: 14; Robertson 1988: 15). However, by far the most popular example of the burial of an individual’s wealth in the face of imminent danger comes not from the Roman period at all, but from 17th-century England and the famous diaries of Samuel Pepys. In these Pepys describes how the arrival of the Dutch fleet off the south coast in June 1667 forced him to collect together all his money in gold coin and send it together with his wife and father to his country estate away from London, where he instructed that it should be buried for safe-keeping. Only in October of the same year, once the threat from the Dutch had passed, did Pepys attempt to recover what he had buried, digging at night (‘with a pail and a sieve’) lest someone should see him and realise that gold coins were buried in

Blanchet’s principles are evident in another important contribution to the study of hoarding in the Roman period, published in 1977 by the Bulgarian scholar Boris Gerov for the encyclopaedic Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt. In this Gerov set out the basis for his analysis as follows: ‘Coin hoards were hidden at all times and for various reasons. Their large-scale burial at a specific time is an indicator of important events which disrupted the normal course of life: events that led to the deaths of the owners of the hidden hoards, or to them being unable to return to their homes.’ (Gerov 1977: 112). Despite the caveat in his first sentence, Gerov went on to discuss the numerous hoards of 2nd and 3rd century coins from Bulgaria and Romania solely as ‘indicators’ of the many barbarian invasions and incursions into the Roman provinces of Moesia, Dacia and Thrace between AD 101 and 284. Thus, the assumptions that were the basis of first Clayton’s, and then Blanchet’s and later Hedley’s interpretations were firmly established by the last quarter of the 20th century and had become an important part of hoarding narratives throughout Europe (for example, 102

The burial, loss and recovery of Roman coin hoards in Britain and beyond: past, present and future

Fig. 1: Sequence of coin hoards from Roman Britain (based on Robertson 2000 and Abdy 2002) his garden. After a series of mishaps (‘I begun heartily to sweat, and be angry’), Pepys was able to recover most of his gold coins from the ground and, with the exception of about £20 missing, the Pepys hoard was retrieved.

of Romano-British coin hoards, the evidence was systematically organised to present an overview of the pattern of hoarding throughout the Roman period. Over 1,400 hoards were arranged according to the dates of their latest coins and this information was presented in chart form that showed how hoarding in Britain fluctuated between the conquest under the Emperor Claudius and the end of the Roman period in the early 5th century (Fig. 1). Three peaks of hoarding were identified: hoards closing with coins of Marcus Aurelius (161-80), the Tetrici (27074) and Honorius (395-402) – and Robertson’s theoretical basis for interpreting these hoarding peaks was further explained in the following way:

These stories have appeared in many studies of coin hoarding to support the existence of threat-induced ‘emergency’ hoards in Antiquity, yet the relevance of such documented examples of hoarding behaviour to the study of Roman-period coin hoards in Britain has never been fully explained. Nevertheless, the fact that Pepys took care to (and was able to) bury his wealth far away from the epicentre of the Dutch threat in London is noteworthy, as this seems likely to reflect a natural reaction when confronted by danger (a form of the ‘fight or flight’ response to perceived attack, harm or threat to survival).{5} The ideas outlined by Robertson and Grierson, among others, created an interpretative framework that was able to explain every hoard recovered from Roman Britain. Thus, at times of peace and prosperity some people selected certain coins to hoard in order to save them (a minority of which were lost or forgotten about), while at times of unrest and disturbance more people gathered what coins they had to hand in order to keep them safe (a greater proportion of these hoards remained in the ground because of the direct impact of the causes of the unrest). This model also justified the continued discussion of hoards in a supporting role to the historical narrative of Roman Britain. The importance of Prof. Roberston’s article in particular, lay in the fact that, for the first time in the academic study 103

‘If the numbers and the topographical distribution of the coin hoards lost in Britain during each period are considered in conjunction with the literary and archaeological evidence for contemporary disturbances, it becomes clear that in general and allowing for some losses due to mere accident, the evidence of the hoards tallies with evidence from other sources. The loss of large numbers of hoards may then be accepted as a concomitant of unsettled conditions, and even as an index of them, particularly if there were large concentrations of losses in certain areas, and, in the absence of further information, may then be admitted as evidence for unsettlement in Roman Britain which would otherwise be lacking.’ (Robertson 1974: 29-31).

Peter Guest

By plotting the distributions of hoards that formed the three Romano-British peaks, Robertson suggested that the hoards of Marcus Aurelius supported references in the literary sources for disturbances in northern Roman Britain during the 160s, the Tetrican hoards were evidence for the general unsettled conditions in Britain between 270 and 300 (the ‘3rd century crisis’), while the distribution of Honorian hoards reflected the ‘havoc’ caused by Saxons, Picts and Scots landing on the southern and eastern coasts of England during the later 4th and early 5th centuries (Robertson 1974: 31-33). Thus we can see how ideas established in the 19th century continued with only minor modifications into the late 20th century. Up to this point in time, the study of Roman coin hoards had been the preserve of numismatists and historians, but from the 1960s and 1970s archaeologists also began to see Roman coin hoards as a topic that was important to their relatively new discipline’s perspective on the past. Influenced by other social sciences, but particularly anthropology and sociology, archaeologists were more inclined to view the material culture of past societies as evidence of social practices and traditions, rather than as historical evidence. During the 1970s and 1980s, under the influence of socalled ‘new archaeology’ and later theoretical frameworks, empirical methodologies were proposed that would remove subjectivity from the study of archaeological finds and, so it was believed, allow them to tell their own stories instead of being used merely to provide corroboration for historical narratives.

without the intention to recover them at a later date. Several objections to the creation of artificial categories of hoards were raised: firstly, they did not seem to reflect the evidence of the hoards themselves, secondly the hoard categories were derived from a limited number of sources none of which were Roman and British, and lastly it was argued that the evidence should inform the process of hypothesis and explanation rather than the other way around if it was to accurately reflect the actions of people in the past (Reece 1987: 61; Aitchision 1988). In the 1990s the subject of hoarding in the Roman period became a topic of debate at the annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conferences, where the traditional view of coin hoards was challenged by researchers who believed that archaeology and history told different (and not necessarily complementary) stories. The debate between Martin Millet and Catherine Johns exemplifies the differences that existed between archaeologists at that time. Johns, a curator in the Department of Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities at the British Museum, defended the established interpretation of hoards being buried in response to fear and unrest, while Millett, then Professor of Roman archaeology at the University of Durham, questioned this orthodox position and asked why the subject had not embraced some of the recent approaches and ideas from prehistoric archaeologyparticularly the notion previously raised by Aitchison that hoards might have been buried without any intention to recover the objects in the future (Johns 1994; Millett 1994). The publication in 1990 of Richard Bradley’s influential work The Passage of Arms was the most recent articulation of similar ideas in Prehistoric archaeology and, for a while at least, its inspiration extended beyond the Bronze and Iron Ages to the study of hoarding in the Roman period. Any optimism that the study of Roman coins would embrace some of the approaches and interpretations from other branches of archaeology was short-lived, however, and the notion that coin hoards might be evidence of past ritual practices and traditions did not gain favour.{7}

The influential article by Professor Robertson described above, for example, was published in the proceedings of a ground-breaking conference held in London in 1973, at which archaeologists put forward their ideas alongside historians and numismatists. The title of the conference ‘Coins and the Archaeologist’ – was in part a statement of intent, and some of the papers in the subsequent publication together presented an alternative approach to coin studies that today is often referred to as ‘applied numismatics’ (Casey and Reece 1974; Casey and Reece 1988).{6} The organisers of the conference and editors of the proceedings volume would become two of the most influential figures in Roman archaeology in Britain, and for many the work of John Casey and Richard Reece defines the modern approach to archaeologicallyrecovered Roman coins. By the 1980s both Casey and Reece were writing about coin hoards as accumulations of ‘value’ rather than coins per se, which had the effect of broadening the subject’s appeal to others who were also interested in how objects come to embody the concept of value, and thereby became ‘valuable’ in past societies (Casey 1986: 51-67; Reece 1987: 46-70).

In fact, the academic study of Roman coin hoards has proven to be remarkably resilient to change. It is still invariably assumed that hoards were buried with intent to recover and that, unless it can be shown to be otherwise, people mainly deposited objects in the ground in the face of a threat of violence from barbarians or civil war. The eventual (posthumous) publication of Robertson’s An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards in 2000 restates the author’s interpretations put forward in 1974 (and 1956 before that), and this model is also favoured in the most recent general discussion of the subject in the English language by Richard Abdy (Robertson 2000; Abdy 2002).

Reece in particular questioned the evidence for the convenient categorisation of hoards that Robertson, Grierson and others had put forward, while in an important paper in World Archaeology, Neil Aitchison wondered if the reasons for hoarding were more complex than hitherto had been imagined, going so far as to suggest that some hoards might well have been buried

That the pendulum of academic interpretation has swung back once again towards the ideas of Blanchet can be seen in the recent debate regarding the reasons for the burial and non-retrieval of the great treasure hoard of late Roman gold and silver objects from Hoxne in Suffolk. In the publication of the coin element it was suggested that the evidence for hoarding in early 5th-century Britain

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could not support the interpretation of finds like Hoxne as responses to the threat of raiding and invasions by Angles, Saxons, Picts or pirates from Ireland (Guest 2005: 16-21). In the separate publication of the gold jewellery and silver tableware from Hoxne, Catherine Johns expressed the opposite view that Hoxne was most likely buried and not recovered precisely as a result of the turbulent events experienced by the population of Britain at this time (Johns 2010: 201-10). The debate concerning the reasons for the burial and non-retrieval of the Hoxne Treasure demonstrates the gulf that still exists in the study of hoards in the Roman period. Of course, just because an idea or an interpretation has been around for a long time does not necessarily make it wrong, but nor does it make it right and understanding why an explanation first articulated in the 18th century is still so influential in the scholarly debate today is worth exploring in a little more detail.{8} The conservative nature of Roman hoard studies The reasons for the longevity of the ‘emergency’ model for Roman coin hoards in Britain are varied and complex, though I would like to suggest that there are three main causes of this interpretative model’s tenacity: • the legislative framework within which new hoards have been reported and valued • an affinity between modern academic scholarly traditions and Roman history and culture • the division of the study of the Roman period between different academic disciplines The laws concerning who owns finds of objects from Antiquity and what happens to them after their recovery have had a significant impact on the study of RomanoBritish coin hoards. Until 1997 the medieval common laws of Treasure Trove stipulated that gold and silver objects or bullion found in England, Wales and Scotland were legally defined as treasure trove provided that noone could prove they owned it. A further legal condition was that a find would become Crown property if had been buried with an intention to recover it again later (animus revertendi) rather than simply lost (Bland, this volume). By the 20th century, museum curators who wished to acquire important hoards (particularly those in national museums who cared for and displayed treasure trove on behalf of the crown), had to argue at coroners’ inquests that the finds had been temporarily buried and accidentally lost (usually in the face of an exceptional emergency) so that it could be declared treasure. It is evident that the legal necessity to argue for an unknown person’s intent to recover the objects they had buried under unknowable circumstances must have affected how a newly-discovered coin hoard was interpreted.

while Prehistoric hoards in particular generally contain fewer items of weaponry and jewellery that often appear to have been deliberately broken prior to deposition, and are more likely to have been deposited in places from which recovery would have been unlikely (such as rivers). This is one reason why Prehistoric archaeologists are more comfortable than their Roman counterparts with the idea of deposition as part of rituals and ceremonial practices to explain hoarding behaviour. The Treasure Act of 1996 removed the circumstances of burial and loss from the definition of treasure and since that time treasure cases in England and Wales are decided solely on the basis of the nature of the find and its contents. Modern traditions of hoard interpretation have been shaped also by the perception that the Roman past was somehow different to other periods of European history. The influence of Roman Antiquity was particularly strong in 19th century nation states, and in Britain the ruling classes looked to the Roman Empire as a model for their own global hegemony, seeking perhaps to justify British colonial ambitions in Africa and Asia as well as hoping to learn lessons from the past that might help British imperialism avoid its own decline and fall (Freeman 2007; Hingley 2008). To many people the Romans were more like them than their prehistoric or medieval ancestors who had not shared the same ‘civilised’ logic or rational (and therefore modern) understanding of the world. A by-product of this fascination with the Classical world is the long-established assumption that Roman coins functioned primarily as money in the modern sense of the word. This view was uncontroversial for much of the 19th and 20th centuries and underpinned many of the modern studies of Roman coinage (from Mattingly 1932 to Howgego 1995 and Harl 1996). Yet, the physical similarity of Roman and modern coins does not automatically mean that both objects served exactly the same functions. The Swedish historian and numismatist Sture Bolin made precisely this point in his critique of the approach developed by the great German historian Theodor Mommsen: ‘Mommsen has quite simply shifted the monetary system of his own day two thousand years back in time, and in testing various ancient currencies he has based his analyses and made his classification on principles which were valid for the coinage of his own time.’ (Bolin 1958: 12). and: ‘A present-day institution can, of course, trace its descent directly from an ancient institution and retain the same outward appearance without necessarily having the same functions. In the course of its development its functions may wholly or partly have changed their nature.’ (Bolin 1958: 14).

Finds from the Roman period discovered in Britain prior to 1997 were more likely to be classed as treasure trove than others from Prehistory or the Medieval period. To some extent this reflects differences between Roman hoards and those from Prehistoric and Medieval times: Roman hoards frequently consist of large quantities of portable objects (including coins) and intact objects, 105

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Bolin’s basic point is that we are not modern Romans and, therefore, even though Britain during the Roman period was part of a monetised economy, it should not be assumed that how we understand the present-day institution of money was necessarily shared in Antiquity (Aitchison 1988: 271-2; Guest 1997a). While there is no doubt that Roman coins were issued to be used in monetary exchanges, most notably paying the professional army, it is clear that they performed other functions too, for example in gift-giving (particularly as part of formal ceremonies), as votives or grave-goods (for a useful recent summary, see van Heesch 2008). Accepting that Roman coins could have non-fiscal functions has the effect of loosening the conceptual association between hoards and the urge to hide monetary wealth for safekeeping and, most importantly, the assumption that non-recovery indicates some kind of failure, the result of an unintended event such as the death of the hoarder. As Bolin argued over 60 years ago, objective analysis is needed before we can conclude which function, or functions, a coin might have performed in a particular context (including being hoarded with other coins or objects of value).

consequence of which is that comparing the evidence from different parts of the Roman world is more difficult than it should be considering we are studying a single currency, albeit one in use 2,000 years ago. This fragmentation of scholarly principles and analytical methods encourages the study of Roman coinage at the national and subnational scales, which means that coin hoards from one part of the Roman Empire have tended to be studied in isolation from similar hoards from other parts. This is especially the case in Britain where previous discussions of coin hoards have at times demonstrated a typically insular form of academic parochialism. On the rare occasion that hoards from wider areas are collected together for analysis, there remains a tendency to select evidence in order to support a particular predetermined hypothesis, often following the traditional notion that hoards can be used to trace historically attested wars and other disruptive events (see Gazdac 2012 for a recent manifestation of this approach to the study of hoards from the middle and lower Danube). On the other hand, while it is true that coin hoards from Germany, Britain and France etc. are recorded according to different formats, one of the greatest legacies of the 20th century in the field of numismatics consists of the published national corpora of coin finds that now exist for various countries in Europe, including Britain, France, Germany, Austria, Luxembourg, Italy, Slovenia and Hungary among others.{10} These contain vast quantities of invaluable information and, with some effort, it is possible to bring the hoards from different nations together and to compare the patterns of hoarding from diverse parts of the Roman Empire and beyond.

The final reason for the traditionalist nature of the study of Roman coin hoards is the general lack of integration between the academic disciplines of numismatics, history and archaeology. The Hoxne Treasure is a very good example of how these divisions affect the study and interpretation of important evidence. After its initial discovery in 1992 the objects from Hoxne were taken to the British Museum for preliminary analysis and valuation (the Treasure Trove laws were still in operation). The gold jewellery and silver vessels went to the Department of Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities, while the 15,000 or so coins were sent to the Department of Coins and Medals. Dividing the hoard up in this way made practical sense, but the consequence of this was that the two parts were studied independently of one another and, in the end, were published as two separate volumes. The original ambition to publish a third volume bringing together both parts into a single whole again was never followed up and, unfortunately, the analysis of this important find remains based on academic specialisms rather than archaeological reality.{9}

Fig. 2 shows over 500 1st- and 2nd-century coin hoards from five countries, arranged according to the denominations they contain. From this very straightforward analysis it is clear that Britain and Germany produce different types of early Roman hoards to France, Belgium and Italy: in the former countries the ratio of silver to bronze hoards is approximately 3:1 (circa 60 % and 20 % of the total number of hoards respectively), while the opposite occurs in France, Belgium and Italy where hoards of bronze coins are about three times as common as silver hoards. The obvious explanation for this clear divergence is the presence of large number of soldiers in Britain and those parts of Germany to the west of the Rhine limes, who were paid in silver denarii (overall the British and German patterns are remarkably similar).

The hoarding of coins in Roman Britain and the Western Empire- some observations These influences described above have produced a distinctive British approach to the study of coin hoards. During the 20th century, scholars in other European countries also developed their own methods for the study of Roman coinage, and today archaeologists, historians and numismatists interested in coin hoards tend to conduct research according to a patchwork of different national and academic traditions (for recent examples of this in the English language compare Howgego 1995; Harl 1996; Allason-Jones 2011).

It has been recognised for some time that the denarius was closely associated with the Roman army and in this respect Fig. 2 simply proves what was already known anecdotally. The denarius must have been less commonly available to the populations of Roman France, Belgium and Italy once their military garrisons had moved on to Britain and Germany, and in these places the bronze denominations of the sestertius, dupondius, the as and its fractions appear to have composed a far greater proportion of the Roman coinage in circulation. This

These differences even extend to the fundamentals of how coins and hoards are catalogued and reported, a 106

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Fig. 2: Metals contained in early Roman imperial coin hoards from Britain and other parts of the western Empire (up to AD 222). A = 309 hoards; B = 97 hoards; C = 59 hoards; D = 29 hoards; E = 29 hoards. Data from Robertson 2000 (A); Guest 1994 (B-E). suggests that different currencies were in use in different provinces of the Roman Empire, depending on the relative presence or absence of Roman legionaries and auxiliaries. How, if at all, the restricted availability of low-value denominations affected the prices of commodities in the marketplaces of frontier provinces such as Britain and Germany is unclear, but the systematic analysis of early Roman hoards from different parts of the Roman Empire also highlights a number of other differences whose explanation requires a little more consideration.

Other possibly meaningful similarities and differences can be observed from a comparison of the sequences of all Roman coin hoards from these five countries (see Fig. 3 where the national charts are shown with the same yaxis). Although the large numbers of late 3rd-century hoards from France and Belgium have the effect of flattening the sequences from Britain, Germany and Italy, where hoarding seems to have taken place more consistently throughout the Roman period, nevertheless it is clear that all parts of the western Roman Empire share certain key features in their hoarding patterns. The first of these occurs during the later 2nd century when Britain and Italy produce noticeable peaks of hoards closing with coins struck during the reign of Marcus Aurelius, while hoards closing with issues of Commodus are more common from Germany, France and Belgium. The conventional interpretation of the British peak associates hoards of Marcus Aurelius with unrest in the northern part of the country in the 160s, but does not the widespread incidence of later 2nd century hoards from all parts of western Empire mean that we should look for a common cause for this general rise in hoarding activity at this time, rather than evoking explanations that assume the populations of these countries were all affected by contemporary but isolated events? For instance, might the rapid reduction of the denarius’ silver content during the reign of Septimius Severus, closely followed by the introduction of the antoninianus in 215 (more commonly known as the radiate, this new denomination was tariffed

A good example is the unusually large quantity of hoards of gold aurei from France and, to a lesser extent, Belgium (gold hoards represent slightly less than 30 % of all French early Roman hoards). Aurei were hoarded in the Gallic provinces throughout the 1st and 2nd centuries and, therefore, these finds cannot be explained as a reaction to a specific event or series of events. Interestingly, gold hoards seem to be more common in coastal regions and concentrations occur in Limousin and Pays-de-la-Loire in western France, as well as along the northern coast from Haute-Normandie into Belgian Flanders. The causes of this atypical pattern are not known, but it suggests either that aurei were more commonly available in these parts of western and northern Gaul, or, more likely, that the populations in these areas were more prone to bury their gold coins than elsewhere. 107

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108

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Fig. 3: Sequences of Roman imperial coin hoards from Britain and other parts of the western Empire. A = 1492 hoards; B = 258 hoards; C = 276 hoards; D = 118 hoards; E = 95 hoards. Data from Robertson 2000 (A); Guest 1994 (B-E). at two denarii but contained silver equivalent to only 1 ½ denarii), have resulted in the widespread hoarding of old denarii in order to keep these good quality coins in active circulation, if the alternative was to return them to the imperial treasury where they would be reissued as new coins with lower intrinsic values? Closer examination of the hoards’ contents would show if this explanation holds water, but for the time being it is worth noting that later 2nd-century hoards are more likely to consist of denarii than bronze coins.

reformed radiate was increased to some 5 %, but for the next 20 years or so these new coins were struck only in very small quantities and it seems that the local copies were intended to make up for the abrupt reduction in the supply of new official coinage in the 270s and 280s. This means that the late-3rd century peaks shown on the Fig. 3 charts probably demonstrate a general increase in hoarding in the years up to 294/296 when the currency reforms of Diocletian introduced an entirely new currency system. Effectively this spreads the peaks over a longer time period than suggested by their latest coins, and it also raises the possibility that these radiate hoards are somehow a reaction to the Diocletianic reforms that it is believed must have demonetised the existing coinage already in circulation. The reasons for this reaction remain to be fully explored, but the discovery of late 3rdcentury hoards in large quantities from all parts of the western Empire suggests that an interpretation in which these were part of a general response to the economic effects of the ‘3rd Century Crisis’ better fits the evidence than explanations that see these hoards as a consequence of localised unrest in the Roman provinces.

Coin hoards of the later 3rd century are most common from all parts of the western Roman Empire, particularly in France and Belgium but also in Britain. By this time the denarius had long since disappeared and the Roman mints were producing radiates with a silver content of less than 1 or 2 %. The frequency of these hoards from all parts of the Roman world again suggests a universal explanation should be sought for their burial and nonrecovery. Many of these hoards contain locally-made copies (so-called barbarous radiates) that were most likely produced after the emperor Aurelian reformed Rome’s currency in 274. The silver content of the 109

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As the previous discussion hopefully shows, comparing the chronologies of hoards from different parts of the Roman Empire can be an effective way of exploring the available evidence. It is important to bear in mind, however, that charts such as those on Figs. 1 and 3 do not describe actual patterns of hoarding activity over time - in reality they can tell us no more than which hoards close with certain emperors’ coins. Consequently, there must be serious doubts about the reliability of the most popular method of analysis for studying Roman coin hoards and its potential to produce meaningful results. These reservations and some possible ways forward will be explored in the final section of this article.

A more accurate method of dating coin hoards is needed and the obvious solution would be to substitute an indication of a coin’s period of circulation for its date of production. This would reduce the significance of the date of the most recent coin and thereby provide a more realistic indication of when the hoard could have been buried. A hoard closing with a sestertius struck in 145, for instance, would appear in a list or on a chart under Antoninus Pius (138-161), despite the fact that the sestertius can only date the burial of the hoard to that emperor’s reign or later. While it seems very likely that bronzes of Antoninus Pius would have been at their most plentiful during his immediate successors’ lives, can we be certain that this coin was not available to be hoarded also during the reigns of Alexander Severus (222-35) or Postumus (260-9), the first so-called ‘Gallic’ emperor who attempted to return to the 2nd-century standards and struck ‘old fashioned’ sestertii himself?

Future challenges Hoards of Roman objects, including coins, have an important part to play in our continued appreciation and understanding of Roman Britain. It could be that most coins hoards were buried for safekeeping in the face of imminent threat and that the majority of hoarders did intend to return at a later date to recover their hidden wealth, or it might be the case that the deliberate deposition of coins and valuable objects for other reasons was far more common that is currently thought. At the moment, however, we are still some way from being able to make informed judgements about why a collection of coins was hoarded together and it seems to me that there are two major obstacles to a more objective and reliable understanding of coin hoarding in the Roman world. The first concerns the point made earlier that Roman coins are perceived invariably as money, that hoards therefore represent stores of monetary wealth, and that hoarders must have intended to recover this wealth at a later date (i.e. the ‘emergency’ model). The second problem is how coins and coin hoards are dated.

Fortunately, hoards themselves offer the best means of resolving this problem, and by looking at the internal composition of hoards it should be a relatively simple task to reach the point where we could say that, for instance, 50 % of Antonine sestertii had disappeared from circulation by 192, 75 % by 222 and 95 % by 275. We would then be able to state that there is a 50 % chance that the sestertius of Antoninus was still in circulation by 192, but a 25 % chance it was in use up to 222 and a 5 % chance it came to be in someone’s hoard as late as 275. These are invented probabilities because I have not done the analysis, but with time I could and so could anyone else. Then we would be in the enviable position of having the realistic relative sequence of coin use to apply to the dating of hoards, which would lead to a more accurate history of hoarding in the Roman period.{11} Paying closer attention to the contents of Roman coin hoards would improve our understanding of when they were buried and, potentially therefore, the possible reasons for their burial. Certainly there can be significant variation between hoards closing with coins of the same emperor or numismatic issue period, and several studies have attempted to classify the composition of coin hoards – generally based on the proportions of old and recent coins they contain. Hoards composed of mainly older coins are known as ‘archaic’ or ‘early’ hoards, while recent coins are more common in ‘modern’ or ‘recent’ hoards. Previous studies have shown that the application of these more objective and realistic classifications based on hoards’ internal profiles can be a valuable approach to unravelling the often complex patterns of ancient hoarding (for example, Creighton 1992; Lockyear 2007; Reece 2008).

The obvious first step when considering why a hoard was buried in the ground is to find out when the burial took place. It is surprising, therefore, that after so many years of discussion and debate, in most cases we can only state with any degree of certainty the date after which a hoard was buried and not when it was most likely buried. This is because the dating of hoards still relies on the striking of their latest coins and we do not have the necessary knowledge of when and for how long Roman coins were in use and available to be hoarded. Although we have a very good idea when Roman coins were struck, unfortunately, the date when the latest coin in a hoard was produced is often conflated with the date of the hoard’s deposition. The two dates are not the same, however, and the striking of the most recent coin only gives us the time after which the hoard was buried (its terminus post quem), which, given that it is clear Roman coins remained in circulation for many years after they were struck, could have been a considerable period of time before it eventually was buried. This problem with dating has been a cause for concern for many years, yet we still seem to be some way from finding a solution (see Lockyear 2012 for a recent summary).

This method has been applied to the final ‘peak’ in the sequence of Romano-British hoards from the later 4th and the beginning of the 5th centuries (see Fig. 1), providing new perspectives on hoarding at the end of Roman Britain and beyond. More than 200 hoards closing with coins struck for Theodosius I, Arcadius and Honorius between 388 and 402/8 are known from Britain, but dating their burial is challenging as in this case there 110

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are no later coins to provide dates before which they were likely to have been deposited in the ground. Traditionally, this group of hoards has been seen as a short-lived response to the events leading up to the end of the Roman occupation in Britain and its immediate aftermath in the first decades of the 5th century (see Guest 2005: 16-21 for a summary; also Abdy 2006; Abdy & Williams 2006). However, the tpq of 388-402/8 for these hoards is virtually open-ended and in theory there is no reason why they could not have been buried at any time during the 5th century, or potentially even later. A study of the hoards’ contents showed that there are significant differences in their internal compositions, some of which are characteristically ‘early’ while others have more ‘recent’ profiles. This indicates that they were probably buried over a longer period of time than their shared termini post quos suggest. The same study also demonstrated that bronze coins appear to have circulated with a greater ‘velocity’ than silver coins in early 5thcentury Britain, but that the high value coins remained available to be used (and therefore hoarded) for longer than the contemporary small change denominations (Guest 1997b).

hoard from Britain that was definitely buried in the face of an external threat and not recovered as a result of the threat’s aftermath. On the other hand, while we do not know that the ‘emergency’ category of coin hoards existed, we can be certain that some hoards were buried without the intention to recover their contents at a later date. These include the assemblages recovered from the Sacred Spring at Bath and Coventina’s Well at Carrawburgh, Northumberland on Hadrian’s Wall, both of which consist of coins and other objects deposited by many people over long periods of time (Cunliffe and Davenport 1985; Allason-Jones and MacKay 1985; Walker 1988). At these sacred sites a variety of objects performed votive functions and it might be argued that, because the Sacred Spring and Coventina’s Well assemblages were not collected together at a single moment in time, they are not hoards and they should not be considered in a discussion of hoarding in the Roman period. However, this view mistakenly assumes we know what a coin hoard should look like and, conversely, we should wonder how many other votive ‘hoards’ already have been discovered where the nature of the assemblage is not obvious because they were not recovered from a sacred spring or well (see also Sauer 2005 and Sauer 2011)?

Understanding coin hoards as caches of ‘value’ rather than as collections of individual objects would be a significant step forward in the study of the reasons why people in people in the Roman world buried objects in the ground and did not recover them. For instance, although Britain, like all parts of the western Empire, produces far more hoards from the second half of the 3rd century than the first two centuries of the Roman period (which also generally contain many more coins than earlier hoards), simply quantifying hoarding levels in such crude terms will not tell us about the relative worth of these hoards to their owners in the different periods. Late 3rd-century hoards almost exclusively contain radiates whose silver content, and consequently their monetary value, was significantly lower than the bronze denominations produced by the imperial treasury in the 1st and 2nd centuries, and much less than the silver denarius that was hoarded quite commonly in Britain up to the 220s. Therefore, if we take the value of hoards’ constituent coins into account, the burial of many more hoards in the second half of the 3rd century does not appear to reflect an equally significant increase in the value of the coins buried at this time compared to earlier periods. In view of this, instead of markers of insecurity and general crisis, perhaps the late 3rd-century hoarding peak discussed in the previous section simply represents the changing nature of Roman currency and the increasing availability of Roman coinage to more people in more places than ever before?

In April 2010 a metal detectorist found a hoard of 52,503 late 3rd-century coins in a field near Frome, Somerset. Subsequent excavation of the find spot showed that a large ceramic vessel had been placed into a pit before the coins were poured into it and the hoard finally sealed with a ceramic bowl placed upside down over the mouth of the larger vessel to form a lid (see Bland, this volume: fig. 17). The coins are predominantly base silver radiates of the period 253 to 291 and in the past the find would most probably have been seen as a prime example of an ‘emergency hoard’ buried and lost during a period of unrest. An assessment of the burial site and the nature of the hoard itself, however, indicates that it is unlikely the coins were intended to be recovered, as the emergency model requires if the hoard represented a store of monetary wealth temporarily buried for safe-keeping. The large pot could not have been lifted out of the ground without the weight of the coins it contained (approximately 160 kg) causing it to break, so either the intention was that the coins would be recovered in smaller batches, or they were supposed to remain in the ground. Corrosion on many of the coins at the bottom of the pot showed that the pit may well have been filled with water at the time of the hoard’s deposition, and the association of the find spot with water is emphasised by the presence of a nearby spring. On the basis of these critical pieces of circumstantial evidence, the Frome hoard is now thought to have been a votive offering in a special place rather than an ‘emergency hoard’ as traditionally conceived (Moorhead, Booth and Bland 2010). Of course it could be that the community that felt compelled to dedicate these 50,000 coins did so at a time of insecurity or in the face of a coming threat to their livelihoods, but the key difference with the ‘emergency’ model is that they appear to have

The systematic and objective analysis of the evidence can go some way towards moving the debate forwards from the discussion of hoards as either ‘emergency’ and ‘savings’ hoards. As was described earlier, these are invented categories and it is noteworthy that, despite the discovery of many new hoards over the past 30 years and the undertaking of numerous general studies of hoarding, we have not been able to recognise a single Roman coin 111

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buried the coins without intending to retrieve them at a later date (a feature of Roman sacrifice). While the debate about the nature of Frome hoard is likely to continue for some time, the careful consideration of its location, contents and its container suggests that we should not exclude a religious motive for the deposition of coins in the Roman period when they are not found in a sacred pool or a well. Again, we might speculate how many other traditional ‘emergency hoards’ were in fact, like the Frome hoard, votive deposits buried without the intention to return to the site at a later date and recover the coins they contain?{12}

A consideration of other objects either found together with coins as part of a hoard, or in the archaeological context in which the hoard was found, also can have a great deal to tell us about the reasons for their burial and non-recovery. It would be helpful if hoards of multiple object types are discussed as a single entity more frequently, as this might also indicate if some coins were buried and not recovered because their function in the final act of their use-lives was as votives in a religious ceremony. Finally, we might also consider if some hoards were buried and not recovered because the coins they contain had lost their previous value and had become worthless (for example, demonetised coins), or if hoards of objects might have been deliberately left in the ground because they had somehow come to embody or represent a special value – perhaps one that was thought to exert a negative influence on their owners – that had to be disposed of or made safe in this way?

Conclusions This article began with a description of how the Throckley hoard was interpreted in the years since its discovery in 1879, followed by an examination of how hoard studies developed from the end of the 19th century up to the present day. It is suggested that the classification of coin hoards, particularly the invention of ‘emergency’ and ‘savings’ hoards, reflects modern attitudes towards the Roman past rather than proven archaeological reality, while our continued failure to accurately date when hoards were buried and lost remains a significant problem. A number of possible solutions to the dating impasse are suggested here that, it is hoped, would allow us to appreciate coin hoards as cultural as well as historical artefacts (see also Kemmers and Myrberg 2011).

Coin hoards have much to tell us about Roman Britain and its inhabitants. In the past scholars have adopted uncritical approaches to the study of hoarding and today we can see that the picture is far more complex than was previously thought. The years since the passing of the Treasure Act in 1996 and the establishment of the Portable Antiquities Scheme in 1997 have witnessed a surge in the number of known Roman coin hoards from Britain, yet the analytical tools we possess to study this wealth of new evidence remain largely unchanged since the 1970s. We need to develop the objective methodologies that will enable us to examine the complexities of the evidence in meaningful ways, and an appreciation of how the study and interpretation of coin hoards has or has not evolved is the first step in achieving this modest ambition.

The contents of coin hoards and the observable similarities or differences between their internal compositions are likely to be crucial in leading to a better understanding of the hoarding phenomenon in the Roman period, though there are also other areas where knowledge could be improved. These include a greater awareness of the context of deposition – archaeological and topographic as well as historical – which could provide useful information regarding the circumstances of a hoard’s burial and non-retrieval. This means looking not just at the vessels in which the coins might have been contained but, in cases where hoards are discovered in settlements, whether they are found inside or outside buildings, if they are found close to doorways, on top of or under floors and surfaces, or in the fills of external features such as ditches and pits. For the majority of coin hoards that are not found in settlements, the location and aspect of the burial site in the surrounding landscape should be considered. For instance, were hoards buried close to sources of water, prominent features in the countryside, roads, field ditches etc. and was there any identifiable change in the places where hoards were buried during the Roman period? This kind of investigation is relatively straightforward given the availability of GIS programs that allow not just the production of distribution maps, but also more sophisticated analyses that can be used to explore potential intervisibility between hoards and other natural or man-made features in the landscape.

Endnotes {1} The rise in the discovery of coin hoards and other finds was matched by the appearance of local as well as county antiquarian associations whose members would report new finds and publish their accounts in the associations’ transactions. The Antiquarian Society of Newcastle upon Tyne was established in February 1813. The preface to the first volume of Archaeologia Aeliana, published in 1822, records that ‘the purport of its Institution was declared to be “Inquiry into Antiquities in general, but especially into those of the North of England, and of the Counties of Northumberland, Cumberland, and Durham, in particular”’. The institution is now called The Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne and celebrated its bicentenary in 2013. {2} The earliest discussion of Roman hoards from Britain that I am aware of was published in 1724 in John Pointer’s volume Britannia Romana, or Roman Antiquities in Britain, viz. Coins, Camps and Publick Roads. Pointer was Chaplain of Merton College, Oxford and his research included an inventory of known hoards arranged by county. In his preface Pointer discussed the reasons why Roman coins were hoarded: ‘If it should be ask’d, What should be the Reason of burying so much Roman Coin here in Britain? I answer, I am not of Dr 112

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Leigh’s opinion who (in his Nat. Hist.) tells us that the Romans buried their Money rather than that it should come into the Enemy’s Hands. For (alas) of what Service cou’d a Pot or two of Copper Coins be to a whole Country? The intrinsick Value of one of those Pots of Coins, cou’d not amount to above 20, or 30 or 40s at most. But they seldom left their Silver behind ‘em, and when they did, they were but a few Denarii in an Urn. And they knew better things than to leave their Gold behind ‘em. And as for another Opinion, That They hid their Money on Prospect of a Return; the same Answer may serve. I rather think that they buried such Quantities of Money in several Places, as so many incontestable Memorials of the once Roman Greatness, and undeniable Testimonies of the large Extent of their prevailing Conquests.’ I am very grateful to Roger Bland for drawing Pointer’s remarkable book to my attention. {3} This led to the observation that hoards that remained in the ground had somehow ‘failed’ because their intended recovery had not taken place (Reece 2002: 71; Casey 1986: 53). {4} According to Robertson: ‘It has, of course, long been recognised that the widespread concealment and loss of coin hoards, at a particular period, in a particular country or district, was, in all probability, due to unsettled conditions in that country or district. ... in view of the probable connection between the loss of a large number of coin hoards and contemporary events, a study of the Roman coin hoards lost at various periods in Britain may be expected to throw light on contemporary RomanoBritish history, as well as, obviously, in contemporary Romano-British currency.’ (Robertson 1974: 14). Grierson was of the same opinion: ‘Over and above the value of emergency hoards to the numismatist, their study can provide much incidental information to the historian. The total number of hoards is only significant in a general way, since it is impossible to make allowance for the number that were concealed and subsequently recovered, but their geographical distribution is often instructive.’ (Grierson 1975: 133). {5} This also seems to explain the distribution of the unusually large number of coin hoards from period of the English Civil War in the 1640s, which does not correlate with those areas where the fighting was most intense. Instead, these hoards appear to concentrate in parts of the country where the royalist and parliamentarian armies were recruited (Kent 1974; Besly 1987). A similar explanation was suggested by Michael Crawford for the various peaks of hoarding in Italy during the later Republic that occur at the same time as various foreign and civil wars (Crawford 1969; Crawford 1985: 193-4). {6} John Casey and Richard Reece did not consider themselves traditional numismatists. Instead they saw coins as archaeological material that, if studied using modern analytical methods, could integrate coinage within the broader study of the Roman period. As the editors stated in the beginning of the conference proceedings: ‘We hope very much that the appearance of this volume will encourage the necessary co-operation between the two disciplines [numismatics and archaeology] and give archaeologists and numismatists

alike food for thought and incentive to further research.’ (Casey and Reece 1974: foreword). {7} This is in stark contrast to the field of Iron Age numismatics where such ideas have been far more readily accepted as the basis for meaningful analysis and debate (see Haselgrove and Wigg-Wolf 2005). {8} It is a concern when academic agreement or disagreement is based on instincts, beliefs or gut–feelings rather than objective analysis of the evidence. In a review of the John’s volume the reviewer agrees with that author’s view that the Hoxne Treasure was buried by people who were under threat and that burial took place with the intention to recover the accumulated wealth once the threat had passed, suggesting: ‘The careful packing of the objects at Hoxne implies the intention of recovery, and the fact that so many hoards have come from East Anglia, an area likely to have been particularly vulnerable to invasion in the late Roman period, would fit with a pattern of burial for safekeeping.’ (Ling 2011). No-one can know what the careful packing of objects in the treasure chest means, but this statement suggests the Hoxne chest was packed in a particular way because its owners wanted to recover it later and, furthermore, that the ritual deposition of gold and silver objects did not involve the same degree of care. The second fact marshalled to support the ‘emergency’ interpretation is actually not a fact at all but an opinion that fails to take into account the point that has been made several times now, which is that all parts of the Roman Empire were ‘vulnerable to invasion in the late Roman period’ but only southern Britain – including other areas as well as East Anglia – produces such a remarkable concentration of hoards of late Roman objects (Hobbs 2006: 53-63). Hoxne does not fit an obvious ‘pattern of burial for safekeeping’ and it is doubtful if we would recognise one even if such a thing existed. {9} Although the curatorial structure of the British Museum has changed in the past 20 years, how the future discovery of a hoard of similar size and range of objects to Hoxne would be treated is uncertain. The Department of Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities was merged with the Department of Medieval and Later Antiquities in 2003 to form the Department Prehistory and Europe, while the Museum’s numismatic expertise remains in the separate Department of Coins and Medals. A positive development was the transfer of funding for the Portable Antiquities Scheme to the British Museum in 2010, which, as the Department of Portable Antiquities and Treasure, co-ordinates the study of new finds of treasure. In 2013 this was merged with the Department of Prehistory and Europe to form the Department of Britain, Europe and Prehistory. Nevertheless, the separation of archaeological and artefact specialisms for the Roman period remain deeply ingrained in the UK’s academic institutions, including the British Museum. This volume, for example, includes separate articles for Roman hoards based on the different types of objects they contain. {10} Many countries emulated the German arrangement of the Fundmünzen series established in the 1960s, although for various reasons Britain, France and Italy in 113

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particular have followed different formats (see Robertson 2000 and Guest 1994). {11} John Collis introduced the principles of frequency seriation to the question of coin circulation (Collis 1974). In this, an issue of coinage will be most commonly in use in the years after its production, after which the quantities of coins available will gradually and steadily decline until they finally disappear from circulation altogether. This is shown using classic ‘battleship curve’, the length of which depends on various factors, including a coin’s size and appearance, its value and frequency of use, and the influence of external factors such as interventions by the state (who might recall coinage or demonetise coins). The study of Republican denarii, including Marc Antony’s ‘legionary’ issues, in Romano-British hoards has shown that this approach works very well. We know that denarii of the later Republic were relatively common in Britain from 43 AD and that they declined as a proportion of the coins in circulation during the rest of the 1st century before suddenly disappearing from hoards at the beginning of the second. This abrupt termination of the ‘battleship curve’ of Republican denarii in RomanoBritish hoards is convincingly explained as the result of the recall of old silver coins during the reign of Trajan (Reece 1974: 90-94; Reece 1987: 57-60). {12} Therefore, the notion that hoards that remained in the ground should be seen as ‘failed’ hoards because they were not recovered by the owners needs to be reconsidered (see {3} above).

Casey, J. 1986, Understanding Ancient Coins: an introduction for archaeologists and historians (Batsford, London). Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds) 1974, Coins and the Archaeologist, British Archaeological Reports British Series 4 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds) 1988, Coins and the Archaeologist, 2nd edition (Seaby, London). Clayton, J. 1880, ‘Discovery of a Hoard of Roman Coins on the Wall of Hadrian’, Archaeologia Aeliana 8 (2nd series), 256-80. Collis, J. 1974, ‘Data for Dating’, in Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds), Coins and the Archaeologist, 173-183 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Cook, B. and Williams, G. (eds) Money and History in the North Sea World (essays in honour of Marion Archibald) (Brill, Leiden). Crawford, M. 1969, ‘Coin Hoards and the Pattern of Violence in the Late Republic’, Papers from the British School at Rome 37, 76-81. Crawford, M. 1985, Coinage and money under the Roman Republic: Italy and the Mediterranean economy (Methuen, London). Creighton, J. 1992, The Circulation of Money in Roman Britain from the First to Third Centuries (Unpublished PhD thesis: University of Durham). Cunliffe, B. and Davenport, P. 1985, The Temple of Sulis Minerva at Bath. Volume I: the Site, (Oxford University Committee for Archaeology, Oxford). Dembski, G. 1977, ‘Die Antiken Münzschatzfunde aus Österreich’, Numismatische Zeitschrift 91, 3-64. Freeman, P. 2007, The best training ground for archaeologists. Francis Haverfield and the invention of Romano-British studies. (Oxbow, Oxford). Gazdac, C. 2012, ‘War and peace’! Patterns of violence through coin hoard distribution: the Middle and Lower Danube from Trajan to Aurelianus’, Istros XVIII, 165-98. Gerov, B. 1977, ‘Die Einfälle der Nordvölker in den Ostbalkanraum im Lichte der Münzschatzfunde I: Das II. u. III. Jahrhundert (101-284)‘, in Temporini, H. (ed.) Aufstieg und Niedergang der Römischen Welt II 6, 110-181. De Greef, G. 2002, ‘Roman coin hoards and Germanic invasions AD 253-269. A study of the Western hoards from the reigns of Valerian, Gallienus and Postumus’, Revue Belge de Numismatique et de Sigillographie 148, 41-99. Gricourt, D. 1988, ‘Les incursions de pirates de 268 en Gaul Septentrionale et leurs incidences sur la politique de Postume’, Tresor Monetaires 10, 943. Grierson, P. 1975, Numismatics, (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Guest, P. 1994, A Comparative Study of Coin Hoards from the Western Roman Empire, (Unpublished PhD thesis, University of London).

Bibliography Abdy, R.A. 2002, Romano-British Coin Hoards (Shire Archaeology, Princes Risborough). Abdy, R 2006, ‘After Patching: imported and recycled coinage in 5th-6th century Britain’, in Cook, B. and Williams, G. (eds), 75–98. Abdy, R., and Williams, G., 2006, ‘A catalogue of hoards and single finds from the British Isles c. 410675’ in Cook, B. and Williams, G. (eds), 11-74. Aitchison, N.B. 1988, ‘Roman wealth, native ritual: coin hoards within and beyond Roman Britain’, World Archaeology 20/2, 270-83. Allason-Jones, L. 2011, Artefacts in Roman Britain: Their Purpose and Use (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Allason-Jones, L. and McKay, B. 1985, Coventina's Well, a shrine on Hadrian's Wall (Trustees of the Clayton Collection, Chesters Museum). Berciu and Mitrea 1978, Daco-Romania. (Nagel, Geneva). Besly, E. 1987, English Civil War Coin Hoards (British Museum, London). Blanchet, A. 1900, Les trésors de monnaies romaines et les invasions germaniques en Gaule (Paris). Bolin, S. 1958, State and Currency in the Roman Empire to 300 AD (Almqvist & Wiksell, Stockholm). Bradley, R. 1990, The Passage of Arms: an archaeological analysis of prehistoric hoards and votive deposits (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). 114

The burial, loss and recovery of Roman coin hoards in Britain and beyond: past, present and future

Kos, P. 1986, The monetary circulation in the southeastern Alpine Region, ca. 300 BC – AD 1000 (Ljubljana). Laing, L.R. 1969, Coins and Archaeology (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, London). Ling, R. 2011, review of Johns, C. 2010, ‘The Hoxne Late Roman Treasure: gold, jewellery and silver plate’, The Antiquaries Journal 91, 359-60. Lockyear, K. 2007, Patterns and Process in Late Roman Republican Coin Hoards, 157-2 BC., British Archaeological Reports International Series 1733 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Lockyear, K. 2012, ‘Dating Coins, Dating with Coins’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 31.2, 191-211. Mattingly, H. 1932, ‘Hoards of Roman coins found in Britain and a coin survey of the Roman province’, Journal of Roman Studies 22, 88-95. Millett, M. 1994, ‘Treasure: interpreting Roman hoards’, in Cottam, S., Dungworth, D., Scott, S. and Taylor, J. (eds), Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, Durham 1994, 99-105 (Oxbow, Oxford). Mirnik, I. 1981, Coin Hoards in Yugoslavia, British Archaeological Reports International Series 95 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Mitrea 1945, ‘Penetrazione commerciale e circolazione monetaria nella Dacia prima dale Conquista’, Ephemeris Dacoromana 10, 3-154. Moorhead, S., Booth, A. and Bland, R. 2010, The Frome Hoard. (British Museum Press, London). O’Neil, B. 1936, ‘Coins and archaeology in Britain’, Archaeological Journal XCII, 64-80. Pointer, J. 1724, Britannia Romana, or Roman Antiquities in Britain, viz. Coins, Camps, and Publick Roads (Oxford). Popović, V. 1975, ‘Les témoins archéologiques des invasions avari-slaves dans l’Illyricum byzantin’, Mélanges de l’Ecole Française de Rome 87, 445-504. Popović, V. 1981, ‘Une invasion slave sous Justin II inconnue des sources écrites’, Numizmatičar 4, 111-26. Reece, R. 1974, ‘Numerical aspects of Roman coin hoards in Britain’, in Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds), 78-94. Reece, R. 1987, Coinage in Roman Britain, (Seaby, London). Reece, R. 2002, The Coinage of Roman Britain. (Tempus, Stroud). Reece, R. 2008, ‘Roman silver goes abroad’, in Bursche, A. and Ciołek, R. (eds), Roman Coins Outside the Empire: ways and phases, contexts and functions, 59-73 (Moneta, Wetteren). Robertson, A. 1956, ‘The Numismatic Evidence of Romano-British Coin Hoards’, in Carson, R.A.G. and Sutherland, C.H.V. (eds), Essays in Roman Coinage presented to Harold Mattingly, 262-83 (Oxford University Press , Oxford). Robertson, A. 1974, ‘Romano-British coin hoards: their numismatic, archaeological and historical

Guest, P. 1997a, ‘The interpretation of coins: practice and theory’, in Leslie, A. (ed.), Theoretical Roman Archaeology and Architecture: the third conference proceedings, 200-12 (Cruithine Press, Glasgow). Guest, P. 1997b, ‘Coin Hoards and the End of Roman Britain’, in Bland, R. and Orna-Ornstein, J. (eds), Coin Hoards from Roman Britain, Vol. X, 411-423 (British Museum Press, London). Guest, P. 2005, The Late Roman Gold and Silver Coins from the Hoxne Treasure (British Museum Press, London). Harl, K. 1996, Coinage in the Roman Economy, 300 BC to AD 700. (John Hopkins Press, Baltimore). Haupt, P. 2001, Römische Münzhorte des 3. Jhs. in Gallien und den germanischen Provinzen (Verlag Bernhard Albert Greiner, Grundbach). Haselgrove, C. and Wigg-Wolf, D. (eds) 2005, Iron Age Coinage and Ritual Practices (Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike: Berlin). Hedley, W.P. 1931, ‘The Walbottle (Throckley) hoard of Roman coins’, Archaeologia Aeliana 8 (4th series), 12-48. van Heesch, J. 2008, ‘On the edge of the market economy: coins used in social transactions, as ornaments and as bullion in the Roman Empire’, in Bursche, A. and Ciołek, R. (eds), Roman Coins outside the Empire: Ways and Phases, Contexts and Functions, 49-57 (Moneta, Wetteren). Hingley, R. 2008, The Recovery of Roman Britain 1586 to 1910: a colony so fertile. (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Hobbs, R. 2006, Late Roman Precious metal deposits, AD200-700: changes over time and space, British Archaeological Reports International Series 1504 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Howgego, C. 1995, Ancient History from Coins. (Routledge, London). Johns, C. 1994, ‘Romano-British precious-metal hoards: some comments on Martin Millett’s paper’, in Cottam, S., Dungworth, D., Scott, S. and Taylor, J. (eds), Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, Durham 1994, 107-116 (Oxbow, Oxford). Johns, C. M. 2010, The Hoxne Late Roman Treasure: Gold Jewellery and Silver Plate. (British Museum Press, London). Jurukova, J. 1970, ‘Les invasions slaves au Sud du Danube d’apres les trésors monétaires en Bulgarie’, Byzantino-Bulgarica 3, 253–63. Kemmers, F. and Myrberg, N. 2011, ‘Rethinking numismatics: the archaeology of coins’, Archaeological Dialogues 18 (1), 87–108. Kent, J.P.C. 1974, ‘Interpreting coin finds’, in Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds), 184-200. Koethe, H. 1942, ‘Zur Geschichte Galliens im dritten Viertel des 3. Jahrhunderts‘, Bericht der Römisch-Germanischen Kommission 32, 199224. 115

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significance’, in Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds), 12-36. Robertson, A. 1988, ‘Romano-British coin hoards: their numismatic, archaeological and historical significance’, in Casey, J. and Reece, R. (eds), Coins and the Archaeologist, 13-38. 2nd edition (Seaby, London). Robertson, A. (R. Hobbs and T.V. Buttrey eds) 2000, An Inventory of Romano-British Coin Hoards, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication 20 (Royal Numismatic Society , London). Sauer, E. 2005, Coins, Cult and Cultural Identity: Augustan coins, hot springs and the early Roman baths at Bourbonne-les-Bains. (Leicester Archaeology Monographs 10: Leicester). Sauer, E. 2011, ‘Religious rituals at springs in the Late Antique and Early Medieval world’, in Lavan, L. and Mulryan, M. (eds), The Archaeology of Late Antique Paganism, Late Antique Archaeology 7, 505-550 (Brill, Leiden). Schulzki, H.-J. 2002. ‘Der Katastrophenhorizont der zweiten Hälfte des 3. jahrhunderts im Raum der CCAA. Historisches Phänomen und numismatischer Befund‘, Kölner Jahrb. 34, 788. Sutherland, C.H.V. 1937. Coinage and Currency in Roman Britain. (Milford, London). Vladimirova-Aladzova, D. 1995-1997, ‘Barbarenüberfälle in der Provinz Untere Moesia’, Numizmatika i Sphragistika IV, 81-92. Walker, D. 1988, ‘Roman coins from the sacred spring at Bath’, in Cunliffe, B. (ed.), The Temple of Sulis Minerva at Bath. Volume II: the Finds from the Sacred Spring, 281-358 (Oxford University Committee for Archaeology, Oxford). Werner, J. 1950/51. ‘Münzhorte als Quelle historischer Erkenntnis’. Jahrbuch für Numismatik und Geldgeschichte2. Wigg, D. 1991, Münzumlauf in Nordgallien um die Mitte des 4. Jahrhunderts n. Chr. (Studien zu Fundmünzen der Antike: Berlin).

116

The Staffordshire Hoard in Context Kevin Leahy This lecture was originally given under the misleading title ‘The Staffordshire and other Anglo-Saxon Hoards’ which, in view of the unique character of the Staffordshire Hoard, presented some problems. There are, of course, well-known finds from burials, as at Sutton Hoo, Suffolk and Taplow, Buckinghamshire but these are likely to represent a practice unrelated to the caches of precious metals seen in hoards. Hoards are known from the later Saxon period, for example, the Trewhiddle (Wilson 1964: nos. 90-103, pl. XXXIV-XXXVII), Vale of York (Williams and Ager 2010), and Cuerdale (Graham-Campbell 2011) hoards of precious metal objects, deposited, either by the Vikings, or by people trying to keep them from the Vikings. There is also a tradition of hoards of iron tools and weapons as found at Flixborough, Lincolnshire, (Ottaway and Cowgill 2009: 253-77), Nazeing Essex, (Morris 1983: 27-39) and Scraptoft, Leicestershire (Leahy, 2013) but, again, these are of later date and it would be difficult to suggest any similarities with the Staffordshire find. Only the Crondall hoard, Hampshire (Åberg 1926: 148-9, fig. 290; Sutherland 1948) is of comparable date to the Staffordshire hoard but its 101 gold coins and two gold jewels represent material not included in the Staffordshire deposit. In order to place the Staffordshire Hoard into context the finds of Early Anglo-Saxon objects, that passed through the Treasure process between 1997 and 2009, were analysed which, it was hoped, provides a representative sample of 5th- to 7th-century gold and silver. In the first 12 years of its existence the Department of Portable Antiquities and Treasure at the British Museum dealt with 260 cases in which the finds dated from the 5th to the 7th century. Of these 133 were gold, 63 silver-gilt and 64 silver (Table 1).

Bead Bracteate Brooch Buckle

PAS Gold 7 11 6 6

Button Cross

1 4

Helmet crest Hilt fittings Horn mount Pendant

1 1 (set) 55

PAS Silver

Staffs Hoard

1

1 (stone)

41 (30 gilt) 9 (4 gilt) (Fig. 1.4)

1 (?) (silver) 2

(Fig. 1.6 and 1.7) 2 (gilt) (cf. Fig. 1.5) (Fig. 1.1-1.3) 1 (gilt) 8 (1 gilt) (Fig. 1.6-1.8) 7 (4 gilt) 8 (3 gilt) (Fig. 1.1-1.3)

Pin Pommel cap

10

Pyramid

9

15 (10 gilt)

Ring, finger Ring, pommel Seal matrix Studs Total

4

8 (1 gilt) 6 (4 gilt)

2 3 1 + (silver gilt) 73 collars, 151 plates

92 (73 gold, 14 silver, 5 uncertain) 10 (8 gold, 1 silver, 1 plated) 4 (3 staples)

1 8 124

106

6

Table 1: Finds of Early Anglo-Saxon Treasure recorded between 1997 and 2009. All finds are of gold, unless otherwise stated.{1}

Table 1 shows how the hoard differs from the general pattern of gold and silver recorded by the PAS but, needless to say, some interpretation and caution is needed. Of the 47 brooches reported as Treasure, 37 are 6th century or earlier, and only three, all gold, are assigned to the 7th century. Perhaps the shortage of brooches in the Staffordshire hoard is not as surprising as first thought. The small silver brooch found with the hoard (K-786) is a simple slip-knot ring with a disproportionately large pin. While plain, and difficult to date, it is probably best seen as part of the hoard deposit. The absence of gold bracteates in the hoard is also likely to be due to chronological factors; bracteates are a 5th to 6th century phenomenon. We are on safer ground with the pendants, of which 40 of the Treasure finds (all gold) could be assigned to the 7th century (Fig. 1.6-1.8) and a further 14 to the 6th/7th century, the remaining nine were of 5th to 6th century date. The absence of these, otherwise common, objects in 117

the Staffordshire hoard must be significant: they are not rare, representing 32.3% of the 7th-century gold with a further 11.3% being assigned to the 6th/7th century. A garnet-set gold pendant was found at Hammerwich, 1.5km from the hoard find spot (DCMS 2006: cat. 115) which might be significant as this material is scarce South Staffordshire. Seven gold beads, which were worn ensuite with pendants, have been reported, but are also absent from the hoard. In addition to the pendants, four cross-pendants have been recorded (see the examples from Newark, Nottinghamshire (Fig. 1.6): British Museum 2009: cat. 181; and Newball, Lincolnshire (Fig. 1.7): DCMS 2004b: cat. 92). A cross-pendant was found in the hoard (K303 together with an altar, or processional, cross (K655) and the inscribed strip which might be an arm from a cross (K550).{2} It is notable that none of the other crosses recorded as Treasure represents craftsmanship of the highest order and garnets, where used, may have been reused, pointing, perhaps, to declining standards in the later 7th century.

Kevin Leahy

Fig. 1: Some of the 7th-century gold objects found in England since 1995. These objects vary in size and some have been enlarged for visibility, in each case one of the main dimension is quoted. 1.1. Gold and garnet pommel cap from Ludlow (Dinham), Salops. This bears clear Christian imagery with the three crosses of Calvary flanked by beasts’ heads. Width: 35mm. Webster 2005: 32, fig.7 a and b. Image: The British Museum. 1.2 Filigree gold hilt fittings from near Market Rasen, Lincs. Five fittings from the hilt of a sword; pommel cap, upper and lower guard plates and two collars from the grip. The small ingot was found with them (DCMS 2004a: cat. 58). Width of pommel cap 40mm. Image: author. 1.3. Pommel cap from Aldborough, East Riding of Yorkshire. One face is decorated with filigree, the other with cells of the type used in cloisonné work but, in this case, there are empty (DCMS 2000: cat. 06). Width 45mm. Image: author. 1.4. Cloisonne garnet set tongue plate and part of the foot of a three-rivet buckle from near Doncaster, South Yorkshire (DCMS 2006: cat. 136). Width of plate 25mm. Image: PAS. 1.5. Gold and garnet mount in the form of a boar’s head, Nornay, Notts. This fine object may have come from the crest of a helmet. Length 14mm. Image: author. 1.6. Gold and garnet cross pendant from Newark, Nottinghamshire (DCMS 2002: cat. 75). Width 25mm. Image: PAS 1.7. Gold and garnet pendant in the form of a cicada insect, Horncastle area, Lincolnshire (DCMS 2004b: cat. 92). Width 20mm. Image: author. 1.8. Gold cross-pendant from Newball, Lincolnshire (British Museum 2008: cat. 272). Width 20mm. Image: author. 118

The Staffordshire Hoard in Context

In addition to the absence of feminine dress fittings in the Staffordshire Hoard this writer has commented (Leahy and Bland 2009: 11) on the lack of fine buckles bearing three large rivets, as typified by the examples Alton, Hampshire, Faversham, Wickhambreux, Sarre, Kent and Taplow, Buckinghamshire (Speake 1980: pl. 6 and 7). While 15 buckles have passed through the Treasure process, large, three rivet, buckles appear uncommon and only four could be seen as being of a quality comparable to the Staffordshire Hoard (the gold buckle tongue plate from Thurnham, Kent (British Museum 2008: cat. 285); a silver gilt tongue plate and three rivet plate fragment from near Doncaster (DCMS 2006: cat. 136; Fig. 1.4); a silver buckle and plate from Littlebourne, Kent (DCMS 2000: cat. 61) and the buckles from Prittlewell, Essex (Museum of London 2004: 26-7). There are also two small gold buckles from Letheringset with Glandford, Norfolk (DCMS 2006: cat. 135) which are very similar to two small gold buckles found in the hoard (K144 and K685). Large, fine buckles are, it seems, again less common than I assumed and their absence from the hoard might not be surprising.

Staffs hoard (80 Finds) PAS Treasure (16 finds)

Cloisonné 20 (25.0%) 4 (one Ag) (25.0%)

Incised 9 (11.3%) 3 (18.8%)

Cabochon 1 (6.3%)

Filigree 51 (63.8%) 8 (50.0%)

Table 2: Decorated pommel caps recorded as Treasure between 1997 and 2009 and from the Staffordshire hoard. Incised decoration includes only figurative designs and not straight linear decoration. Objects bearing both cloisonné and filigree (as on Fig. 1.3) appear in both columns but as this occurs in both data sets a comparison can be made. Other hilt fittings such as grip collars and guard plates are rare and we only have the find from near Market Rasen, Lincolnshire (DCMS 2004a: cat. 58; Fig. 1.2) where a near-complete hilt assembly was found. In addition to the Treasure finds the PAS recorded (to January 2012), 16 copper alloy pommel caps. This figure seems low as it might have been expected that base metal caps would be considerably more common than those of precious metal. The number of base metal pommel caps may have been even lower, as some may have been originally covered with gold plates, a practice seen in the Staffordshire hoard and on the gold caps from Wellingore, Lincolnshire (DCMS 2004b: cat. 117) and Aldborough, East Yorkshire (DCMS 2000: cat. 60; Fig. 1.3).

The other costume accessories missing from the hoard are finger-rings although the Treasure records might go some way towards explaining this. Of the 12 early AngloSaxon rings recorded eight were seen as 6th century or earlier (two gold, one gilt, the rest silver) one was 6th to 7th century (silver) and three were 7th century (two gold and one silver). It appears from the Treasure records that 7th-century finger-rings were not common and it would be wrong to place too much emphasis on the absence of them from the hoard.

A feature of some early medieval swords is a ring attached to the upper plate of the pommel (Fischer 2008). Six silver pommel rings have been recorded as Treasure over the ten year period, four of which were gilded. The Staffordshire Hoard contained one elegant, one-piece, double ring (K543) and three silver staples which may have been used to attach rings to pommel caps although, K543 is best paralleled by a fitting on the Sutton Hoo shield (Bruce-Mitford 1978: 129-37).

‘Studs’ is an amorphous group of objects which are likely to have a number of functions, some of those recorded as Treasure are likely to have been parts of brooches but other functions are possible and the role of the six examples in the hoard was also varied; some were settings from the large cross, and the chequered glass setting (K545) has been found to have been part of a complex composite object (K545/1055/130). There are objects which are more common in the Staffordshire hoard than amongst the general Treasure finds, in particular the sword hilt fittings which dominate the hoard. Pommel caps are, interestingly, fairly well represented amongst Treasure finds with 18 recorded examples, eight of which can be dated to the 7th century (five gold, three silver, one gilt). These were decorated as shown in Table 2: It can be seen that the proportions of the different types of decoration are broadly similar suggesting that the caps found in the hoard represents the general frequency of use. The increased frequency of incised decoration and the presence of cabochon garnets amongst the PAS finds many be due to chronological or social considerations; the material in the hoard being drawn from an upper layer of society. 119

Pyramid shaped mounts are comparatively well represented amongst the Treasure finds with a total of 24 examples, nine gold, 15 silver, of which are 10 gilt. Of these eight bore cloisonné garnet decoration (four gold, five silver-gilt). Three pyramids were set with cabochon garnets (one silver and two gold). The Staffordshire Hoard contained ten pyramids, eight gold, one silver and one gold on copper alloy. Eight were decorated with cloisonné garnets and two with cabochon garnets. In addition to the Treasure finds the PAS has recorded (to December 2009) 15 copper alloy pyramids some of which have a setting at their apex. As with pommel caps this number seems low; one would have expected base metal fittings to have been much more common than versions made in gold and silver.

Kevin Leahy

To summarise: Staffordshire Hoard PAS Treasure finds PAS Base metal

Pommel caps 92 18 16

can be paralleled by a find from Eye, Suffolk (DCMS 2002: cat. 74). It is also possible that, given the fragile nature of these plates and strips, they may be represented amongst the fragmentary gold cells which have been recorded as unidentified Anglo-Saxon Treasure.

Pyramids 10 24 15

The Treasure statistics allows us to look at the pattern of metal use during the early Anglo-Saxon period there being a total of 133 finds of gold, 63 silver-gilt and 64 silver. Plotting by conventional time bands gives the following bar-chart:

Table 3: Pommel caps and pyramids from the Staffordshire hoard together with finds recorded by the PAS and as Treasure 1997-2009. To place these numbers into context it is worth noting that the PAS had, to the end of 2009, recorded 1066 early Anglo-Saxon cruciform brooches: pommel caps and pyramids are not common finds. While the magnificent cloisonné garnet hilt fittings found at Sutton Hoo are well known, other swords found in the aristocratic burials, such as Taplow, had no surviving fittings. These may have been removed prior to burial (a possible source of the 92 pommel caps found in the Staffordshire Hoard) or could have been made of an organic material as on the find from ‘Cumberland’ in the collection of the British Museum. (British Museum 1923: 92, pl. VII). It is difficult to determine how many helmets are represented in the Staffordshire hoard but there is, to date, no evidence to suggest that more than one was present, the cheek-pieces; crest, crest fittings and foils could have all come from one helmet. The PAS has recorded three objects which might be crests from helmets although, it must be said, in no case is the identification certain. The gold and garnet boar’s head from Nornay, Nottinghamshire (DCMS 2002: cat.75; Fig. 1.5) is, for all its small size, a stunning image and could have come from the crest of a helmet of unparalleled quality. The two other possible helmet fittings are the silver-gilt boar from Horncastle, Lincs. (DCMS 2004a: cat. 41) and the remarkable Style I mount from Thimbleby (PAS NLM219C93) which is probably a buckle tongue (Marzinzik, 2012, 94-5). Historically, only a small number of early Anglo-Saxon helmets are known: Benty Grange, Derbyshire (Bruce-Mitford and Luscombe 1974: 223-42); Sutton Hoo, Suffolk, (Bruce-Mitford 1978: 138-226), the ‘Pioneer’ helmet from Wollaston, Northamptonshire (Meadows 1997: 391-5), and the figure of a boar from Guilden Morden, Cambridgeshire (Foster 1997: 166-7). It is interesting to note that Thomas Bateman’s description of the discovery of the Benty Grange helmet leaves us in little doubt that it, like the Sutton Hoo helmet, was covered in Pressblech foil mounts ‘There are too, many fragments, some more or less ornamented with silver, which have been riveted to some part of the helmet in a manner not to be explained or understood, …’ (Bateman 1861: 31). These fragments appear not to have survived excavation.

Fig. 2: Early Medieval Treasure 1997-2009, percentages of metals used, by century. Each column contains the number of finds represented. While highly generalised this plot does reveal some trends. The proportions of the three basic alloys (gold, silver and silver-gilt) remained fairly constant during the 5th and 5th to 6th century but in the 6th century there was a fall in the amount of gold used compensated for by a rise in the use of silver-gilt which rose from 16.7% (4/24) in the 5th to 6th century to 51.4% (38/74) in the 6th century: the aspiration for gold perhaps exceeding supply. In the 6th to 7th and 7th century the amount of gold being used rises from 13.5% (10/74) in the 6th century to 55.3% (26/47) in the 6th/7th century rising to 77.9% (81/104) in the 7th century. The Staffordshire hoard contains 5.10kg of gold and 1.44kg of silver giving the same proportion (78.0%) as the recorded Treasure. Unfortunately, this is not quite as convincing as it looks, (the quantities in the hoard are by mass, and Treasure by number of finds) although they still likely to represent similar proportions of alloys in use. The composition of the hoard has some implications for its date. It is believed that around the middle of the 7th century the supply of gold to western Europe was interrupted, the fineness of Merovingian gold coins plummeting around AD 640 with the gold coinage being replaced by silver by around AD 675 (Kent in BruceMitford 1978: 611-4, fig. 439; Gannon 2013: 51-3, fig. 2). This may have implications for the date of the hoard’s deposition: is it likely that, in the face of the ‘gold famine’, this quantity of metal would have survived above ground much after AD 650?

One group of finds from the hoard which have not so far been paralleled elsewhere are the 22 plates and 48 strips all of which are decorated with cloisonné garnet settings of the highest quality. Perhaps we do have some parallels: the garnet inlaid rod from the hoard, K1055 which formed part of a remarkable composite object (see above) 120

The Staffordshire Hoard in Context

objects appear less common in the Midlands, this may relate to silver objects tending to be early, 60.3% (38/63) dating to the 6th century, with silver not being so readily available in the less well established areas. The distribution of finds by date (Fig.4) again shows an eastwest gradient with the earliest material being more common in the east. Seventh-century finds are widespread and occur in all areas. The distribution of weapon fittings (Fig. 5) is particularly interesting as it again shows that the Staffordshire hoard is part of a larger pattern. The distribution of finds is thin, but some trends may be suggested. There is a concentration of finds in East Anglia with 14 finds (six pommel caps and eight pyramids). A second small group exists in Lincolnshire which may be significant as the area is linked to the hoard find spot by the river Trent and its tributaries. Other pommel caps have been found in the west, the remarkable example from Ludlow, with its clear Christian imagery (Webster 2005: 32, fig.7 a and b; Fig. 1.1) was found 65km to the south-west of Hammerwich and, on a north-south line with the hoard, are the gold caps from Maxstoke Priory, Warwickshire (unpublished) and near Cricklade, Wiltshire (PAS WILT-B5EE27). A silver pommel cap was found in North Wales at Gresford, Wrexham (British Museum 2008: cat. 1226).

Fig. 3: Finds of early medieval gold, silver and silver gilt recorded as Treasure between 1997 and 2009. The Staffordshire hoard is marked by the star.

Fig.4: Finds of early medieval gold, silver and silver gilt recorded as Treasure between 1997-2009 by conventional dating. Staffordshire hoard marked by the star.

Fig. 5: Finds of early medieval gold, silver and silver gilt war-gear recorded as Treasure between 1997 and-2009. Staffordshire hoard marked by the star.

The distribution maps of PAS Treasure finds provide a useful context into which the Staffordshire hoard can be placed. The overall pattern of finds (Fig. 3) provides a good coverage over Anglo-Saxon England. Some areas are rich, Kent, East Anglia and Lincolnshire are clearly outstanding, the fens around the Wash and in the east of Lincolnshire are empty as is the south coast, with few finds between Kent and the strong concentration on the Isle of Wight. Interestingly, although it is on the western edge of the distribution, the Staffordshire hoard is not as isolated as might have been thought. Finds of silver

Pendants are the most common gold objects to be reported and are widely distributed, finds being most frequent in East Anglia and Kent, but with small groups in Lincolnshire and in the area around where the hoard was found (Fig. 6). Pendant crosses occur in the East Midlands with finds from Newball, Lincolnshire; (British Museum 2008: cat.272; Leahy 2007: pl. 14; Fig. 1.8) Newark (PAS DENO-89E427; Fig. 1.6) and, in East Yorkshire, Holderness, (DCMS 2000: cat. 63; MacGregor 2000: 217-22). From further south is the 121

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cross from Ely, Cambridgeshire (PAS CAMHER9C4BA8). Buckles are, as was suggested above, uncommon but seem to share the same distribution as pendants (Fig. 6) but with two outliers, a silver gilt buckle plate from Doynton, Gloucestershire (PAS GLO9A3D35) and a silver buckle from near Swindon, Wiltshire (PAS WILT-D7D707). The buckle found closest to the hoard is the silver plate with Style II decoration from Newton Solney, Derbyshire (DCMS 2004b: cat. 121). Large, three rivet buckles of the type seen at Sutton Hoo and Taplow are uncommon, although the remains of one was found near Doncaster (DCMS 2006: cat. 136; Fig. 1.4).

into the Midlands, Dorset and Wiltshire with an outlier in the Vale of Glamorgan.

Fig. 7: Finds of early Medieval cloisonné and cabochon garnet work recorded as Treasure between 1997 and 2009. Staffordshire hoard marked by the star.

Fig. 6: Finds of early Medieval pendants, crosses and buckles recorded as Treasure between 1997 and 2009. Gold, black; silver, grey. Staffordshire hoard marked by the star. The distribution of early Anglo-Saxon Treasure set with cloisonné and cabochon garnets is broad and not particularly revealing (Fig. 7). What can, however, be seen is that the pattern extends across the Midlands and there is no lacuna in the area where the hoard was found. The Mercians clearly had access to this high-grade material. In total 45 items of Treasure decorated in Style I have been recorded together with 16 items with Style II decoration (Fig.8). Style II decoration was often associated with high status burials (Sutton Hoo, Taplow, Caenby, Lincolnshire) and could be seen as an elite art form. Finds of gold and silver objects decorated with animal art in Salin’s Style I are concentrated in the east and on the Isle of Wight reflecting their earlier date. Style II decorated finds are more wide-spread with a thin scatter extending a little to the west. This is clearly only part of the picture, Style I decoration is common on base metal objects and widespread. Style II is much less common and the PAS has recorded (to March 2012) 38 items decorated in this style (Fig. 8). In general this material emphasises the pattern revealed by the Treasure finds but extends the distribution of Style II metalwork

Fig. 8: Finds of early Medieval metalwork decorated in Salin’s Styles I and II, data based on Treasure finds, 1997-2009 and PAS records. Staffordshire hoard marked by the star. It had been considered (by the writer at least) that the single finds of pommel caps represented the same practice of deposition as was seen, writ large, in the Staffordshire hoard. In view of this the locations in which the other caps were found was analysed in the hope that some pattern would emerge. Of the 18 pommel caps which went through the Treasure process it was possible to determine the topographic context of 14 with some 122

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degree of confidence. Four were found close to streams, five on hill-tops and five on flat ground, suggesting that there was no discernible pattern in the locations of these objects, they could have come from graves, casual loss or ritual contexts. While this aspect of the study could not be supported there can be no doubt of the importance of PAS and Treasure finds in our understanding of the Staffordshire hoard which offers us our best hope of a context for this remarkable find.

Aspects of Anglo-Saxon Archaeology, Sutton Hoo and other Discoveries (Gollancz, London), 223-42. Bruce-Mitford, R. 1978, The Sutton Hoo Ship-burial, Volume 2, Arms, Armour and Regalia (British Museum, London). DCMS 2000, Treasure Annual Report 1998/9 (DCMS, London). DCMS 2002, Treasure Annual Report 2000 (DCMS, London). DCMS 2004a, Treasure Annual Report 2002 (DCMS, London). DCMS 2004b, Treasure Annual Report 2003 (DCMS, London). DCMS 2006, Treasure Annual Report 2004 (DCMS, London). Gannon, A 2013 Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles 63. British Museum Anglo-Saxon coins 1. Early Anglo-Saxon Gold and Anglo-Saxon and Continental Silver Coinage of the North Sea Area, c. 600-760, (British Museum, London). Graham-Campbell, J. 2011, The Cuerdale Hoard and Related Viking-age Silver and Gold from Britain and Ireland in the British Museum (British Museum, London). Fischer, S. 2008, Les Seigneurs des Anneaux. Bulletin de liaison de l’Association française d’Archéologie mérovingienne, Hors série no 2.(Inscriptions runiques de France, tome 1, 2nd edition (Paris, L’Association française d’Archéologie mérovingienne). Foster, J. A. 1977, ‘A Boar Figurine from Guilden Morden, Cambs.’ Medieval Archaeology 21, 166-7. Leahy, K. 2007, The Anglo-Kingdom of Lindsey (Tempus, Stroud). Leahy, K. and Bland, R. 2009, The Staffordshire Hoard (British Museum, London). Leahy, K. 2013 ‘A deposit of Early Medieval iron objects from Scraptoft, Leicestershire’ Medieval Archaeology, 57, 223-237 MacGregor, A. 2000, ‘A 7th-century pectoral cross from Holderness, East Yorkshire’, Medieval Archaeology 44, 217-22. Marzinzik, S 2012, Masterpieces Early Medieval Art, British Museum Press, London Meadows, I. 1997, ‘Wollaston: The ‘Pioneer’ burial’, Current Archaeology 154 (September 1997), 391-5. Morris, C. A. 1983, ‘A Late Saxon hoard of iron and copper alloy artefacts from Nazeing, Essex’ Medieval Archaeology 27, 27-39. Museum of London, 2004, The Prittlewell Prince: the Discovery of a Rich Anglo-Saxon Burial in Essex (Museum of London, London). Ottaway, P. and Cowgill, J. 2009, ‘Woodworking, the tool hoard and its lead containers’, in Evans, D. and Loveluck, C., Life and Economy at Early Medieval Flixborough, c. AD600-1000, Excavations at Flixborough Vol. 2, The Artefact Evidence Oxbow , Oxford), 253-77.

To even start to understand the Staffordshire hoard, it must be looked at in the context of other finds of 7thcentury gold and silver. Excavations like Sutton Hoo and Prittlewell are of vital importance in providing this context but it is fortunate that the PAS can provide a large number of broadly comparable items from locations scattered across England. Even at this stage it is possible to see some trends: while the hoard is on the edge of the distribution of 7th-century fine metalwork it is not geographically isolated; the PAS finds serve to emphasise the unbalanced nature of the Staffordshire hoard – the absence of feminine dress fittings is striking; the lack of other items, such as large belt buckles and finger rings, seems to fit in with the pattern found over the rest of England - these are not common items. It had been hoped that the find spots of other sword fittings recorded by the PAS might reveal some pattern to suggest why the hoard had been buried but this was not the case. While the Staffordshire hoard is unique it is possible to begin to place it into a context using excavated material and finds recorded by the PAS. We are deluding ourselves if we think that we will ever arrive at a real understanding of the Staffordshire hoard but the finds reviewed here might do something to reflect the society in which it was created. Endnotes {1} Additional material has been discovered and recorded since 2009 but the broad pattern of finds remains unchanged. {2} ‘K’ numbers identify references to the first catalogue of the hoard which remains in use. Bibliography Åberg, N. 1926, The Anglo-Saxons in England in the Early Centuries after the Invasion (Heffer and Sons, Cambridge). Bateman, T. 1861, Ten Years’ Diggings in Celtic and Saxon Grave Hills in the Counties of Derby, Stafford and York from 1848 to 1858 (George Allen, London). British Museum 1923, A Guide to the Anglo-Saxon and Foreign Teutonic Antiquities in the Department of British and Medieval Antiquities (Trustees of the British Museum, London). British Museum 2008, Treasure Annual Report 2005/6 (British Museum, London). British Museum 2009, Treasure Annual Report 2007 (British Museum, London). Bruce-Mitford R. and Luscombe M. R. 1974, ‘The Benty Grange Helmet’, in Bruce-Mitford, R. (ed.)

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Speake, G. 1980, Anglo-Saxon Animal Art and its Germanic Background (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Sutherland, C. H. V. 1948, Anglo-Saxon Coinage in the Light of the Crondall Hoard (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Williams, G. and Ager, B. 2010, The Vale of York Hoard, Objects in Focus (British Museum, London).

Webster, L. 2005, ‘Visual Literacy in a proto-literate age’ in Hermann, P. (ed.), Literacy in Medieval and Early Modern Scandinavian Culture. The Viking Collection 16 (University Press of Southern Denmark., Odense), 21-46. Wilson, D. M. 1964, Anglo-Saxon Ornamental Metalwork 700-1100 (British Museum, London).

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The Deposition and Hoarding of Non-Precious Metals in Early Medieval England John Naylor Introduction

Water-related deposition will be primarily explored here through finds from rivers, although further discussion will be made with respect to some settlement-related finds.

It is well known that enormous numbers of metal objects are found every year in Britain both through archaeological excavation and metal-detecting activity.{1} These include coins and a diverse corpus of other material relating to the daily lives of medieval people. This corpus continues to grow rapidly, with over 20,000 objects of medieval date (c. 410-1500 AD) recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) in 2014 alone. How should we interpret this mass of data? In reality it is extremely difficult to determine the potential motives behind the deposition of these objects, and it is assumed by most early medieval archaeologists that finds of non-precious metals – and indeed many precious metal objects too – were generally either lost or discarded.{2} Spreads of ‘refuse’ have been found on many settlement sites, sometimes as levelling material, including at Flixborough, North Lincolnshire, Lechlade, Gloucestershire and Fishergate, York, and many sunken featured buildings (SFBs) are filled with midden material upon demolition (Loveluck and Atkinson 2007: 73; Kemp 1996: 54-9; Bateman et al 2003: 40-3). On metaldetected sites, spreads of finds have been used to assess the area of activity, such as at Cottam, East Yorkshire (Richards 1999) or to assess potential zones of activity across a settlement and its vicinity (Davies 2010). It is generally accepted that this combined evidence should be interpreted within a framework of the disposal or loss of objects as part of the patterns of everyday life. However, there are exceptions, some of which are well-known. The most obvious examples are the hoards of gold and silver objects (coins and other artefacts) and material buried with the dead –the Staffordshire Hoard, the Vale of York hoard and the barrow burials at Sutton Hoo, Suffolk for example (Leahy and Bland 2009; Ager and Williams 2011; Carver 2005) – but alongside this, there has been a growing recognition by archaeologists working in both the Roman and early medieval periods that some finds of non-precious metal objects may be important examples of the deliberate deposition of both (seemingly) everyday objects and other groups, including weaponry. It has been argued that at least some of these cannot be explained as the concealment of wealth in times of instability nor of the storage of material for recycling (e.g. Bland, this volume; Hamerow 2006; Hingley 2006; Thomas 2008). This has followed similar debates among prehistorians which have resulted in the general acceptance that votive and ‘placed’ depositions were a widespread practice across settlements and the wider landscape (e.g. Bradley, this volume; Bland, this volume; cf. Garrow 2012).

Finds from watery locations- the example of rivers Objects have been deposited in water (rivers, lakes, bogs etc.) or in locations directly associated with water for thousands of years (e.g. Bradley 1990; Booth et al 2007: 217-20, 231-4; Yates and Bradley 2010; Lund 2010). While often associated with prehistoric deposits, river and water finds are not uncommon in later periods. The bulk of finds comprise weaponry, although other types of object are also found such as the five Roman pewter dishes from Shepperton Ranges, Surrey, found in a former river channel of the Thames and late Roman lead tanks – possibly baptismal fonts – found in wells across eastern and south-eastern England; early medieval nonweapon finds include the silver pins and hanging bowl from the River Witham (Booth et al 2007: 217-20; Petts 2003; Stocker and Evison 2003). It is important to note that these are mostly quite large items, generally found as the result of dredging over the last 100 years or so, and this has likely impacted the retrieval of smaller items.{4} Finds of early-medieval objects in rivers tend to be clustered geographically towards southern and eastern areas. In eastern England, swords and seaxes have come from the River Colne and Lea in Essex; weapons and stirrups from the fens and rivers of Cambridgeshire and eastern Norfolk; and numerous finds from the River Witham including swords and axes and the other objects mentioned above (Crummy 1980: 19; Wilson 1965: 40; Stocker and Evison 2003; Reynolds and Semple 2011: 43). Many finds have also been made in the River Thames and its tributaries (see below). Fewer finds are known in the south and west, but include stirrups from a tributary of the River Leadon near Gloucester and from the River Avon at Seagry, Wiltshire; and a sword from the River Frome at Wareham (Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 114, 118-9; Wilson 1965: 40). Very few river finds are known from northern England, although a buckle loop and plate were recently discovered in the River Tyne at Corbridge, Northumberland (PAS NCL-B707A4 and NCL-B56E31). The interpretation of these finds, especially for those of Bronze and Iron Age date has changed greatly in recent years. Previously river finds were often considered to be losses of weapons during battles or river crossings (see Bradley, this volume, and Bland, this volume, for brief resumés; Randsborg 2002 and Painter, this volume, provide critiques of votive deposition in water) but there is now a general acceptance that such deposits are best interpreted within the prism of votive deposition, the act of placing objects into bodies of water rendering them virtually inaccessible and evidence for ritualised

These deposits of early-medieval non-precious metalwork and their interpretation form the focus of this paper. For convenience they have been divided broadly between deposits in watery locations and those related to settlements while recognising that deposition may involve both of these elements or be more ambiguous.{3} 125

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Fig. 1: Distribution of finds from the River Thames and its tributaries in the Upper Thames Valley to the west of Oxford. Note that the findspots for many of the objects are not known precisely and their position on this map should be taken as approximate. water (Reynolds and Semple 2010: 42-3). Booth et al (2007: 234) have also speculated as to whether some Thames minsters located at crossing points can be seen in relation to these finds, given the potential link between crossings and deposition in the Iron Age and Roman periods, and the correlation seen so clearly in the Witham Valley (Stocker and Evison 2003). However, the early medieval finds from the Thames have not been considered in a systematic way previously, and what follows provides a preliminary examination of this dataset.{6}

permanent deposition (Bradley 1990; York 2002; Lambrick 2009: 288-9). Recent interpretations of riverine finds of early medieval date also emphasise this permanence of deposition, and the idea of the river as a liminal boundary space where protection may be needed or where dangerous objects could be neutralised (Stocker and Evison 2003; Booth et al 2007: 231-4; Lund 2010; Reynolds and Semple 2011). In support of this, argues Lund (2010: 93), is the sheer weight of evidence with ‘[t]he number of early medieval artefacts found in English rivers…far too high to represent casual losses’. While a number of such studies exist exploring small groups or single objects (often swords), there has been little systematic examination of rivers finds as a whole (although see Stocker and Evison 2003). The following case study brings together one of the largest sets of English data, from the River Thames and its tributaries, in order to explore distribution patterns and their potential interpretations.

The database produced (see Appendix 1) yielded a total of 267 non-precious metal objects recovered from the Thames and its tributaries along its length from Cricklade, Gloucestershire in the west to Tower Hill, Greater London in the east. This included 163 spearheads, 28 axes, 26 seaxes and 37 swords.{7} The distribution of this material is by no means even (Figs.1, 2, 4, 5 and 7), with several clusters of finds, although it is somewhat unclear how this may relate to the episodes of periodic dredging undertaken from which many finds were reported, albeit only as a result of finds made by workmen rather than archaeologists (Greenway 2013a). Indeed, as Grayson (2010: 3) notes, finds were reported to the nearest lock, bridge or inn, and the areas of concentration of Bronze Age objects are not dissimilar to those of Anglo-Saxon date (York 2002: fig. 2).

River finds from the Thames and its tributaries Finds of Anglo-Saxon metalwork from the River Thames – alongside those of other periods – have been made for many years, especially during extensive dredging works in the 1950s and 1960s, as well as finds from the mid-late 19th century made in London (Greenaway 2013a: 42). {5} Blair (1994: 99) has remarked on the large quantity recovered between Oxford and Reading, and Booth et al (2007: 231-4) noted the concentration around Wallingford Bridge, including spearheads and a sword; and a large number from between Sonning and Taplow. Alongside the Late Anglo-Saxon/Viking material which has received greatest attention (e.g. Wilson 1965; Seaby and Woodhead 1980; Blair 1994; Reynolds and Semple 2011), Booth et al (2007: 234) have also highlighted the range of 5th- to 9th-century material found, especially in the Middle Thames, although there is the potential that at least some of this may have been old when it entered the

Few Anglo-Saxon finds have been made to the west of Oxford (Fig. 1). A late Anglo-Saxon sword was found at Ten Foot Bridge, Chimney, less than a kilometre from the location of the very large 10th- to 11th-century cemetery which was on an estate belonging to the minster at nearby Bampton (Crawford 1989), and a Scandinavian type 1a stirrup at Shifford (Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 106, cat. no. 2). Just to the east, a seax was recovered at Standlake, close to the confluence of the Rivers Thames and 126

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in Oxfordshire and an early royal centre (Booth et al 2007: 96, 100). At one of the major crossing points in this area, Wallingford, six spearheads and a sword have been found, all apparently of Late Saxon date, including a well-located recent find found less than 100m upstream of the bridge (Dawson 2010; Greenway 2013b). A seax was found a little downstream at Chalmore Ferry, and a spearhead and seax at Bow Bridge, Cholsey in, it seems, a small tributary of the Thames. The crossing of the Thames by the Icknield Way at Goring/Streatley has provided further evidence, with a sword and spearhead recovered from the vicinity at Benson Reach. A number of finds have also been made further downstream around Reading (Fig. 4), with a sword and a number of axes found at the confluence of the Thames with the Kennet, and a spearhead and axe were found in the river Kennet at Reading, the town being a crossing point of the river (see Booth et al 2007: fig. 3.52).

Windrush at Newbridge. Several objects have been found in Oxford, where a crossing has existed since at least the Middle Anglo-Saxon period (Booth et al 2007: fig. 3.50), although Blair and Crawford (1997) have convincingly argued that the finds of 10th to 11th-century stirrups and other metal objects are more likely to relate to a riverside burial, leaving a spearhead and shield boss dredged up in 1884 as the only potential river finds. On Thames tributaries to the north and east of Oxford, two spearheads – one 5th to 7th century, the other Late Saxon – were found at Kidlington in the River Cherwell and an axe in a bank of the River Thame at Holton.

The majority of finds on the stretch of the Thames in Berkshire from Reading to Cookham (Fig. 4) consist of spearheads, including Early Anglo-Saxon types from near Marlow, Hurley and Sonning Bridge although axes and a Late Saxon sword have also been found in the river ‘near’ Twyford and at Henley Bridge, a likely ancient crossing point (Booth et al 2007: 42; Wilson 1965: 52, appendix A). A significant quantity of material has also been recovered from Cookham to Staines (Fig. 4 and 5), with over 40 finds recorded including at least 33 spearheads (the number is uncertain owing to unquantified antiquarian finds), four swords and two seaxes. This area includes the rich 7th-century barrow burials at Taplow, and the mid-late Saxon palace at Old Windsor. An unquantified number of spearheads and an axe were recovered from the river near Cookham, a crossing point of the river, and the location of both an Anglo-Saxon minster and a small 10th/11th-century burh on Sashes Island (Blair 1996: 23; Booth et al 2007: 256). Spearheads and an axe are known from ‘near’ Maidenhead but their exact location is uncertain, and a sword and spearhead from Bray, another possible Late Saxon minster (ibid.: 259). Two Late Anglo-Saxon swords and at least three Early Saxon spearheads come from Windsor, alongside a copper-alloy and silver sword pommel of 8th- to 9th-century date (Fig. 6) which is decorated with elaborate gold filigree (Hinton 1974: cat. no. 36; Swanton 1974: 89). Many of the weapons found in this stretch of the Thames come from around the midlate Saxon palace site at Old Windsor with numerous spearheads, including both early Anglo-Saxon and late Saxon types but no swords or seaxes are known. A seax was found further downstream, however, at Magna Carta Island, and a Late Saxon sword, two Early Saxon and two Late Saxon spearheads at Staines, crossing point of the Silchester to London Roman road and confluence of the Rivers Colne and Thames, where a late Saxon town grew up around the minster and which appears to have had some status given the presence of an execution cemetery (ibid.: 41,141). Another Late Saxon sword was recorded a little downstream from Staines, near Chertsey, Surrey.

Fig. 2: Distribution of finds from the River Thames and its tributaries in the Upper Thames Valley from Abingdon to Goring. Note that the findspots for many of the objects are not known precisely and their position on this map should be taken as approximate. The first substantial concentration of finds is located along the stretch of river from Abingdon to Goring (Fig. 2), producing 26 objects (including 16 spearheads, three swords (Fig. 3) and six seaxes), an area well-known to be rich in archaeological finds and sites, especially in the pre-Viking period (Hamerow et al 2013). These finds appear to show some relation to crossing points and the confluences with other water courses. A possible crossing identified by Grayson (2010: 6) at Little Wittenham (Day’s Lock) coincides with finds of two seaxes and a spear. Around Dorchester-on-Thames, where the Rivers Thames and Thame meet, and the Alcester to Silchester Roman road crosses the latter a seax has been found near Shillingford at Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. A seax and three spearheads have been found in the Thames at Benson. There is no evidence for a crossing of the river here but it was the location for the most valuable Domesday manor 127

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Fig. 3: Late Saxon sword found near Abingdon. Ashmolean Museum accession no. AN 1890.14. Image: © Ashmolean Museum.

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Fig. 4: Finds from the River Thames and its tributaries in the Middle Thames region, Goring to Bray. Note that the findspots for many of the objects are not known precisely and their position on this map should be taken as approximate.

Fig. 5: Finds from the River Thames and its tributaries in the Middle Thames region, Bray to Kingston Upon Thames. Note that the findspots for many of the objects are not known precisely and their position on this map should be taken as approximate.

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Fig. 6: 8th- to 9th-century sword pommel from the Thames at Windsor. Ashmolean Museum accession no. AN 1909.518. Image: © Ashmolean Museum. The area around the confluence of the Rivers Wey and Thames (Fig. 5) appears to have been a location of longterm importance. Booth et al (2007: 232-3) have outlined recent work on the Shepperton Ranges where two swords, a seax, spearhead and axe have been recovered from the Thames and silted palaeochannels (alongside finds ranging in date from the Middle Bronze Age to Roman periods), and within a short distance of the Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Upper West Field. A Late Anglo-Saxon axe was also found at the bridge over the Wey on the western side of Weybridge town. Another river junction – this time between the Thames and the Hogsmill – and crossing point at Kingston-on-Thames has produced a Late Saxon seax and spearhead, and five Early Saxon spearheads. Abdy and Williams (2005: 14, cat. no. 3) note that ten 6th-century gold tremisses were found in the Thames at Kingston in the 19th century although little else is known about the find. A late Saxon stirrup was also found less than a kilometre downstream at Hampton Wick.

century zoomorphic drinking horn terminal was found on the foreshore at Lambeth (PAS LON-EFCF31; Fig. 8). Drinking horns were prestigious items – they have been found in ‘princely’ burials including Sutton Hoo Mound 1, Taplow and Broomfield, Essex, and it is known that they were bequeathed in wills of the Late Anglo-Saxon period (Leahy 2003: 60; Hinton 2005: 145) – and it is possibly all that remains of a drinking horn deliberately deposited in the river. Secondly, a 6th to 7th-century fishshaped shield mount was found on the foreshore at Barnes and it is now impossible to tell if this entered the water on its own or still attached to its shield but it could be seen within both the remits of the weapons found in river and as casual losses of smaller finds (Cohen 2011: fig. 58). Regardless of how we interpret them – and these two examples show how difficult it is – these small finds are illustrative of the amount of material which can be recovered from English rivers and that the larger objects, especially the weaponry, must be considered against. However, numerous early medieval weapons have been recovered in the stretch of the river from Brentford to Tower Hill. At Brentford, a crossing point of the River Brent from at least 705 (Mills 2010: 75), and confluence of Brent and Thames, a Late Saxon sword and a spearhead have been recorded, and numerous Early Saxon spearheads. There are regular findspots along the river into central London. These include an axe at Hounslow; two Early Saxon spearheads and a Late Saxon sword at Kew; seven Early Saxon spearheads and two seaxes from Mortlake; several spearheads and a sword

As the Thames passes through Greater London (Fig. 7),{8} many more objects have been recovered from the river, both from antiquarian activity, dredging and the actions of the collectors and metal-detectorists working on the foreshore. Many of these are small objects, probably mostly casual losses, with around 3,000 finds (of all periods) recorded by PAS to date including early medieval pins, coins and strap-ends.{9} Other early medieval small finds may be (perhaps) seen differently, however. Two examples will suffice- the first is an 8th130

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Fig. 7: Finds from the River Thames and its tributaries in Greater London. Note that the findspots for many of the objects are not known precisely and their position on this map should be taken as approximate.

Fig. 8: An 8th-century zoomorphic drinking horn terminal found on the Thames foreshore at Lambeth. PAS LONEFCF31. Image: K Sumnall (PAS). 131

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pommel from Chiswick Eyot; and at Putney spearheads (Fig. 9), an axe and a broken sword, at least some only a short distance upstream of the Thames confluence with the Wandle. A Late Saxon seax inscribed in runes, sword and stirrup and five Early Saxon spearheads have been recovered from Battersea, the stretch of river where the Falcon joins the Thames,{10} and swords from Vauxhall around its confluence with the Effra (Ackroyd 2011: 40,49). The stretch of the river through Westminster to the City has long been known for its rich finds assemblage. Late Saxon swords have been recovered at Westminster – where the abbey was important by the time of Edward the Confessor (1042-66) (Vince 1990: 32-3) – and at Lambeth, some seemingly around the junction with the River Tyburn on the north bank. Also found in the river ‘near’ Westminster Bridge is a runic inscribed silver fitting for the scabbard of a knife or seax (Webster and Backhouse 1991: cat. no. 179). Numerous axes and spearheads, including a possible hoard of six spearheads, and ‘one or two swords’ (Wilson 1965: 51) have been found in the vicinity of London Bridge at the City, Wilson (ibid.: 50) speculating that some of the axes may have been lost by carpenters working on the bridge. A type 2cii Late Anglo-Saxon stirrup and two axes were found at Tower Hill.{11} Finally, to the north of the Thames, on one of its tributaries– the River Lea – Late Saxon swords have been recovered from Enfield, Edmonton and Walthamstow.

This brief overview of the finds from the Thames and its tributaries has highlighted the large number of early medieval objects which have been recovered from it. As mentioned above, the distribution is not dissimilar to that outlined for those from earlier periods (York 2002; Lambrick 2009: 288), although there is variation in the locations of clusters of artefacts between periods. This may indicate real differences in the assemblages, suggesting that the patterns seen do reflect something of past activity rather than being a function of the haphazard, unsystematic nature of recovery during the dredging of the 1950s and 60s. This can only be properly assessed through multi-period study. However, the relative dearth of material from all periods recovered upriver from Dorchester-on-Thames requires further investigation to assess the levels of likely recovery bias, including the extent of dredging in comparison to other stretches of the river. Regarding the early medieval finds, it is immediately apparent from the maps that there is variation in the distribution of different object types. Spearheads are the most common and most widespread weapons found along the Thames and its tributaries, and have been found in all location types (crossing points, confluences, high status/defensive sites and ‘open’ stretches of water). Conversely, swords and seaxes appear more constrained. The chronology of deposition may play a part here- while swords, seaxes and axes mostly date to the 9th-11th centuries many, although by no means all, of the spearheads are Early-Middle Anglo-Saxon types, probably deposited before the 9th century, and represent a different depositional period perhaps unconnected with the later swords and seaxes. Of the later finds, most swords and seaxes were recovered from within the vicinity of confluences with other waterways and at crossing points, although the findspot details for many of these finds are not hugely precise given the date and circumstance of recovery. Other locations include the sword from Chimney found near to the large Late Saxon cemetery, and the seax in the stretch of river passing the royal estate at Benson. In fact, clusters of finds within the vicinity of important royal centres (Benson, Old Windsor, Kingston, Westminster and St Pauls) appear to be an important feature of the depositional geography. The concentration of seaxes in the Dorchester-on-Thames to Cholsey area certainly also warrants further investigation. Axes are rarer as river finds – excepting the numerous finds at London Bridge – but exhibit similar patterns of deposition, with the majority around crossing points or confluences. Overall, these finds are comparable to Bronze Age, Iron Age and Roman finds, indicating the long-term ritual importance of the riverine landscape. Medieval documentary sources highlight the spiritual significance of the river to Christian communities of the Thames Valley (Ackroyd 2007: 84-5) but there is little in the evidence to suggest a link between the siting of minsters and the location of deposition as witnessed in the Witham Valley (Stocker and Evison 2003). Rather, it seems to be certain features of the river – confluences and crossing

Fig. 9: A 9th-century spearhead from the Thames at Putney. PAS LON-920814. Image: K Sumnall (PAS). 132

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points especially – which are important and the repeated deposition in these types of location suggests that this activity was structured by certain conventions. Is it possible that those objects which were considered the most powerful – swords, for instance – were deposited at what may have been perceived, physically or psychologically, as the most dangerous or vulnerable points on the river. This may point to deposition as a form of protection. Christie (2013: 143) has suggested that weapon deposits can be ‘linked to the vision of the river Thames as a boundary and frontier – territorial, physical and mental’ and Lund (2010: 54-6) that the crossing was more than a mere physical movement but rather that it could ‘signify entering the area of another owner, an assembly place or the land of the dead’ (ibid.: 56). Rivers were, of course, also significant communication routes, and so this combination of physical and mental worlds produced an ambiguous space, liminal and accessible, important for social, political and commercial activity (Semple 2011: 747-56). Such ‘protection’ may be, of course, only one reason for deposition, with Christie (2013: 142) neatly summing this up in suggesting that river deposits can be read at various levels including ‘martial’, ‘personal’ and ‘ritual’ and it is not unreasonable that the deposition of objects would occur at similar locations but for different reasons. The execution of a man in the Thames accompanied by his sword (Reynolds and Semple 2011: 46) highlights this, as do groups of other objects, such as late medieval pilgrims’ badges which appear to have been thrown into the water deliberately, perhaps as thanks for reaching the shrine at the end point of a pilgrimage, including in the River Stour at Canterbury (Egan 2007: 74; Garcia 2009).

deliberate deposition of non-precious metals in other places. Settlement-related and other deposition In the introduction to this paper, I briefly outlined changing attitudes to the interpretation of the deposition of objects in Roman and early medieval contexts, and how ideas from prehistoric archaeology are shaping new thinking for historic periods. Hamerow’s thoughtprovoking work gives an important basis for discussion (2006; 2012: 120-43). Examining the deposition of animal and human bone in the 5th to 8th centuries, she highlighted a number of trends suggesting that some of the bone found was likely deposited in a manner which could not be explained through rubbish disposal or the infilling of dismantled structures or other features. Describing such deposits as ‘special’ or ‘placed’, Hamerow (2006: 29) argued that these could be linked to the fertility of the settlement, and especially structures such as ‘sunken featured buildings’ (SFBs) which may well have been grain stores. She found that closure deposits were far more common than foundation deposits (although these were not unknown), and that the placement of many ‘special deposits’ was linked to certain locations, especially boundaries, entrances and certain structures, notably SFBs. Given this and other recent work undertaken on iron and lead hoards (e.g. Thomas 2008; Ottaway 2009; Cowgill 1994; 2009a, 2009b; Leahy 2013) it is worth reviewing the evidence here and examining the interpretations proposed. This section is intended to provide an overview discussion of a range of finds which were outside the focus of Hamerow’s work and which have been, so far, mostly only discussed within specialised excavation reports. I will start with some of the most visible and spectacular deposits of non-precious metal objects– the hoards of iron tools (and other objects) which have been found around Britain, sometimes within lead tanks – before discussing some more general site finds.

A further element of the riverine landscape which warrants attention is the relation of river finds to features on land. I outlined above some instances where river finds are close to contemporary cemeteries (e.g. Chimney, Shepperton) and ecclesiastical or royal sites (e.g. Westminster, Kingston-upon-Thames) but there was also an extant and visible prehistoric landscape. The early-medieval re-use of prehistoric monuments is well known with burials and stray finds known at numerous sites (e.g. Williams 1997; Semple 2013), and along the Thames clusters of Anglo-Saxon finds also coincide with concentrations of monumental prehistoric activity, such as the area between Abingdon and Goring or from Windsor to Staines where large numbers of Neolithic and Bronze Age monuments are known (Garwood et al 2011: fig. 14.9 and fig. 14.24). Hamerow (2012: 142-3) has also noted a correlation in the locations of early Anglo-Saxon settlements and cemeteries with earlier monuments, especially in the Thames Valley.

Hoards of iron objects

This short case study has illustrated the huge potential for sustained study of the finds from the Thames and other rivers. Given the numbers of finds from the Thames, their distributions and patterns of deposition, I have highlighted what I consider the likely ritual character of their deposition. With this in mind, it is now appropriate to turn our attention to review the evidence for the 133

Leahy (2013: table 1, 231-3) has listed 11 recorded groups of iron objects, of which he suggests at least nine as hoards, four associated with lead tanks (in three cases the iron objects were inside the lead tanks). All date within the period of the 8th-10th centuries, except Nazeing, Essex which may be as late as the 11th century. The hoards consist predominantly of tools, the objects relating to a range of activities including woodworking and agriculture (cultivation and harvesting) with fewer metal-working related items and weapons, although the latter were still found in over half of the deposits (ibid., 233). As many include elements of scrap metal, they have traditionally been seen as metalworkers’ hoards buried for future recycling such as those from Nazeing, or Crayke, East Yorkshire (Morris 1983: 36; Sheppard 1939: 279). However, such an interpretation can be challenged. The presence of scrap items does not necessarily indicate a group of objects intended for recycling- the deposition of scrap in the burials at Tattershall Thorpe, Lincolnshire and Barton-on-Humber,

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Lincolnshire (Hinton 1998: 5, 15), illustrates that such material can still possess meaning and symbolism; Thomas (2008: 386) argued that the association of some finds – Hurbuck, County Durham, Westley Waterless, Cambridgeshire {12} and Nazeing – with watery locations was itself suggestive that re-assessment of their deposition was overdue; and Lund’s (2010: 58) linking of myths surrounding legendary smiths living near water obstacles and the deposition of tool chests on river banks in Scandinavia bears serious consideration, especially considering at least one deposit (Nazeing) is from just such a location. Two recently published hoards – Flixborough and Bishopstone, East Sussex – have highlighted this shift in emphasis in attempts to explain the nature of the deposition of particular finds. Both were found in relation to major excavations (Ottaway 2009; Thomas 2008), although, unfortunately, only the latter has good contextual information.

motives behind the burial of tool hoards. A number of them may, indeed, not even be hoards but rather are just spreads of settlement debris, such as the metal-detected assemblage from Lea Green, North Yorkshire and Torksey, Lincolnshire. It is important to note, though, that the objects in many cases are not old and worn even if some are crushed, and this adds further complications to their interpretation if they were perfectly useable tools which were, for some reason, discarded or marked for recycling (Leahy 2013: 235). Another way to consider these finds is, perhaps, in looking at early medieval perceptions of iron. It was viewed with suspicion and considered magical, as were those who worked with it (ibid.; Hinton 1998:15). Whether this means that iron could simply be discarded or had to be disposed of in certain ways remains open to question. Cameron’s work on Anglo-Saxon medicine (1988: 208-9) shows that a number of medicinal recipes either include iron - in some cases, through modern eyes, for good physiological reasons - or expressly forbid any objects of iron to be used in its preparation. As such, the deposition of iron objects could be explained through potential taboos towards the metal, perhaps intensified in certain objects which, through the way in which they had individually been used, may have become magical, precious, tainted or dangerous. Ultimately, however, it is only with more hoards discovered in secure contexts that we will be able to more fully explore these ideas, and try to demarcate between those deposited permanently without any intention to recover, those which may be better explained as temporary stores of a smith’s raw material, and those representing discard or loss.

The excavations at Bishopstone uncovered a high status settlement occupied from the 8th century into the Late Saxon period. Within the settlement a large, square feature proved to be a cellared structure, interpreted as a free-standing tower. The iron hoard was discovered in a post-hole located in the cellar of this structure, where it was probably deposited during the tower’s dismantling, as a possible act of ‘ritual closure’ (Thomas 2008: 34955, 391-3). As a deliberate deposit, buried without the intention of recovery, Thomas argued that the 25 objects in the hoard were specially chosen ‘to represent important aspects of an estate’s economy or source of wealth’ (ibid.: 391) with the groups of objects relating to different aspects of the estate, including both agricultural activities and household. The hoard from Flixborough, 8th to 10thcentury in date, was also discussed within the remits of material buried symbolically without intention to recover (Ottaway 2009). Only discovered during quarrying after excavations of the settlement were completed, the hoard lacks any stratigraphic information but its location, seemingly some way west of the settlement focus, suggests it cannot be considered in quite the same manner as the Bishopstone hoard. Consisting of 12 carpentry tools, two cultivation tools, a bell, and iron suspension rings all placed within two lead tanks (ibid.: 256), Ottaway considered the combination of the bell, incised with a star-like eight-armed cross, and the woodworking tools to represent a possible Christian element to the deposit. He argued that the objects may be related to the construction of the possible church on the site (Building 1a, dating to the early-mid 8th century), rendering them spiritually charged objects and their further use inappropriate or that the 12 objects may have symbolically represented the 12 apostles or Christ the carpenter (ibid.: 261). Both of these hoards are interpreted as closely related to the long-term well-being of the settlement and Thomas’s (2008: 390) argument that the deposition may ‘mark a transition in the intertwined narratives of a settlement’s inhabitants and their built environment’ is a strong one. A word of caution, however, comes from Leahy (2013: 229-35) who has highlighted the difficulty in understanding the

Lead tanks and vessels Alongside the hoarding of iron, and sometimes associated with it, are finds of lead containers or tanks. Most have been found in Lincolnshire and East Anglia with outliers in the Midlands and northern England, no doubt reflecting the distribution of lead out from its source in the Derbyshire Peak District (Loveluck 1995; Cowgill 2009a: 273-4). They are, however, not easily interpreted. At least some are poorly constructed, and often appear unfinished, which may have rendered them unsuitable for containing liquids, with Cowgill suggesting all were simply scrap items waiting to be recycled, possibly having been originally used in the measurement of grain or other dry goods (ibid.: 274-6). However, examples from Westley Waterless and another from near Corby, Northamptonshire (Fig. 8) include decorative panels, the latter quite ornate, and others, including Flixborough, have incised decoration (Fox 1923: 300, pl. xxxv no. 3; PAS WAW-A4D8D4; Ottaway 2009). While Cowgill (2009a: 270) considers that it is inappropriate to equate Anglo-Saxon examples with the Late Roman vessels which may have acted as baptismal fonts – many of which appear to have been deposited in a votive manner (Petts 2003) – others disagree. John Blair (2010: 160-1) concurs that the finishing of the tanks makes their attribution as baptismal fonts somewhat difficult, but he

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Fig 10: Decorated Middle Saxon lead tank from near Corby, Northamptonshire. PAS WAW-A4D8D4. Image: A Bolton (PAS). still considers that the water-related depositional environment of some to be indicative of ritual practice, suggesting that other potential uses for them could also have carried great meaning, including the preparation of medicines or as vessels for the undertaking of ‘ordeal by hot water’. Gilchrist (2008: 125) has also noted the use of lead in medieval ‘magico-medicinal’ practice and as the preferred material onto which amulet or charms were inscribed. The poor construction and finishing could simply indicate that this element was of little importance for their overall function in many cases. Indeed, Cowgill (2009a: 270-2) admits that they could be made watertight by the addition of a lining and also that the jagged edges seen on some indicate they were used only sporadically or for short periods at a time. Both possibilities are compatible with the potential functions suggested for the vessels by Blair (2010).

these peaty or regularly inundated areas. It is also possible to consider the Flixborough hoard as associated with water- environmentally, the site is located at the interface of the peat bogs and marshland of the Trent and the Lincolnshire Edge (Loveluck 2009b), and with the hoard found downslope of the main settlement area towards the wetlands it may be that its situation is more intimately related with water than initially thought. At Bottesford, the tanks found in the southern boundary ditch were only c. 200m from the current route of the Bottesford Beck which runs into the River Trent although it is difficult to necessarily associate their deposition to the river except that they were located on the riverward side of the settlement. However, as Yates and Bradley (2010) have shown for certain Bronze Age hoards objects do not have to be in water to be associated with water. The tanks excavated from Riby Cross Roads and Bottesford were both found within ditches, the former in the latest phase of the ditch of enclosure 2 (Steedman 1994: 226), and the latter c. 0.5 m apart at the base of a ditch terminal (Boyer et al 2009: 68), and this may also suggest similarities of practice. Although Cowgill (2009b: 84) interpreted the deposition of the tanks in practical terms – in that she argued they could be easily re-discovered for recycling or exchange – Bottesford’s excavators were less certain, suggesting reasons behind their deposition remain open to debate (Boyer et al 2009: 102).

Alongside this, the locations of deposition are interesting. Thomas (2008: 386) lists the iron hoard associated with a lead cauldron at Westley Waterless as a water-related deposit (although we have seen this may not be the case), but it is possible to suggest a water-related element to at least three others in some way. The Willingham, Cambridgeshire tank included in Cowgill’s (2009a: fig. 7.11) Flixborough report, is from a parish on the fen edge with the River Ouse framing two sides of the parish boundary. Peat fen and alluvium form the northern part of the parish. Before draining in the 17th century, it would have likely been substantially flooded every year (Wright and Lewis 1989) and could have been buried in one of

Deliberate, ritual deposition within boundary and enclosure ditches has a long history with continuity from 135

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later prehistory into the early medieval period at least (Haselgrove, this volume; Hingley 2006: 230-4, 240-52; Hamerow 2006). In Hamerow’s (2006: 12) discussion of the Early Anglo-Saxon evidence, boundary ditches were one of the foci for deposition, and the continuation of this practice into the 8th century at least with the lead deposits at Riby and Bottesford would not be out of place. The careful placing of the Bottesford bases close together in a ditch terminal, folded and oriented in exactly the same way (Boyer et al 2009: 68), along with the Riby example found folded and horizontal in the final fill of an enclosure ditch (Cowgill 1994: 267) also suggests that the objects were carefully placed. Given their potential uses within medicinal or judicial practice (Blair 2010: 160-1), such vessels were objects which may have been perceived as powerful or meaningful to the community and appropriate for deposition without the intention to recover, perhaps akin to other ‘closure’ deposits discussed by Hamerow (2006). It is unfortunate that so few lead tanks have been recovered archaeologically and so we remain unaware of the context of deposition for most examples. However, given the similarities of depositional location in the excavated examples, possibly including the way they were placed within the feature, alongside a water-related element to at least three others, I would argue that there are strong reasons to suggest that these were ‘placed’ deposits buried without the intention to recover.

within the remits of the larger iron hoards discussed above, and illustrates the potential importance of the placement of single objects within features.{13} Within the settlement space, Hamerow (2006) also argued that buildings, especially ‘sunken featured buildings’ (SFBs), were another focus for ‘placed’ deposits, often in their final abandonment phases and I have already discussed the important tool hoard deposited during building demolition at Bishopstone (see above). Alongside likely ‘special’ deposits of bone, Hamerow also commented that some examples of metal objects may have been deposited within acts of closure and abandonment. At Mucking, a charcoal-rich layer contained two 7th-century brooches, one on the base of the hollow in SFB GH 42, and three late 7th to mid-8thcentury silver coins – sceattas – were found on the floor of GH 168; a Roman coin, plus pins, an amber bead and weaving-beater on/just above the floor of an SFB at Puddlehill, Bedfordshire (ibid.: 21-2; Hamerow 2012: 136-8). A third example of coinage found within structural elements of a building includes the hoard of three 8th-century silver sceattas from Fishergate, York discovered in the foundation trench of Structure 2 as part of a general abandonment/levelling deposit found across the site (Kemp 1996: 32-4, 57-8), perhaps mirroring the type of deposit seen at Mucking. While this layer of material was finds-rich, including other coins, it is nevertheless interesting that a small hoard was recovered from a structure and would not be out of place as a closure deposit, although its placement within the beam slot (i.e. the base or elsewhere) is not described in the report. Finally, another site where likely ‘placed’ deposits of animal bone are known, Cresswell Field at Yarnton, Oxfordshire also includes evidence for the potentially deliberate placement of metalwork. In SFB 7325, of 8thcentury date, the skulls of a cow and two horses, and mandibles of at least five horses were considered as votive by the excavators, and in the same feature, pin beaters (of different sizes), a bone comb and an iron knife were all found close to the bottom of the fill (Hey 2003: 75; Bell 2003: 184-5; Dodd 2003: 297). These objects may all relate to animal husbandry and production at the settlement, and can perhaps be considered under the aegis of its fertility and continued prosperity as was perhaps the case at Bishopstone (Thomas 2008: 390-1). These few examples illustrate the variety of deposition within early medieval settlement contexts, and it appears likely that at least some of this must be considered to have ritual significance often relating to abandonment and change, although we have also seen that notions of protection may likewise be important.

Other deposits As we have seen, deposits on settlements that can be interpreted as ‘placed’ are not confined to iron hoarding and lead vessels. Diverse evidence for the deposition of animal and human bone is also known, within structures, entrances and boundaries (Hamerow 2006), and in this context it is worth considering the deposition of other metal objects in such locations. Hamerow (2006: 21-2) highlighted some finds of metalwork, including a 5th- to 6th-century axe hammer and ring, incorporated into the trackway leading to the entrance at Cadbury Castle, Somerset, and a possible shrine in the entrance at Cadbury-Congressbury, Somerset whose post-holes contained amphora handles, bone and a copper-alloy pendant, suggesting these deposits may have been ‘intended to confer supernatural protection to the entranceway into the settlement’ (ibid., 22). Catholme, Staffordshire provides another interesting example. Here, excavations of a 7th to 9th-century settlement uncovered three burials (two human, one bovine) at entrances to enclosures, and these have already been interpreted as ‘placed’ deposits (Hamerow 2006: 10). Additionally, however, a number of metal objects were found which warrant further consideration: near to the base of pit [3370], dug into the ditched enclosure D21 in Zone VII, a barrel padlock, a possible seax, and two knives were discovered in a charcoal-rich deposit; a pair of shears was found in the bottom of ditch [3227], again in ditch D21; and another knife was found in a pit dug into ditch D39 part of which forms the inner side of entrance E7 and trackway T5 (Losco-Bradley and Kingsley 2002: fig. 3.97). One wonders if such finds should be considered

Lastly, along with these finds from settlements (and water-related deposition discussed above), are those discovered at other locations. Semple (2013: 77-83), for instance, has examined the occurrence of Anglo-Saxon weapons at prehistoric monuments. These include weapons left in isolation at monuments such as barrows, and groups of weapons left at hillforts or linear landscape features. Such deposits appear to span the Anglo-Saxon period, much as they do in rivers, although prehistoric 136

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monuments seem to have been a focus in the 6th and 7th centuries. She argues that such deposits fit into a longterm pattern which began prior to the early medieval period and extending into the modern day, relating to ‘visitation, curiosity and veneration’ of such monuments (ibid.: 78).

Within these discussions questions relating to religion, and how the deposition of objects might relate to religious practice, are important. It is possible that some of the finds discussed in this paper represent the continuation of folk traditions adhering to pagan practices. The finds of 10th- and 11th-century weapons in rivers may themselves be indicative of a pagan Scandinavian presence in Viking-Age England (Lund 2010:60). The 11th-century edicts and lawcodes of Wulfstan of York and King Cnut outlawing pagan rituals – especially relating to veneration in watery places – do show that such activity was still prevalent among at least some of the population (Thomas 2008: 383; Lund 2010: 59). However, there is also strong evidence to suggest that these activities are not, in fact, inconsistent with early-medieval Christianity (e.g. Stocker and Evison 2003; Hamerow 2006: 27-8; Thomas 2008: 383-91; Ottaway 2009: 258-61; Lund 2010: 59-60). Such activity can be seen as the re-negotiation and appropriation of earlier practice to adhere to an early-medieval Christian world view, as perhaps seen most strikingly through the finds on causeways by the minsters along the Witham Valley, depositions which continued well into the later medieval period (Stocker and Evison 2003). A number of finds include Christian iconography – the lead tank and iron bell from the Flixborough hoard and the sceattas found at Mucking and Fishergate, York for instance – but by no means all, and depending upon an object’s use or specific function it may have become imbued with elements relevant to, for example, Christian beliefs or folk magic. In fact, it seems increasingly likely that after the 8th century – with the exception of the span in the 10th-11th centuries – activities and rituals which may have had some kind of origin in earlier pagan practice still did not equate to pagan beliefs, rather that they were expressed afresh through medieval Christianity (Hutton 2011). Further work is certainly needed to contextualise many of the these finds, especially relating to the broader landscapes of the river finds, which will provide a framework for a more complete understanding of their deposition and the potential reasons behind them. A fuller study of iron finds in the landscape is also needed using a far larger sample of sites to test the interpretations I have made here.

The deposition of objects in settlement contexts is inevitably difficult to assess, as is distinguishing between intentional deposition, waste disposal, and accidental loss, especially on finds-rich sites such as Flixborough or Fishergate, York where ironwork and copper-alloy objects were relatively common. In some cases this is compounded by a lack of detail in the published excavation report, including the location of objects within the fill, or even the discussion of the features themselves. A useful approach has been applied to Iron Age and Roman iron deposition by Hingley (2006: especially figs. 6-7), and this may an appropriate method to apply to the early medieval evidence. Regardless, from the few examples listed here evidence exists for the deliberate, ‘placed’ deposition of non-precious metalwork on early medieval settlements and for these such evidence needs to be tested and explained. Most importantly, perhaps, is the recognition that single finds as well as hoards or groups of objects can have interesting depositional histories which cannot be dismissed as the disposal of unwanted items. Conclusion The aim of this broad and relatively brief review of the deposition of non-precious metals in early medieval England is to note that there is a strong body of evidence suggestive of deliberate deposition of metalwork without the intention of recovery, which can be interpreted within a ‘votive’ framework. This is not surprising given the evidence for the long-term processes of deposition extending from early prehistory to the concealment of objects such as ‘witch bottles’ in post-medieval houses (e.g. Bland, this volume; Merrifield and Smedley 1958), and fits in well within the broader parameters of ‘placed’ or ‘special’ deposits in early medieval Britain as outlined by Hamerow (2006; 2012: 120-43). It is also possible that the deposition of single objects, or small groups, as seen at Catholme, can be explained within such a scheme, thus extending this type of deposition beyond the larger hoards such as those found at Bishopstone or Flixborough which have provided the focus for previous discussion. The link between deposition of objects and places related to water or in water is no surprise and, indeed, has been made on other occasions (e.g. Stocker and Evison 2003; Booth et al 2007: 231-4; Lund 2010). The recent discovery of a potential 7th-century ritual landscape, away from domestic settlement, consisting of platforms around a waterlogged hollow at North Ferriby, North Yorkshire adds further evidence to the likely importance of water to people’s perceptions of landscapes in the early medieval period (Fenton-Thomas 2011). The additional possibility that some finds from dry land may be related to water has been made here, although this requires further study.

While interpretation remains difficult and is dependent on both good recording and publication which allows full assessment of the context of deposition, it is possible to bring out some broad trends here. Finds of weapons from rivers tend to cluster near potentially dangerous locations such as crossing points and confluences; and boundaries or entrances are favoured locations on settlements, as are periods of change when buildings are demolished and backfilled. While recognising that myriad reasons and varied beliefs may lie behind such deposits, it does appear that notions of ‘protection’ are important, be that of the community (i.e. the continued prosperity and fertility of the settlement and its land), or protection from harm, which may constitute protection from the dangers of the river or perhaps protection by the river from the objects deposited in it. All of these point to the burial of some objects for the long-term good of the community. 137

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Iron and lead seem to be especially important (see above for a brief discussion of the perception of iron in AngloSaxon England), although it is clear that copper-alloy and precious metals are not absent or neutral in these types of deposit.

and bent coins found in the countryside (Anderson 2010; Kelleher 2012), or finds of early medieval objects at prehistoric monuments which are briefly discussed below (Semple 2011). {4} The find of a small Jellinge-style disc brooch by a metal-detectorist working on dredged river spoil in eastern Lincolnshire (PAS PUBLIC-9AA0E3) and the numerous small finds made by ‘mudlarks’ on the Thames foreshore in London attest to the presence of these smaller objects in rivers (see also endnote {9}), as do the Witham pins. However, definitively considering these as anything other than casual losses is difficult unless there is a particular reason to do so, as seen for instance in the large numbers of late medieval pilgrims badges found in the River Stour through Canterbury at the Eastbridge (Egan 2007, 74). It should be noted that along the Upper and Middle Thames, Booth et al (2007: 217-20) note that a number of small Roman and Iron-Age objects have been found, but this does not appear to be the case for the early medieval period. {5} See the annual reports on material dredged from the Thames and reported in the Berkshire Archaeological Journal for this period. For material from other periods see Lambrick (2009); York (2002); Booth et al (2007: 217-20). {6} This case study is based on a search of published literature on the region (see Appendix for a list of finds including references) with the addition of a brief search of the various county Historic Environment Records (HER) databases and English Heritage Pastscape database accessed via www.heritagegateway.org.uk (last accessed 1-10-14) and the Portable Antiquities Scheme (www.finds.org.uk; accessed 1-10-14). While I am confident the majority of finds are included and correctly dated, the results must remain preliminary until detailed study can be undertaken. {7} The figures provided for spearheads and axes are certainly an underestimation as a number of antiquarian reports list only ‘spearheads’ or ‘axes’. {8} It should be noted that the Thames flowing through London today has a very different topography to that of the early medieval London region, and is narrower, deeper and has its tidal reach is now further upstream than during the Anglo-Saxon period when this probably only extended as far as The Strand area (Lundenwic) (Cohen 2003). {9} Collecting of material from the Thames foreshore through London has a long history and the Thames Mudlarks have been very active since the 1970s. It is important to note that the 3,000 finds recorded by PAS since 1997 represents only a small proportion of the total number of finds made on the foreshore over the years. My thanks to Roger Bland for this observation. See also Wheeler (1927; 1935) for examples of small objects found in the rivers of London. {10} Marsden (1980: 147 and 212, endnote 24) mentions a group of pewter ingots stamped with the Chi-Rho and the inscription ‘SPES IN DEO’ (Hope in God) as well as a name SYAGRIVS. These have been dated to the 5th century on the basis of the name in relation to a Gaulish ruler of the same name, although Marsden argues a 4thcentury date is just as likely.

In conclusion, the proportion of objects discussed here in comparison to the overall corpus of material recovered remains small, and there is little to suggest that the bulk of objects were anything other than refuse.{14} This includes bone, ceramics and metal objects. Such a wide range of material suggests there is a need to carefully assess the nature of the deposition of finds made during excavations or metal-detector surveys/fieldwalking, although the latter is inevitably more difficult (but see Anderson 2010 and Kelleher 2012 for late medieval examples examining ampullae and bent coins respectively); the depositional and landscape contexts of precious metal hoards (including coinage) also warrant further investigation although such discussions are, unfortunately, outside the scope of the present article. In this paper, I have tried to illustrate that the deposition of non-precious metals in early medieval England was not a ‘neutral’ activity, even in some cases where the discard of material is the intended action, and that a more complete appreciation of the motives behind their burial can only come from placing each object into its landscape and settlement context. Acknowledgements My thanks must go to Helena Hamerow and Roger Bland who read and commented on an earlier draft of this paper, and to Jillian Greenaway for discussing aspects of the Thames Water Collection at Reading Museum. The paper also benefited greatly from discussions with Kevin Leahy. Any errors or omissions remain my own responsibility. My thanks also to the Ashmolean Museum for permission to use the images of the Abingdon sword and Windsor pommel in Figs. 3 and 6. The background map detail used in the figures is based on copyright digital map data owned by Harper Collins Cartographic and is used with permission. Endnotes {1} Finds reported through PAS and Treasure are summarised each year in a number of publications, most notably for medieval artefacts in in the journals Medieval Archaeology and the British Numismatic Journal, and in the PAS Annual Report. See also annual summaries in Britannia (Roman) and Post-Medieval Archaeology. The Portable Antiquities Scheme website can be found at finds.org.uk. {2} Many spreads of early medieval material appear to represent some form of occupation, including permanent settlement, others perhaps of a seasonal nature relating to markets or meeting places. Alongside this, however, the importance of manuring of fields cannot be underestimated. See, for example, Jones (2005). {3} This is not to say that deliberate deposition did not take place elsewhere, which it undoubtedly did. See, for example, the interesting cases of later medieval ampullae

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{11} Marsden (1980: 74-5) notes large numbers of Roman objects found in this area, apparently votive offerings ‘linked to water spirits of gods associated with the Thames and the Walbrook’ (ibid: 74). These include a wide range of objects coins, tools, statuettes, jewellery and incense burners found on sites by the current course of the river and through dredging. Bland and Loriot (2010: 61) note that three gold Roman coins were found at London Bridge which ‘must represent either chance losses or offerings to the god of the river’. My thanks to Roger Bland for bringing these to my attention. {12} Leahy (2013: 230) suggests this may be a mistake with the Westley Waterless hoard found while digging field drains rather than during marshland reclamation. {13} An iron knife was also found in the ‘make-up of the causeway dump at the same entrance [as the burials]’ (Dawson 2002: 111) although it is unclear quite what type of deposit this is. Another feasible example could be the complete axe and handle found in an 11th-century pit at Milk Street, London, not far from St. Paul’s, and although little stratigraphic evidence is forthcoming from the report, the axe was located well within the pit (Pritchard 1991: 135). {14} However, even this may not be the simple discarding of waste. In examination of the midden dumps at Flixborough, Loveluck (2009a) has argued that they are so extensive in comparison to most settlement deposits that they could be seen as a form of conspicuous consumption in themselves, discarding material which could easily have been recycled and reused.

4. Sansom’s Ford, Shifford, Oxfordshire A Late Saxon stirrup of Type 1a; Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 106 (cat. no. 2). 5. New Bridge, Standlake, Oxfordshire Late Saxon Seax; Blair 1994: 99, fig. 59. 6. Moreton Swifts, Oxfordshire A Late Saxon axe described as coming ‘from the Thames at Moreton Swifts’. This location may be just east of Newbridge, Standlake as shown on 1945-7 OS map as ‘Moreton’ and the location of Moreton Farm. Given the lack of certainty this find has not been mapped; Collins 1948-9: 19. 7. Gosford Bridge, Kidlington, Oxfordshire (River Cherwell) Early Saxon spearhead of Swanton type C2; Sauer 1998: 20; Swanton 1974: 59. 8. Kidlington, Oxfordshire (modern footbridge over River Cherwell) Late Saxon spearhead (Petersen type M) found in River Cherwell; Sauer 1998: 20. 9. Oxford, Oxfordshire Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type E2); Swanton 1974: 72. 10. Magdalen Bridge , Oxford, Oxfordshire Early Saxon shield boss and Late Saxon spearhead found in River Cherwell in 1884 along with a number of Viking objects with which they do not appear to be associated. The latter are now re-interpreted as derived from a riverside burial; Seaby 1950:31-3; Blair and Crawford 1997. 11. Holton Mill, Holton, Oxfordshire (River Thame) A late 11th- to early 12th-century axe found in the bank of the river; Oxoniensia 17-18 (19523): 226. 12. Quarrendon, Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire (River Thame) Early Saxon seax and Mid-Late Saxon spearheads; Babb 1996: 148. 13. Sandford Lock, Sanford-on-Thames, Oxfordshire 8th- to 9th-century spearhead; BAJ 65 (1970): 60. 14. Bog (or Bugg) Mill, Abingdon, Oxfordshire (possibly on River Ock) Late 9th-century sword with broken blade; Hinton 1970; Hinton 1974: 1-7 (cat. no. 1); Backhouse et al 1984: 34-5 (cat. no. 14); Blair 1994: 99, fig. 58; Ashmolean Museum accession number: AN1890.14. 15. Culham Weir, Culham, Oxfordshire 8th- to 9th-century spearhead; BAJ 1970: 60. 16. Clifton Weir, Clifton Hampden, Oxfordshire Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 63 (1967-8): 75. 17. Day’s Lock, Little Wittenham ,Oxfordshire Two seaxes and a Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 59 (1961): 59. 18. Keen Edge Ferry, Brightwell-cum-Sotwell (Shillingford), Oxfordshire A Late Saxon seax of Wheeler type III; Evison 1963-4. 19. Benson Lock / Benson, Oxfordshire

Appendix: Finds from the River Thames and its tributaries All finds from Thames unless otherwise stated. The catalogue is arranged in geographical order along the Thames from west to east. It should be noted that this forms a preliminary list based on published sources and a short, targeted search of the online herirtagegateway.org.uk (last accessed 1-11-14). It is likely that further and more in-depth study will reveal additional finds and also that some listed here should be discounted. Any errors and omissions remain my own. Abbreviations: BAJ: Berkshire Archaeological Journal; WANHM: The Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine; VCH: Victoria County History; HER: Historic Environment Record. 1. Castle Eaton near Kempsford, Wiltshire Stirrup of Seaby and Woodfield (1980) Type 2cii ‘probably from silt dredged from the Thames’; WANHM 78 (1984): 133 (no. 75). 2. Ten Foot Bridge, Chimney, Oxfordshire Late Saxon sword; also known as the ‘Shifford Sword’ (Oakeshott 1994); Grove 1938: 254-6; Oakeshott 1994; Blair 1994: 98, fig. 59. 3. Shifford, Oxfordshire Two Early Saxon spearheads, (Swanton types E4 and H1); Swanton 1974: 71 (listed as ‘Old Shifford’). Late 11th- to early 12th-century spur; Jope 1956: 40 (cat. no. 5). 139

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Seax; BAJ 61 (1963-4): 108. Three spearheads (1xSwanton type F2; 1x Swanton type I2; 1x Late Saxon); Swanton 1974: 33; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75; Greenaway 2013b. 20. Wallingford Bridge, Wallingford, Oxfordshire Six Late Saxon spearheads; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75; Dawson 2010; Greenaway 2013b; Booth et al 2007: 231. Late Saxon sword, end missing; BAJ 62 (19656): 75; Evison 1967; Greenaway 2013b; Booth et al 2007: 231. 21. Chalmore Ferry, near Wallingford, Oxfordshire A small bent seax; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75; Greenaway 2013b. Late Saxon axe (Wheeler type VI); BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75. 22. Bow Bridge, Cholsey, Oxfordshire Seax; BAJ 61 (1963-4): 108; Greenaway 2013b; Booth et al 2007: 231. Two Late Saxon spearheads; BAJ 61 (1963-4): 108; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 74; Greenaway 2013b; Booth et al 2007: 231. 23. Littlestoke Ferry, South Stoke, Oxfordshire Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75; Greenaway 2013b. 24. Moulsford Railway Bridge, Moulsford, Oxfordshire Two Late Saxon spearheads; BAJ 62 (1965-6): 75; Greenaway 2013b. 25. Benson Reach Cleeve near Goring, Oxfordshire A broken sword of ‘Danish type’ and Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 61 (1963-4): 108-9; Greenaway 2013b; Booth et al 2007: 234. 26. Basildon, West Berkshire Late Saxon axe (Wheeler type II); Collins 19489: 19. 27. Appletree Eyot, Tilehurst, West Berkshire Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 57 (1959): 119. 28. Roebuck Ferry, Tilehurst, West Berkshire Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 58 (1960): 62. 29. Sulhampstead, West Berkshire (River Kennet) Late Saxon spearhead found in old dredgings beside lock; BAJ 63 (1967-8): 73. 30. Stratfield Saye, Hampshire (River Loddon) A Late Saxon sword with silver wire decoration (Petersen Type L); BAJ 66 (1971): 132. 31. Reading (River Kennet) Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types E2 and E4); Swanton 1974: 75. 32. Reading, mouth of River Kennet A Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (Appendix A); Grove 1938: 251; ‘battle-axes in the Reading Museum come from the mouth of the Kennet’; VCH Berks I (1906): 246. 33. Reading (River Thames) Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type H3); Swanton 1974: 75. 34. Twyford, Wokingham (near) Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (Appendix A); Grove 1938: 252-3. 35. Twyford, Wokingham (River Loddon)

Axe found in River Loddon; Peake 1931: 236. 36. Temple Lock, Bisham, Windsor and Maidenhead Late Saxon spearhead found between Temple Lock and Bisham Church; PastScape record no. 248354 (pastscape.org.uk- accessed 1-11-14). 37. Shiplake, Oxfordshire Late Saxon spearhead, with an ‘elaborately decorated’ blade; BAJ 57 (1959): 119-20. 38. Sonning Bridge, Sonning, Wokingham Late Saxon spearhead found ‘approximately 600 yards [c. 550 m] downstream from Sonning Bridge’ (BAJ 56: 54); BAJ 56 (1958): 54; Booth et al 2007: 234. 39. Sonning, Wokingham Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton types I2); BAJ 57 (1959): 119-20; Swanton 1974: 83. 40. Wargrave, Wokingham Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 56 (1958): 56; Booth et al 2007: 234. 41. Marsh Lock, Henley-on-Thames (near), Oxfordshire Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 56 (1958): 54; Booth et al 2007: 234. 42. Henley Bridge, Henley-on-Thames, Oxfordshire Late Saxon axe (found by a diver, not dredged); BAJ 65 (1970): 58; Booth et al 2007: 234. 43. Hurley, Windsor and Maidenhead Early Saxon spearhead of Swanton type D2; Swanton 1974: 87. 44. Great Marlow/Marlow, Buckinghamshire Three Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types C1, C4 and I2); Swanton 1974: 66; Babb 1996: 144-5; Booth et al 2007: 234. 45. Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types D1 and I2); Swanton 1974: 42. 46. Hedsor Weir, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead Early medieval axe; BAJ 57 (1959): 121. 47. Hedsor Wharf, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead A late Saxon ‘winged’ spearhead; BAJ 57 (1959): 119. 48. Sashes Island, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead An unidentified number of Late Saxon spearheads and other weapons including at least one axe recovered during dredging from the 1850s-1890s; Brooks 1964: 80; Booth et al 2007: 234. 49. above Cookham railway bridge, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead Late Saxon ‘winged’ spearhead; BAJ 57 (1959): 119. 50. Cookham Weir, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead Late Saxon spearhead; Buckinghamshire HER 00532.00.000 51. Babham Ferry (ford just south of), Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead A ‘Saxon spearhead’; Underhill 1937: 35. 52. Boulter’s Reach, Cookham, Windsor and Maidenhead 5th- to 6th-century spearhead; BAJ 66 (1971-2): 134. 53. Cliveden, Windsor and Maidenhead Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type C1); Swanton 1974: 42; 140

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Late Saxon seax; Berkshire HER 00317.00.000 (listed as ‘Thames opposite Cliveden’; accessed via heritagegateway.org.uk; 1-11-14). 54. Boulter’s Lock, Taplow, Buckinghamshire Late Saxon axe; Babb 1996: 150; Booth et al 2007: 234. 55. Maidenhead, Windsor and Maidenhead (near) Seven Anglo-Saxon spearheads; Peake 1931: 126, 211; Booth et al 2007: 234. 56. Maidenhead Bridge, Maidenhead, Windsor and Maidenhead Early Saxon knife; Babb 1996: 150; Booth et al 2007: 234. 57. Bray, Windsor and Maidenhead A Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). Anglo-Saxon spearhead; Booth et al 2007: 234. 58. Surly Hall Point, Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type H2): Swanton 1974: 86. 59. Clewer, Windsor and Maidenhead An Anglo-Saxon spearhead; Foreman et al 2002: 13 (cat. no. 10). 60. Old and New Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead At least six Anglo-Saxon spearheads ‘found in the Thames at New and Old Windsor’, all antiquarian finds; PastScape record no. 251133 (pastscape.org.uk- accessed 1-11-14). 61. Old Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead Early-Middle Saxon spearhead (Swanton type F2). It is not clear if the find listed in Swanton is the same as that published in BAJ; Swanton 1974: 71; BAJ 59 (1961): 60. 62. Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead An 8th to 9th-century sword pommel of copperalloy and silver with panel of elaborate gold filigree decoration; Hinton 1974: cat. no. 36; Webster and Backhouse 1991: 225-6 (cat. no. 180). Two Late Saxon swords (one not certainly Late Saxon); Wilson 1965: 44 (cat. no. 11, Appendix A). 63. Victoria Bridge, Windsor, Windsor and Maidenhead Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types B1 and E1), and one of Early-Middle Saxon date (Swanton type F2); Swanton 1974: 89; Booth et al 2007: 234. 64. Magna Carta Island, Wraysbury, Windsor and Maidenhead Late Saxon seax; Collins 1948-9. Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 60 (1962): 119. 65. Staines, Surrey Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types C1 and C3); Swanton 1974: 83-4; Late Saxon ‘winged’ spearhead from ‘Staines Road Bridge’; BAJ 56 (1959): 56. 66. Riverbank Flats, Staines, Surrey A Late Saxon spearhead; BAJ 56 1959: 54. 67. ‘Mixnam’s Pit’, Chertsey, Surrey

A Late Saxon ‘Ulfberht’ sword (Petersen type S, Wheeler type III); East et al 1985; Pearce 2002: 98; Booth et al 2007: 232. 68. Weybridge, Surrey (River Wey at Wey Bridge) A Late Saxon axe and a spearhead found in the reach below Wey Bridge. Swanton lists one spearhead from Weybridge (type D3): Gardner 1912: 133; Swanton 1974: 88; Booth et al 2007: 233. 69. Shepperton Ranges, Surrey Two Late Saxon swords, two seaxes and a spur found at various locations along Shepperton Ranges near confluence with the Wey; Booth et al 2007: 232-3; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). 70. Sunbury Weir, Sunbury-on-Thames, Surrey Late Saxon spearhead; Collins 1948-9: 17. 71. Hampton, Greater London Seax; Wheeler 1935: 181. 72. Surbiton, Greater London Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type I2); Swanton 1974: 86. 73. Kingston-upon-Thames, Greater London Late Saxon seax: Greater London HER 102097/00/00 Late Saxon axe: Greater London HER 102010/00/00 Five Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types C1, D3, E2, F2 and L); Swanton 1974: 60. Late Saxon spearhead ; Collins 1948-9: fig. A. Hoard of ten 6th-century gold coins; Abdy and Williams 2005: cat. no. 3. 74. Hampton Wick, Greater London Late Saxon stirrup of Seaby and Woodfield type 2cii; Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 116 (cat. no. 29). 75. Brentford, Greater London 44 Early Saxon spearheads; Swanton 1974: 3640. A Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). ‘Francisca’ axe; Wheeler 1935: 142. Late Saxon ‘Carpenter’s’ axe: Wheeler 1927: 25. Early Saxon Shield boss; Wheeler 1935: 162. Two seaxes (Wheeler type I/III and type IV); Wheeler 1935: 180-1. 76. Strand-on-the-Green, Hounslow, Greater London Mid-Late Saxon axe of Wheeler type III; Wheeler 1927: 26. 77. Kew, Greater London Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types E1 and H1); Swanton 1974: 59. Late Saxon sword (Petersen type O); Pearce 2002: 90. 78. Mortlake, Greater London Seven Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types D1, D2, F2, H2, I2 and J); Swanton 1974: 69; Two seaxes; Wheeler 1935: 180. 79. Barnes Railway Bridge, Barnes, Greater London Late Saxon/early Norman axe; Wheeler 1927: 26. 141

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80. Barnes, Greater London Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton type C5 and K2); Swanton 1974: 31. Early Saxon fish-shaped shield mount; Cohen 2011: fig. 58. 81. Chiswick Eyot, Chiswick, Greater London Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types H1 and H3); Swanton 1974: 41. 8th-century sword pommel; Webster & Backhouse 1991: 226 (cat. no. 181). 82. Hammersmith, Greater London Two Late Saxon seaxes (Wheeler type IV); Wheeler 1935: 180-1. 83. Fulham, Greater London Two Late Saxon seaxes (Wheeler type IV); Wheeler 1935: 180. 84. Putney Railway Bridge, Putney, Greater London A Late Saxon sword inscribed with INGELRII; Wheeler 1927: fig. 16 no. 6; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Museum of London accession number A2373. Published by both Wheeler and Wilson under ‘Wandsworth’ but listed as Putney by the Museum of London. 85. Putney, Greater London Four Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types G1, H1, I2 and L); Swanton 1974: 74 9th-century Saxon spearhead; PAS LON920814. Late Saxon axe; Wheeler 1927:25. 86. Wandsworth, Greater London Three Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types D3, E4 and I2); Swanton 1974: 88. 87. Chelsea, Greater London Late Saxon axe of Wheeler type VI; Wheeler 1927: 26. 8th-century silver ring with engraved zoomorphic decoration; Webster and Backhouse 1991: 222 (cat. no. 175). 88. Battersea, Greater London Five Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types B2, F2(x2) and I2); Swanton 1974: 32 Late Saxon stirrup (Seaby and Woodfield type 2cii); Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 114 (cat. no. 22) Late Saxon seax with runic inscription; Wheeler 1935: 180; Backhouse et al 1984: 100-1 (cat. no. 94). Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 32 (cat. no. 1). 89. Vauxhall, Greater London Three Late Saxon swords; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). Wilson cites four swords in his appendix, Wheeler (1927) two swords and Laking (1920) two swords. One of the Laking swords listed as ‘Wandsworth Reach’ (Laking 1920: fig. 19d) is the same as the sword listed by Wilson under ‘Wandsworth’ and previously published by Wheeler (1927: fig. 16 no. 6) and has been removed from this list. 90. Thames foreshore, Lambeth, Greater London Early Saxon spearhead (Swanton type D1); Swanton 1974: 60.

Copper-alloy 8th-century drinking horn terminal; PAS LON-EFCF31. 91. Westminster, Greater London Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 42-4 (cat. no. 10). Late Saxon stirrup (Seaby and Woodfield type 2cii); Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 116 (cat. no. 28). 92. Palace of Westminster, Westminster, Greater London Late Saxon sword; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Dunning and Evison 1961. 93. Westminster Bridge, Westminster, Greater London Silver gilded fitting for a knife or seax scabbard; Webster and Backhouse 1991: 225 (cat. no. 179). 94. Waterloo Bridge, Lambeth, Greater London Late Saxon sword (Wheeler type I); Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Wheeler 1927: 36. 95. The Temple, City of London Late Saxon sword (Petersen type L var.; Wheeler type VI): Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Pearce 2002: 80. 96. Blackfriars, City of London Two Late Saxon axes; Wheeler 1927: 26. 97. London Bridge, City of London ‘One or two’ Late Saxon swords, a group of six spearheads (Petersen type K); Wilson 1965: 502 (incl. appendix A). Late Saxon spearhead with Ringerike decoration; seven axes, iron tongs and ‘grappling hook’; Wheeler 1927: 18. 98. Tower Hill (near), City of London Two Late Saxon axes; Wheeler 1927: 26. Late Saxon stirrup (Seaby and Woodfield type 2cii); Seaby and Woodfield 1980: 116 (cat. no. 25). 99. Edmonton, Greater London (River Lea) Late Saxon sword (Petersen type U; Wheeler type VII); Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Pearce 2002: 110. 100. Enfield, Greater London (River Lea) Late Saxon sword of Wheeler type II; Wheeler 1927: 53; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). 101. Walthamstow, Greater London (River Lea) Two Late Saxon swords; Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A). Finds listed with vague provenance 102. Thames (Oxfordshire). Note: county here refers to pre-1974 region. Three Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types C3 and E4 x2); Swanton 1974: 86-7. 103. Thames (Berkshire). Note: county here refers to pre1974 region. Two Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types D2 and E3); Swanton 1974: 87. 104. London, not further defined Five Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types B2, C2, E2, H2 and I2); Swanton 1974: 62. Two Late Saxon swords (one pommel only); Wilson 1965: 52 (appendix A); Wheeler 1927: 54. 142

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Early Saxon Bronze bowl; Wheeler 1935: 147. Large Late Saxon seax; Wheeler 1935: 181. Two Late Saxon axes; Wheeler 1927: 26. 105. Thames Fifteen Early Saxon spearheads (Swanton types B1 (2), C2 (2), D3 (2), E2 (2), E3 (3), F1 and F2 (3)); Swanton 1974: 87.

Ireland, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication No. 46 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Booth, P., Dodd, A., Robinson, M., and Smith, A. 2007, The Thames Through Time. The archaeology of the gravel terraces of the Upper and Middle Thames. The early historical period: AD 1-1000, Thames Valley Landscapes Monograph No. 27 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Boyer, P., Proctor, J. and Taylor-Wilson, R. 2009, On the Boundaries of Occupation. Excavations at Burrington Road, Scunthorpe and Baldwin Avenue, Bottesford, North Lincolnshire, PCA Monograph 9 (PCA). Bradley, R. 1990 (repr. 1998), The Passage of Arms. An archaeological analysis of prehistoric hoard and votive deposits (Oxbow, Oxford). Brooks, N. 1964, ‘The unidentified forts of the Burghal Hidage’, Medieval Archaeology 8, 74-90. Brookes, S., Harrington, S. and Reynolds, A. (eds) 2011, Studies in Early Anglo-Saxon Art and Archaeology: papers in honour of Martin G. Welch, British Archaeological Reports British Series 527 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Cameron, M. L. 1988, ‘Anglo-Saxon medicine and magic’, Anglo-Saxon England 17, 191-215. Carver, M. (ed.) 2003, The Cross Goes North. Processes of conversion in Northern Europe, AD 300-1300 (Boydell, Woodbridge). Carver, M. O. H. 2005, Sutton Hoo: a seventh-century princely burial ground and its context (British Museum, London). Cohen, N. 2003, ‘Boundaries and settlement: the role of the River Thames’, Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History 12, 9-20. Cohen, N. 2011, ‘Early Anglo-Saxon fish traps on the River Thames’, in Brookes, S. et al. (eds), 12138. Collins, A. E. P. 1948-9, ‘Some Viking-period weapons from the Thames’, Berkshire Archaeological Journal 51, 17-19. Cowgill, J. 1994, ‘The lead vessel’ in Steedman, K. ‘Excavations of a Saxon site at Riby Cross Roads, Lincolnshire’, The Archaeological Journal 151, 212-306 at 267-71. Cowgill, J. 2009a, ‘The lead vessels housing the Flixborough tool hoard’, in Evans, D. H. and Loveluck, C. (eds), 267-76. Cowgill, J. 2009b, ‘Lead vessels’, in Boyer, J. et al, On the Boundaries of Occupation, 73-9. Crawford, S. 1989, ‘The Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Chimney, Oxfordshire’, Oxoniensia 54, 45-56. Christie, N. 2013, ‘The emergent Burh: early medieval Wallingford’, in Christie et al (eds), 67-144. Christie, N., Creighton, O., Edgeworth, M. and Hamerow, H. (2013), Transforming Townscapes. From Burh to Borough: the archaeology of Wallingford, AD 800-1400, Society for Medieval Archaeology Monograph 35 (Society for Medieval Archaeology, London). Crummy, P. 1980, Aspects of Anglo-Saxon and Norman Colchester, Colchester Archaeological Report 1

Bibliography Abdy, R. and Williams, G. 2005, ‘A catalogue of hoards and single finds from the British Isles, c. AD 410-675’, in Cook, B and Williams, G (eds), Coinage and History in the North Sea World c. 500-1250. Essays in honour of Marion Archibald, 11-73 (Brill, Leiden). Ackroyd, P. 2007, Thames: sacred river (Chatto and Wundus: London). Ackroyd, P. 2011, London Under (Vintage, London). Ager, B. and Williams, G. 2011, ‘The Vale of York Viking hoard: preliminary catalogue’, in Abramson, T. (ed.), Studies in Early Medieval Coinage. Volume 2: New perspectives, 135-45 (Boydell, Woodbridge) Anderson, W. 2010, ‘Blessing the fields? A study of late medieval ampullae from England and Wales’, Medieval Archaeology 54, 182-203. Babb, L. 1996, ‘A corpus of Anglo-Saxon weapons and knives in Buckinghamshire County Museum’, Records of Buckinghamshire 38, 139-52. Backhouse, J., Turner, D. H. and Webster, L. 1984, The Golden Age of Anglo-Saxon Art (British Museum. London). Bateman, C., Enright, D. and Oakey, N. 2003, ‘Prehistoric and Anglo-Saxon settlements to the rear of Sherborne House, Lechlade: excavations in 1997’, Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society 121, 2396. Bell, C. 2003, ‘Cresswell Field: Saxon settlement’, in Hey, G., Yarnton: Saxon and Medieval Settlement and Landscape, Oxford Archaeology Thames Valley Monograph 20, 177-297 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Blair, J. 1994, Anglo-Saxon Oxfordshire (Sutton, Stroud). Blair, J. 1996. ‘The Minsters of the Thames’, in Blair, J. and Golding, B. (eds), The Cloister and the World: essays in Medieval History in Honour of Barbara Harvey, 1-29 (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Blair, J. 2010, ‘The prehistory of English fonts’, in Henig, M. and Ramsey, N. (eds), Intersections: the archaeology and history of Christianity in England, 400-1200. Papers in honour of Martin Biddle and Birthe Kjølbye-Biddle, British Archaeological Reports British Series 505, 149-77 (Oxford: BAR Publishing). Blair, J. and Crawford, B.E. 1997. ‘A Late-Viking burial at Magdalen Bridge, Oxford?’, Oxoniensia 62, 135-43. Bland, R. and Loriot, X. 2010, Roman and Early Byzantine Gold Coins Found in Britain and 143

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/ CBA Research Report 39, London: Council for British Archaeology. Davies, G. 2010, ‘Early medieval ‘rural centres’ and West Norfolk: a growing picture of diversity, complexity and changing lifestyles’, Medieval Archaeology 54, 89-122. Dawson, T. 2010. ‘Riverside Park, Wallingford , Oxfordshire’. Unpublished Thames Valley Archaeological Services report 10/19 (http://www.tvas.co.uk/reports/pdf/RMW1019wb.pdf) Dodd, A. 2003, ‘Cresswell Field: objects of iron and bone’, in Hey, G., Yarnton: Saxon and Medieval Settlement and Landscape, Oxford Archaeology Thames Valley Monograph 20, 297-299 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Dunning, G. C. and Evison, V. I. 1961, ‘The Palace of Westminster sword’, Archaeologia 98 (2nd series), 123-158. East, K., Larkin, P. and Windsor, P. 1985, ‘A Viking sword from Chertsey’, Surrey Archaeological Collections 76, 1-9. Egan, G. 2007, ‘Material culture of care for the sick: some excavated evidence from English medieval hospitals and other sites’, in B.S. Bowers (ed.), The Medieval Hospital and Medical Practice, 65-75 (Ashgate, Aldershot). Evans, D. H. and Loveluck, C. (eds) 2009, Life and Economy at Early Medieval Flixborough, c. AD 600-1000: the artefact evidence, Excavations at Flixborough Vol. 2 (Oxbow, Oxford). Evison, V. I. 1963-4, ‘A decorated seax from the Thames at Keen Edge Ferry’, Berkshire Archaeological Journal 61, 28-36. Evison, V. I. 1967, ‘A sword from the Thames at Wallingford’, Archaeological Journal 124, 160189. Fenton-Thomas, C. 2011, Where Sky and Yorkshire and Water Meet. The story of the Melton landscape from prehistory to the present, On-Site Archaeology Monograph No. 2 (On-Site Archaeology, York). Foreman, S., Hiller, J. and Petts, D. 2002, Gathering the People, Settling the Land. The archaeology of a middle Thames Landscape: Anglo-Saxon to post-medieval, Thames Valley Landscapes Monograph No. 14 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Fox, C. 1923, Archaeology of the Cambridge Region (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Garcia, M 2009, ‘Medieval medicine, magic and water: the dilemma of deliberate deposition of pilgrim signs’, Peregrinations 1(3), 1-13. Gardner, E. 1912, ‘Some prehistoric and Saxon antiquities found in the neighbourhood of Weybridge’, Surrey Archaeological Collections 25, 129-135. Garrow, D. 2012, ‘Odd deposits and average practice. A critical history of the concept of structured deposition’, Archaeological Dialogues 19(2), 85-115.

Garwood, P, with Hey, G and Barclay, A 2011, ‘Ritual, ceremony and cosmology’, in Hey, G, Garwood, P, Robinson, M, Barclay, A and Bradley, P (eds), The Thames Through Time: volume 1, section 2; earlier prehistory, 331-82 (Oxbow Books, Oxford). Gilchrist, R. 2008, ‘Magic for the dead? The archaeology of magic in later medieval burials’, Medieval Archaeology 52, 119-59. Grayson, A. J. 2010. ‘Thames crossings near Wallingford from Roman to early Norman times’, Oxoniensia 75, 1-14. Greenaway, J 2013a, ‘River finds: the Thames Water Collection’, in Christie et al (eds), 41-3. Greenaway, J. 2013b, ‘Appendix 2: The Thames Water Collection for Wallingford and surrounding areas’, in Christie et al (eds), 431-5. Grove, L. R. A. 1938, ‘Five Viking-period swords’, Antiquaries Journal 18, 251-257. Hamerow, H. 2006, ‘Special deposits in Anglo-Saxon settlements’, Medieval Archaeology 50, 1-30. Hamerow, H. 2012, Rural Settlements and Society in Anglo-Saxon England (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Hamerow, H., Ferguson, C. and Naylor, J. 2013, ‘The Origins of Wessex pilot project’, Oxoniensia 78, 49-69. Hey, G. 2003, ‘Saxon society at Yarnton’, in Hey, G., Yarnton: Saxon and Medieval Settlement and Landscape, Oxford Archaeology Thames Valley Monograph 20, 59-84 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Hinton, D. A. 1970, ‘Two Late Saxon swords’, Oxoniensia 35, 1-5. Hinton, D. A. 1974, A Catalogue of Saxon Ornamental Metalwork 700-1100 in the Department of Antiquities, Ashmolean Museum (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Hinton, D. A. 1998, ‘Anglo-Saxon Smiths and Myths’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 80(1), 3-22. Hinton D. A. 2005, Gold and Gilt, Pots and Pins. Possessions and people in Medieval Britain (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Hingley, R. 2006, ‘The deposition of iron objects in Britain during the later prehistoric and Roman periods: contextual analysis and the significance of iron’, Britannia 37, 213-57. Hutton, R. 2001, ‘How pagan were medieval English peasants?’, Folklore 122:3, 235-49. Jones. R. 2005, ‘Signatures in the soil: the use of pottery in manure scatters in the identification of medieval arable farming regimes’, Archaeological Journal 161, 159-88. Jope, E. M. 1956, ‘The tinning of iron spurs: a continuous practice from the tenth to the seventeenth century’, Oxoniensia 21, 35-42. Kelleher, R. 2012, ‘The re-use of coins in Medieval England and Wales c.1050-1550: an introductory survey’, Yorkshire Numismatist 4, 183-200. 144

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Kemp, R. L. 1996, Anglian Settlement at 46–54 Fishergate, The Archaeology of York 7/1 (York Archaeological Trust, York). Laking, G. F. 1920, A Record of European Armour and Arms Through Seven Centuries, volume I (Bell & Son, London). Lambrick, G. 2009, ‘Attitudes to life and death’, in Lambrick, G. with Robinson, M. (eds), The Thames Through Times, The Archaeology of the Gravel Terraces of the Upper and Middle Thames. The Thames Valley in Late Prehistory: 1500bc to AD50, Thames Valley Landscapes Monograph No. 29, 283-327 (Oxford Archaeology, Oxford). Leahy, K. 2003, Anglo-Saxon Crafts (Tempus, Stroud). Leahy, K. 2013, ‘A deposit of early medieval iron object from Scraptoft, Leicestershire’, Medieval Archaeology 57, 223-37. Leahy, K. and Bland, R. 2009, The Staffordshire Hoard (British Museum, London). Losco-Bradley, S. and Kingsley, G. 2002, Catholme: an Anglo-Saxon settlement on the Trent gravels in Staffordshire, Nottingham Studies in Archaeology 3 (Dept. of Archaeology, University of Nottingham, Nottingham). Loveluck, C. 1995, ‘Acculturation, migration and exchange: the formation of Anglo-Saxon society’, in Bintliff, J. and Hamerow, H. (eds), Europe Between Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Recent archaeological and historical research in Western and Southern Europe, British Archaeological Reports International Series S617, 84-98 (BAR Publishing, Oxford).

Mills, A.D. 2010, A Dictionary of London Place Names (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Morris, C. 1983, ‘A Late Saxon hoard of iron and copperalloy artefacts from Nazeing, Essex’, Medieval Archaeology 27, 27-39. Oakeshott, R. E. 1994, ‘The Shifford Sword’, in Ellis Davidson, H., The Sword in Anglo-Saxon England. Its archaeology and literature, 225 (Boydell, Woodbridge). Ottaway, P. 2009, ‘The Flixborough tool hoard’, in Evans, D. H. and Loveluck, C. (eds), 256-67. Peake, H. 1931, The Archaeology of Berkshire (Methuen, London). Pearce, I. 2002, Swords of the Viking Age (Boydell, Woodbridge). Petts, D. 2003, ‘Votive deposits and Christian practice in Late Roman Britain’, in Carver, M. (ed.), 10918. Pritchard, F. 1991, ‘Small Finds’, in Vince, A. (ed.), Aspects of Saxon-Norman London: II: Finds and environmental evidence, London and Middlesex Archaeological Society Special Paper 12, 120278 (London and Middlesex Archaeological Society, London). Randsborg, K. 2002, ‘Wetland hoards’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21(4), 415-8. Reynolds, A. and Semple, S. 2011, ‘Anglo-Saxon nonfunerary weapon deposits’, in Brookes, S et al. (eds), 40-7. Richards, J. D. 1999, ‘Cottam: an Anglo-Scandinavian settlement on the Yorkshire Wolds’, Archaeological Journal 156, 1-111. Sauer, E. 1998, ‘In search of the Port-way: excavations in the area of the moated site north of St. Mary’s Church in Kidlington’, Oxoniensia 63, 11-22. Seaby, W.A. 1950, ‘Late Dark Age finds from the Cherwell and Ray, 1876-86’, Oxoniensia 15. 2943 Seaby, W.A. and Woodfield, P. 1980, ‘Viking stirrups from England and their background’, Medieval Archaeology 24, 87-122. Semple, S. 2011, ‘Sacred spaces and places in preChristian and Conversion-period Anglo-Saxon England’, in Hamerow, H., Hinton, D. A. and Crawford, S. (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Anglo-Saxon Archaeology, 742-63 (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Semple, S. 2013, Perceptions of the Prehistoric in AngloSaxon England. Religion, ritual and rulership in the landscape (Oxford University Press, Oxford). Sheppard, T. 1939, ‘Viking and other relics at Crayke, Yorkshire’, Yorkshire Archaeological Journal 34, 273-81. Steedman, K. ‘Excavations of a Saxon site at Riby Cross Roads, Lincolnshire’, The Archaeological Journal 151, 212-306. Stocker, D. and Evison, P. 2003, ‘The straight and narrow way: Fenland causeways and the conversion of the landscape in the Witham Valley, Lincolnshire’, in Carver, M. (ed.), 271-88.

Loveluck, C. 2009a, ‘Changing lifestyles, interpretation of settlement character and wider perspectives’, in Loveluck, C., Rural Settlement Lifestyles and Social Change in the First Millennium AD: Anglo-Saxon Flixborough in its wider context, Excavations at Flixborough Volume 4, 144-63 (Oxford: Oxbow). Loveluck, C. 2009b, ‘Descriptions of the landscape and natural resources’, in Loveluck, C., Rural Settlement Lifestyles and Social Change in the First Millennium AD: Anglo-Saxon Flixborough in its wider context, Excavations at Flixborough Volume 4 (Oxford: Oxbow), 80-2. Loveluck, C. and Atkinson, D. 2007. The Early Medieval Settlement remains from Flixborough, Lincolnshire: The occupation sequence, c.AD600-1000, Excavations at Flixborough volume I (Oxbow, Oxford). Lund, J. 2010, ‘At the water’s edge’, in Carver, M. and Samark, A. (eds), Signals of Belief in Early England: Anglo-Saxon paganism revisited (Oxbow, Oxford), 49-66. Marsden, P. 1980, Roman London (Thames & Hudson, London). Merrifield, R. and Smedley, N. 1958, ‘Two witch-bottles from Suffolk’, Proceedings of Suffolk Institute of Archaeology 28(1), 97-100. 145

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Swanton, M. J. 1974, A Corpus of Pagan Anglo-Saxon Spearheads, British Archaeological Reports British Series 7 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Thomas, G. 2008, ‘The symbolic lives of Late AngloSaxon settlements: a cellared structure and iron hoard from Bishopstone, East Sussex’, Archaeological Journal 165, 334-98. Underhill, F. M. 1937, ‘Notes on recent antiquarian discoveries in Berkshire’, Berkshire Archaeological Journal 41, 33-41. Vince, A. 1990, Saxon London. An archaeological investigation, London: Seaby. Webster, L. and Backhouse, J. 1991, The Making of England. Anglo-Saxon art and culture AD 600900 (British Museum, London). Wheeler, R. E. M. 1927, London and the Vikings, London Museum Catalogues No. 1 (London Museum, London). Wheeler, R. E. M. 1935, London and the Saxons, London Museum Catalogues No. 6 (London Museum, London). Williams, H. 1997, ‘Ancient landscapes and the dead: the reuse of prehistoric and Roman monuments as Early Anglo-Saxon burial sites’, Medieval Archaeology 41, 1-32. Wilson, D. 1965, ‘Some neglected Late Anglo-Saxon swords’, Medieval Archaeology 9, 32-54. Wright. A.P.M and Lewis, C.P. (eds) 1989, ‘Willingham: introduction’ in A History of the County of Cambridge and the Isle of Ely: volume 9: Chesterton, Northstowe and Papworth Hundreds, 398-402. British History Online http://www.britishhistory.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=15509&strque ry=willingham+cambridgeshire . Access date: 03/03/14. Yates, D. and Bradley, R. 2010, ‘The siting of metalwork Age hoards in the Bronze Age of south-east England’, Antiquaries Journal 90, 41-72. York, J. 2002, ‘The lifecycle of Bronze Age metalwork from the Thames’, Oxford Journal of Archaeology 21(1), 77-92.

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Coin Hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544 Martin Allen Introduction

own in this period, but five of the six hoards concerned and most of the few Welsh single-finds of coins of c. 973-1066 are from coastal areas, which would have had most contact with imported coinage (Besly 2006: 702, 717).{2} Boon has associated two hoards containing English coins of Cnut (1016-35) from the north coast of Wales, Bryn Maelgwyn and Pant-yr-Eglwys (and possibly also the poorly recorded Drwsdangoed or Penarth Fawr hoard), with trade in the Irish Sea and the presence of a royal residence of the princes of Gwynedd at Degannwy (Boon 1986: 14-15). At this time, in the 11th century, the interior of rural Wales had an economy in which the use of silver was largely restricted to tribute payments in bullion (Besly 2006: 702).

In 2002 I published a survey of coin hoards deposited in England between 1158 and 1544, which included discussions of the geographical distribution of hoards and their monetary values (Allen 2002: 35-43). It is the purpose of this chapter to investigate these two subjects in much greater depth, extending the analysis to include hoards deposited between Edgar’s reform of the English coinage in about 973 and 1158, and Welsh hoards of c. 973-1544. The article published in 2002 included 335 English finds probably or certainly deposited between 1158 and 1544, and in 2006 I listed and summarized a further 130 hoards for the period from c. 973 to 1158 (Allen 2002: 46-81; Allen 2006: 503-23). My recent book on English monetary history includes consolidated and updated lists of 552 hoards from c. 973 to 1544, and the chapter by Barrie Cook (this volume) provides a new survey of English hoards of 1279-1351 (Allen 2012b: 446-525). None of these publications includes Welsh hoards, and to remedy this deficiency the Appendix lists 57 Welsh finds of c. 973-1544. All of the maps and analyses in this chapter are based upon the 552 English hoards in the book and the 57 Welsh hoards in the Appendix.

In Naismith’s recent analysis of 1,852 single-finds of coins of c. 973-1100 from England there is no significant variation in the regional distribution of finds before and after 1066, apart from an increase in London’s share, possibly connected with a growth in population and commerce (Naismith 2013: 212-14), but the map of hoards in 1066-1158 (Fig. 2) shows a greater number of finds in Yorkshire, north-western England and the West Country than in c. 973-1066. Seven hoards from Yorkshire ending in one of William I’s first three types should probably be associated with the northern rebellions of 1068-9 or William’s very destructive ‘harrying of the north’ in 1069-70 (Thompson 1956: xxv; Dolley 1966: 39). Thomas has mapped English hoards in the reigns of Henry I (1100-35), Stephen (1135-54) and Henry II (1154-89), showing an increase in the Midlands and the West Country under Stephen that might be at least partly connected with the civil war of Stephen’s reign (Thomas 2008: 142 and 162; Blackburn 1994: 149). The four Welsh hoards of the period 1066-1158 are all from areas of Norman lordship in south-eastern Wales and Pembrokeshire, confirming the evidence of singlefinds that the use of money was largely restricted to zones of Norman activity (Dolley 1962: 74; Boon 1986: 38-56, 60-2 and 103-5; Besly 2006: 707-10 and 718-19; Besly 2007: 278).

Geographical distribution of hoards In order to assess the changing geographical distributions of the English and Welsh hoards that are the subject of this chapter they have been plotted on six maps, covering the periods c. 973-1066, 1066-1158, 1158-1279, 12791351, 1351-1464/5 and 1464/5-1544 (Figs. 1-6).{1} It is useful to compare the distribution of hoards in these periods with Kelleher’s recent major survey of singlefinds of 1066-1544 from England and Wales, which has shown a consistent underlying trend of a concentration of finds in the more southern and eastern areas of England, with the densities of finds being low in upland areas of the North and West, although finds tend to increase relatively fast in more western and rural areas through time (Kelleher 2012: 42-5, 49, 52-62, 64-71, 86-7, 89, 91-2, 96-103, 124-31, 138, 249-50, 252-3, 386-456). The map of hoards from c. 973-1066 (Fig. 1) shows an almost complete lack of hoards north of the Humber, in the west Midlands, and in Devon and Cornwall, suggesting that the greatest concentration of hoarded money was in the south and east of England. This should not be taken to imply that there was no use of money in areas with no known hoards, and it is also worth noting that some of the hoards along the south coast in Sussex were deposited around the year 1066 and can be plausibly associated with the abnormal conditions of the Norman invasion of that part of the country (Thompson 1956: xxiv; Dolley 1966: 37). Wales does not lack hoards datable between c. 973 and 1066, although it did not have a coinage of its

In 1158-1279 (Fig. 3) there are significant increases in the numbers of hoards in areas that are almost a blank on the maps before 1158 - the South West, the west Midlands, and the North West - as well as in northern England east of the Pennines and in Wales. The total number of hoards has increased from 81 in 1066-1158 to 117 in 1158-1279, but there does seem to be real evidence here of the growth of a monetary economy, during a period when the English currency was rapidly increasing in size, from an estimated c. £15,000-£60,000 in 1180 to c. £500,000-£800,000 in 1279, and English society was becoming more commercialized (Allen 2012b: 322-8 and 344; Britnell 1996: 79-151; Britnell 2004: 16-17). 147

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Fig. 1: English and Welsh hoards, c. 973-1066. 148

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Fig 2: English and Welsh hoards, 1066-1158. 149

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Fig. 3: English and Welsh hoards, 1158-1279. 150

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Wales shared in this process of commercialization, with the foundation of new boroughs and markets, the conversion of renders in kind to money payments, and large numbers of single-finds of the Short Cross coinage of 1180-1247 from all over Wales (Britnell 2004: 20; Besly 2006: 710-12; Kelleher: 261-2).

1998: 31-9; Donkin 1976: 78-81). Donkin noted that there was a band of high assessments across England in 1225, from Gloucestershire to Lincolnshire and East Anglia (and Kent as an outlier to the south-east), but that in 1334 the zone of higher values had expanded towards the north-west and south-west. Glasscock (1975: xxvixxxii; 1976: 138-43) has published a detailed study of the 1334 lay subsidy returns and used them to analyse the distribution of taxed wealth in much greater depth, with the following conclusions: (i) North and west of a line drawn from Exeter to York is the poorest zone, with assessed wealth usually below £10 per square mile. (ii) High assessments above £20 are common in a zone of agricultural prosperity across lowland England from Somerset and Wiltshire to Lincolnshire and Norfolk, with a scatter of wealthy localities over £30. (iii) The other areas of high assessments are the Thames Valley, east Kent and the coastal plain of Hampshire and Sussex. (iv) Some poorer agricultural areas in the south and east are below £10, including parts of Hampshire, Sussex, Surrey, Kent, Essex and Suffolk.

Cook (this volume) provides a detailed discussion of the geographical distribution of English hoards of 12791351. The most notable feature of the map of English and Welsh hoards in this period (Fig. 4) is a growth in the number of hoards in the northern Border counties, which can be connected with the onset of the Scottish Wars of Independence in 1296 (Thompson 1956: xxxvi-xxxvii, xxxix and xli-xliii; Allen 2002: 36; Kelleher 2012: 2601). Some of the Welsh hoards of this period might be associated with Edward I’s conquest of Wales and Welsh resistance to it, while the two Neath Abbey finds (and possibly also the Cefn Coed hoard) may have been deposited as a result of Edward II’s flight to Neath in November 1326 and his subsequent capture in the area (Boon 1986: 83-7 and 109-14; Dolley 1955-7a: 297-8; Dolley 1955-7b: 558-9; Besly 1993: 86-7; Kelleher: 2612). In 1351-1464/5 (Fig. 5) the concentration of hoards in the northern Border counties continues, as did intermittent conflict with Scotland in this period, and there is a notable increase in Welsh hoards, particularly in parts of Wales bordering England and on the west coast. Some of these Welsh hoards (such as those from Mountain Ash and Neuaddfach) may have been buried during the Owain Glyndŵr rebellion of 1400-c. 1412, but others are later than the rebellion and may be evidence of Welsh economic recovery in this period (Boon 1986: 120-3). The numbers of hoards in Wales and the northern Border counties fall sharply in 1464/5-1544 (Fig. 6), which may have been at least partly a consequence of the more settled conditions of this period. There is also a lack of hoards in Lincolnshire and the northern Midlands in this period, which is more difficult to explain, unless it is due to mere accident of discovery.

Schofield has compared the distributions of assessed wealth in the subsidies of 1334 and 1514-15, concluding that there were two areas with an outstanding increase in wealth by 1514-15: the South West (Cornwall, Devon and Somerset) and the South East (Kent, Surrey, Middlesex, Essex, Suffolk and Hertfordshire) (Schofield 1965: 503-10). This analysis was confirmed by Darby et al (1979: 257-62) who noted the growth of London and its hinterland, increasing prosperity from agriculture and mining in the South West, and the rise of the cloth industry, which extended the areas of high assessments to include parts of the West Riding of Yorkshire. All comparisons of the regional distributions of wealth in the subsidy assessments are vulnerable to the twin criticisms that the nature of the wealth being assessed changed through time, and that the records were affected in various ways by exemptions, under-assessments and tax evasion. The subsidy of one-fifteenth of the assessed value of taxable wealth levied in 1225 was to be paid by all laymen and churchmen in principle, but some religious orders compounded for lump-sum payments without an assessment. Food for household consumption, items used to earn a living, and certain other kinds of possessions such as books, church ornaments, arms and personal riding horses were exempted (Mitchell 1914: 163-4; Mitchell 1951: 139-43 and 151). Money appears only occasionally in the valuations of 1225 (Mitchell 1951: 141). London was not included in the returns due to its resistance to the subsidy, Sussex was substantially under-assessed, and Cheshire, Durham and the Cinque Ports of Kent and Sussex were exempted (Cazel 1961: 71; Donkin 1976: 80).

Coin hoards and the distribution of wealth in taxation records In 2002 I noted the disparity between the relatively large number of hoards in northern England in 1279-1351 and the regional distribution of taxed wealth in the lay subsidies of 1334 and 1524-5 (Allen 2002: 36).{3} Subsidies taxed various fractions of the assessed ‘movable’ wealth of taxpayers, and they were levied at irregular intervals beginning in 1207. The earliest subsidy with data suitable for a regional analysis is that of 1225, for which there are records of the tax paid by counties or pairs of counties (Cazel 1961). The assessments of each county in the lay subsidies of 1275-1352 were first published by Willard, and Donkin has used Willard’s figures to map changes in the distribution of taxed wealth between 1225 and 1334 (Willard 1913; Willard 1914; Willard 1915; summarized with amendments by Jenks 151

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Fig. 4: English and Welsh hoards, 1279-1351. 152

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Fig. 5: English and Welsh hoards, 1351-1464/5. 153

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Fig. 6: English and Welsh hoards, 1464/5-1544. 154

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Between 1275 and 1334 the coverage of the lay subsidies was even wider than that of the 1225 subsidy, in principle at least, applying to all personal possessions, money, credit, mercantile stock, and industrial and agricultural products not needed for the taxpayer’s household consumption, but official and unofficial exemptions gradually grew in scope, causing valuations to fall (Nightingale 2004: 5-8).{4} Clerical possessions and revenues were exempt if they had been included in the Taxation of Pope Nicholas in 1291, and there were certain other exemptions of Church property, because it was now separately taxed in clerical subsidies (Willard 1934: 93-109; Glasscock 1975: xvii-xxii; Jenks 1998: 4). Wales, the palatinates of Durham and Chester, the Cinque Ports (partly, from 1298), the stannaries of Devon and Cornwall, lands in the hands of the king, the queen and the king’s eldest son, and the possessions of royal servants such as moneyers were also exempted, as were those of lepers and certain people and places with special exemptions (Willard 1934: 29-30, 92-3 and 111-29; Glasscock 1975: xxii-xxiv; Jenks 1998: 5). Some towns avoided assessment by offering a fixed sum in composition (Willard 1934: 129-37). From 1295 to 1334 people with goods worth less than a sum that varied between 6s. and 13s. 4d. were exempted, and there were numerous official and unofficial exemptions from the goods that might be included in valuations (Willard 1934: 87-92; Glasscock 1975: xvii-xviii; Ormrod 1991: 156; Jenks 1998: 5-6). In rural areas the goods officially exempted were the armour, personal riding-horses, jewels and clothing of knights, gentlemen and their wives, and their vessels of gold, silver and brass, and in urban areas the exemptions were one garment each for a man and his wife, their bed, one ring, one buckle of silver or gold, and a drinking cup or mazer of silver (Willard 1934: 77-9). Tax assessors often omitted other goods that might be expected to be found in a household, particularly when they were needed for the taxpayer’s livelihood or immediate needs (Willard 1934: 74-7, 79-86; Glasscock 1975: xxv-xxvi; Jenks 1998: 6-7). Cash and plate gradually became customary exemptions, particularly in rural areas, and when cash was assessed it may in some cases have been at a notional valuation after negotiation (Hadwin 1977: 148-9; Nightingale 2004: 5-7, 16). Wool, which was a valuable export commodity with an important role in the medieval English economy, was a major omission from the assessments, presumably because it was taxed heavily when it was exported.

occasions until 1623 (Glasscock 1975: xvi-xvii; Hadwin 1983: 201-2). Hadwin has argued that exemptions, under-valuations and evasions make the lay subsidy records of 1275-1334 unreliable as a source of evidence for the distribution of wealth, and that it is unsafe to assume that evasions and exemptions would have had the same effect in all parts of the country (Hadwin 1983: 200-10). Hadwin’s view has been supported by detailed studies of the Lincolnshire and Gloucestershire tax rolls (Rigby 1990; Franklin 1995: 22-5). Jenks has argued that a comparison of the county valuations of 1275-1334 with those of London does at least indicate that the lay subsidies provide reliable evidence of surplus goods available for domestic trade, because it shows trends common to London and other parts of England, but Nightingale has very effectively challenged the treatment of the data in this analysis (Jenks 1998: 13-29; Nightingale 2004: 2-5). When Schofield analysed the differences between the 1334 and 1514-15 lay subsidy assessments he argued that they were relatively negligible in overall effect, but he admitted that annual incomes and wages were assessed in 1514-15 and not in 1334, that exclusions of goods to be assessed and geographical areas covered differed, and that the assessed lands acquired by the Church since 1291 were much greater in extent by 1514-15 (Schofield 1965: 492-9 and 508). The 1334 valuations largely excluded coins and other financial assets of the taxpayer, but the 16th-century subsidies taxed money, plate, debts owed to the taxpayer and mercantile stock fairly thoroughly (Hoyle 1998: 652-8). In 1524 and 1525 there was a new assessment for the subsidies, which were to be levied on personal property worth more than £2 (including coin, plate and debts owed), and landed income and wages above £1 (Sheail 1972: 111-12; Sheail 1998: 13-16). The assessments of 1524-5 at least share with those of 1334 an incompleteness of coverage and a vulnerability to under-valuation. They excluded Northumberland, Cumberland, Durham, Westmorland and Cheshire, the Cinque Ports and some other places; many returns are missing or badly damaged; and no county has a complete set of tax lists (Sheail 1972: 116). The returns for large parts of northern England not exempted from the assessments are essentially fraudulent, excluding a greater proportion of the population than the instructions of the assessors allowed (Sheail 1998: I, 35-6, 109, 184, 188 and 191; Darby et al 1979: 249).

In addition to the numerous and increasing exemptions, evasion tended to grow with time, and it was particularly prevalent during the widespread opposition to the ‘maltolt’ wool export tax of 1294-6 and at other times of political unrest (Hadwin 1983: 206-10; Nightingale 2004: 8; Ormrod 1991: 155-6). In 1334, following allegations of corruption in the 1332 returns, the assessments were based upon those of 1332 as a minimum, and only in Kent and parts of Wiltshire were new assessments of the movable goods of individuals made (Willard 1934: 5-6, 11-13; Glasscock 1975: xv-xvi; Jenks 1998: 9-12). The 1334 assessments were used in 1336 and on subsequent

It is quite clear that the subsidy records provide a very incomplete measure of the wealth of England, and that the elements of that wealth measured changed substantially through time. Nevertheless, the data for 1225, 1334 and the early 16th century do show a common pattern in the geographical distribution of wealth, developing over the three centuries covered by the data in a manner that is explicable in the context of England’s economic development. The numbers of taxpayers in the poll tax returns of 1377, which are our best evidence for the population of medieval England, have a remarkably similar pattern. In principle, the 1377 155

Martin Allen

poll tax applied to everyone aged 14 or over, with the minor exceptions of beggars and mendicant friars (Beresford 1956-8: 271). Baker has mapped the poll tax figures, showing that the highest populations of taxpayers per square mile are in a now familiar band across England from Somerset and Wiltshire to East Anglia, Lincolnshire and the East Riding, with Kent in its accustomed role as an outlier to the south-east (Baker 1976: 190-2, using data from Russell 1948: 132-3, 1423). The use of the poll tax returns as a measure of the relative density of population is subject to the caveat that it relies upon the unproven assumption that there were no significant differences in the proportion of the population recorded in each county. Nevertheless, the similarities in the distributions of the data from the poll tax and the subsidies suggest that they are all reflecting an underlying pattern of wealth and population that can be usefully compared with the coin hoard data. There are insufficient hoard data for a comparison on a county by county basis, but the figures will sustain an analysis based upon three zones, as shown in Table 1 and Fig. 7, with a central zone of relatively high tax assessments and population and two zones of lower tax and population in the south east and the north and west. South-eastern zone

Central zone

Northern and Western zone

Essex Hampshire Kent Surrey Sussex

Bedfordshire Berkshire Buckinghamshire Cambridgeshire Dorset Gloucestershire Hertfordshire Huntingdonshire Leicestershire Lincolnshire Middlesex (including London) Norfolk Northamptonshire Nottinghamshire Oxfordshire Rutland Somerset Suffolk Warwickshire Wiltshire

Cheshire Cornwall Cumberland Derbyshire Devon Herefordshire Lancashire Northumberland Shropshire Staffordshire Worcestershire

poll tax of 1377 are from the summary published by Dobson (1983: 54-7). To aid a comparison between the various sets of data they have been combined in Table 4, indexing the data from the Central zone at 100. Period

c. 9731066 10661158 11581279 12791351 13511464/5 1464/51544

Southeastern zone

Central zone

2.31 (16 hoards) 2.31 (16)

1.85 (37 hoards) 2.05 (41)

2.74 (19)

Northern and Western zone 0.38 (9 hoards)

Wales

0.75 (6 hoards)

0.85 (20)

0.50 (4)

3.00 (60)

1.28 (30)

1.12 (9)

1.87 (13)

2.05 (41)

1.54 (36)

1.62 (13)

3.17 (22)

2.45 (49)

1.28 (30)

2.24 (18)

1.15 (8)

2.70 (54)

0.81 (19)

0.62 (5)

Table 2: Numbers of hoards per 1,000 square miles Source

Data

1225 subsidya

Tax received (shillings per square mile) Valuation (pounds per square mile) Taxpayers per square mile Tax received (shillings per square mile)

1334 lay subsidyb 1377 poll taxc 1524 lay subsidyd

Southeastern zone

Central zone

12.51

16.81

Northern and Western zone 6.78

12.91

17.53

5.45

29.41

38.59

17.81

42.63

44.23

13.60

Table 3: Subsidy and Poll Tax data per square mile.

Yorkshire

Notes: a. In the 1225 subsidy, Cheshire and Durham were exempted from assessment, London was not included in the accounts of taxation received, and Sussex has been excluded from the analysis because it was considerably under-assessed (Cazel 1961: 71). The amounts received from two pairs of counties in different zones (Essex and Hertfordshire, and Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire) have been divided between the two counties in proportion to the sizes of their assessments for the 1334 lay subsidy. b. Cheshire and Durham were omitted from the 1334 lay subsidy. The data for Cumberland, Northumberland and Westmorland are taken from the 1336 assessment. c. The poll tax returns do not include Cheshire and Durham. d. Cheshire, Cumberland, Durham, Northumberland and Westmorland were not included in the 1524-5 lay subsidies, and other parts of northern England were significantly under-assessed (Darby et al. 1979: 249).

Table 1: Zones of England for comparison of data. Tables 2 and 3 show the numbers of hoards per 1,000 square miles in the three zones, extending the analysis to Wales, and the taxation data per square mile. The data in Table 2 exclude any hoards that cannot be reasonably assigned to one of the seven periods. In Table 3, the data for the 1225 subsidy are from Cazel’s analysis, the 1334 figures are from the summary published by Jenks, and those of 1524 are from the work of Sheail (Cazel 1961; Jenks 1998: 39; Sheail 1998: II, 438). The figures for the

156

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Fig. 7: Data comparison zones. 157

Martin Allen

Period

Hoards, c. 9731066 Hoards, 10661158 Hoards, 11581279 1225 subsidy Hoards, 12791351 1334 lay subsidy Hoards, 13511464/5 1377 poll tax Hoards, 1464/51544 1524 lay subsidy

Southeastern zone

Central zone

124.53

100

Northern and Western zone 20.76

Wales

112.38

100

41.63

24.29

91.19

100

41.67

37.34

74.40 91.31

100 100

40.33 74.93

78.93

73.67

100

31.10

129.29

100

52.25

91.44

76.22 42.66

100 100

46.16 30.03

23.05

96.38

100

30.74

size of hoards in the table because they are much more resistant to the distorting effects of a few hoards of exceptionally high value than the arithmetic mean. There is a substantial increase in the median value of all hoards from less than 1s. in 1066-1158 to more than 3s. in 12791351. This is consistent with the substantial increase in the size of the English currency from an estimated c. £15,000-£30,000 in 1158 to c. £460,000-£490,000 in 1247 and a peak of c. £1,800,000-£2,300,000 in 1319 (Allen 2012b: 322-31, 344-5). There are no available estimates of the Welsh currency, but the hoards show that it was effectively integrated with the currency of England. There is a dramatic rise in the median for all hoards to 13s. 4d. in 1351-1464/5, which can be seen as a direct consequence of the successful introduction of an English gold coinage in 1344, which now became the medium for large reserves of cash in hoards (Allen 2002: 35-6; Allen 2012a: 180-1). The median value of gold hoards is over £10 in 1351-1464/5, declining to £2 6s. ½d. in 1464/5-1544 (from a relatively small number of hoards), which might be consistent with a decline in the size of the English gold currency from estimated c. £1,200,000-£1,650,000 in 1377 and c. £1,120,000£1,200,000 in 1422 to only c. £400,000-£500,000 in 1470 (Allen 2012b: 331-4, 336-9 and 344-5). In contrast, the median size of silver hoards holds steady at about 3s. in 1279-1351 and 1351-1464/5, rising slightly to over 4s. in 1464/5-1544. It is difficult to reconcile this with the much debated shortage of silver coinage in 15th-century England, unless it is supposed that shortages of coinage can encourage hoarding of the few coins that are available rather than the opposite (Bolton 2011: 149-51; Allen 2012a: 182-4; Bolton 2012: 270-4).

40.37

Table 4: Comparative indices. The indices in Table 4 show that the numbers of hoards per square mile are greater in the South-Eastern zone than in the Central zone in c. 973-1066 and 1066-1158, contrary to what might be expected from any of the later taxation data, and that the index for the South East is still higher for the hoards of 1158-1279, 1279-1351 and 13511464/5 than in the 1225 and 1334 subsidy data or the 1377 poll tax. This would seem to indicate that southeastern England had a greater share of the country’s reserves of cash than its share of taxable wealth or population. The index for hoards of 1464/5-1544 in the South-Eastern zone is, however, abnormally low at 42.66, adding a further unexplained anomaly in this period to the lack of hoards in the northern Midlands and Lincolnshire already observed.{5} The indices for hoards in the Northern and Western zone after 1066 are remarkably similar to the figures from the subsidies and the poll tax, with the exceptions of the figures for 1279-1351 and to a lesser extent 1412-1464/5, when there is reason to believe that the numbers of hoards in the northern counties were significantly boosted by the Scottish Wars of Independence.{6} The indices of hoard density for Wales have some similarities to those of the Northern and Western zone, with a low level of about 40 or less in c. 973-1279, rising 78.93 in 1279-1351, but the figures diverge with a further rise in the hoard index to 91.44 in 1351-1464/5. It is worth noting, however, that the total numbers of hoards from Wales are relatively small and potentially unreliable as a point of comparison.

Period

Gold and Silver -

973-1066

-

10661158 11581279

-

-

c. £7 4s. 0d. (1) 12s. 0d. (1) £10 10s. 0d. (25) £2 6s. ½d. (12) 39

-

12791351 13511464/5 1464/51544 Hoard total

The size of hoards and the per capita supply of currency

Gold

£2 16s. 11d. (16) £1 7s. 4¾d. (6) 22

Silver

11½d. (55) 2s. 3½d. (89)

All hoards 1s. 4½d. (42 hoards) 11½d. (55) 2s. 4d. (90)

3s. 1½d. (76) 2s. 9½d. (57)

3s. 2d. (77) 13s. 4d. (98)

4s. 1d. (37)

7s. 8d. (55)

356

417

1s. 4½d. (42 hoards)

Table 5: Median values of English and Welsh hoards, c. 973-1544.

In 2002 I analysed the values of 220 English hoards of 1158-1544, comparing them with estimates of per capita supplies of currency (Allen 2002: 35-6). This analysis can now be extended to 417 English and Welsh hoards of c. 973-1544 of known value, which are summarized in Table 5.{7} Medians are used as a measure the typical 158

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

Fig. 8. Hoards ranked by value. The graph in Fig. 8 displays the monetary values of the hoards in each of the six periods, ranked in order of size from smallest to largest, against a logarithmic scale of values in pence. To allow a direct comparison between the ranked series of hoards in each period the scales of the six lines have been standardized to percentages of the total number of hoards in the period, up to 100. It will be seen that the overall levels of hoard values increase from the lowest in c. 973-1066 and 1066-1158 to the highest in 1351-1464/5, before falling back slightly in 1464/5-1544. This confirms the trends already observed in the hoard medians. The graph also shows that hoard sizes tend to increase faster than the general trend in the highest decile (top 10%) of hoards, indicating the presence of a few very large accumulations of cash. Some of these large hoards could be mercantile in origin, while others may be from the cash reserves of the richest members of society.{8} The rapid falls below the general trend in the lowest decile might be an indication of the difficulty of recognizing very small hoards for what they are when they are discovered, if there is no surviving container.

that used by Bolton for his estimate of currency per capita in 1135-58, and it is consistent with published estimates for 1086 based upon the evidence of Domesday Book, with some allowance for growth (Bolton 2012: 25).{9} This estimate for 1158 and the other population estimates in Table 6 have been increased by a factor of one-twelfth (c. 8.3%) to make allowance for the population of Wales.{10} The English population estimate for 1247 (4.00-4.50 million) is taken from Bolton’s work, but in 1290 I have used a range of estimates from Campbell (4.00 million) and Bolton (5.00 million) (Bolton 1911: 148; Bolton 2012: 26 and 244; Campbell 2000: 399-406; 2008, 925). The estimate of 2.20-3.10 million for 1377 is based upon published estimates calculated from the poll tax returns, and these figures have also been used in 1422 and 1470, in the absence of any comparable data in the 15th century (Cornwall 1970: 40-1; Hatcher 1977: 13-20; Hinde 2003: 70-2). The population estimate for England in 1544 (2.25-2.75 million) is based upon published figures estimated from the lay subsidy returns of the 1520s (Cornwall 1970: 43-4; Hatcher 1977: 68-9; Wrigley and Schofield 1981: 566-9).

There have been various attempts to estimate the per capita supply of coinage in medieval England, with figures suggested by Britnell, Bolton and myself (Britnell 1996: 102-3; Bolton 2011: 148; Bolton 2012: 25-7, 244; Allen 2001: 606-7; Allen 2012a: 179-80). These estimates are of course entirely dependent upon the underlying estimates of the currency and the population, which are subject to change and debate. The currency estimates from 1158 to 1544 in Table 6 are taken from my recent book, and the population figures are from various sources (Allen 2012b: 321-45). The estimate of the population of England in 1158 (1.50-2.50 million) is

The per capita currency estimates in Table 6 show an enormous increase from only 1.3d.-4.4d. in 1158 to 44.3d.-72.1d. in 1290, which is much greater in proportion than the rise in the median value of hoards (Table 5) from 11½d. in 1066-1158 to 38d. (3s. 2d.) in 1279-1351. It is possible that most of the increase in the size of the currency after 1158 was absorbed by the needs of a rapidly commercializing economy and not consigned to hoards. The advent of a gold coinage in 1344 and the population losses caused by the Black Death in 1348-50 and subsequent epidemics can be identified as the 159

Martin Allen

principal causes of an approximately three-fold increase in the estimates of per capita holdings of currency between 1290 and 1377, and a rise in the median value of hoards by a factor of about four between 1279-1351 and 1351-1464/5. The per capita estimates of currency fall by around one third between 1422 and 1470, during a period of bullion shortages, but they recover to about the former level by 1544 (Day 1978; 1981; Spufford 1988: 339-62). Date

1158 1247 1290 1377 1422 1470 1544

Currency estimate

c. £15,000£30,000 c. £460,000£490,000 c. £1,000,000£1,300,000 c. £1,420,000£2,390,000 c. £1,220,000£1,350,000 c. £750,000£950,000 c. £1,000,000£1,500,000

Estimated population of England (millions) 1.50-2.50

Estimated population of England and Wales (millions) 1.62-2.71

4.00-4.50

4.33-4.87

4.00-5.00

4.33-5.42

2.20-3.10

2.38-3.36

114.5d.241.0d.

2.20-3.10

2.38-3.36

87.1d.136.1d.

2.20-3.10

2.38-3.36

2.25-2.75

2.44-2.98

53.6d.95.8d. 80.5d.147.5d.

2. Monmouth, near, Monmouthshire, 1991 or 1992 (990s) Æthelred II Crux type; 12 coins. Value: 11½d. Besly 1993: 84-5; Besly 2006: 715, no. H6. 3. Penrice, Gower, 1825 or 1830 (c. 1005) Æthelred II Helmet type; c. 30 coins. Value: c. 2s. 6d. Dolley 1959: 187-8; Boon 1986: 102-3; Blackburn and Pagan 1986, no. 203; Besly 2006: 715, no. H7.

Estimated currency per capita

4. Drwsdangoed/Penarth Fawr, Caernarvonshire, in or before 1850 (1017-35?) Cnut (only?); 18 coins. Value: 1s. 6d. Thompson 1956: 51 and 114, nos. 131 and 306; Besly 2006: 715, no. H10; information from Edward Besly.

1.3d 4.4d. 22.7d.27.2d. 44.3d.72.1d.

5. Pant-yr-Eglwys, Gwynedd, 1981 (c. 1020) Cnut Quatrefoil type; 4 coins. Value: 4d. Boon 1986: 11-19, 27, 31 and 35; Blackburn and Pagan 1986, no. 207; Besly 2006: 715, no. H8. 6. Bryn Maelgwyn, Gwynedd, 1979 (c. 1025) Cnut Quatrefoil and Pointed Helmet types; Irish; 205 coins. Value: 17s. Boon 1986: 1-11 and 14-35; Blackburn and Pagan 1986, no. 208; Besly 2006: 715, no. H9; British Numismatic Journal 71 (2001), Coin Register 2001, no. 77.

Table 6: Estimates of per capita supplies of currency in England and Wales, 1158-1544.

7. Abergavenny area, Monmouthshire, 2002 (c. 1087) English to William I type 7; 199 coins. Value: 16s. 7d. Treasure Annual Report 2002, 139-40, no. 217.

Conclusions The geographical distributions of coin hoards provide good evidence of the increasing availability of money in northern England and Wales between c. 973 and 1544, although the pattern of hoarding could be influenced by periods of warfare as well as by levels of monetisation. There are underlying similarities between the locations of English hoards and the distributions of taxable wealth and population shown by the subsidies and the poll tax, but a comparison of these three sources of data suggests that south-eastern England often had a greater number of hoards than might be expected from its share of taxable wealth or population. Hoards sizes tend to increase with time, apart from a recession in 1464/5-1544, reflecting underlying trends in the supply of currency. A comparison between hoard medians and per capita estimates of the currency suggests that the proportions of the currency that were in hoards and in active circulation changed through time.

8. Llantrithyd, Vale of Glamorgan, 1962-3 (c. 1115-17) Henry I type 11; 8 coins. Value: 8d. Dolley 1962, 1964; Boon 1986: 103-5. 9. Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire, c. 1858-60 (c. 1124/5) Henry I types 13 and 14; c. 50 coins. Value: c. 4s. 2d. Thompson 1956: 103, no. 268; Besly 2007. 10. Coed-y-Wenallt, South Glamorgan, 1980 (c. 1150) Stephen type 1, Matilda and Independent types; at least 106 coins. Value: 8s. 2½d. Boon 1986: 37-82; Boon 1987. 11. Llangurig, Montgomery, ?1753 (1180-1247 or 124779?) ‘Henry I’; 28 coins. Value: 2s. 4d. Thompson 1956: 85, no. 237.

Appendix. Welsh hoards, c. 973-1544 1. Laugharne, Carmarthenshire, 1930s (c. 975) Edgar Reform type; ?60 coins. Value: c. 5s.? Boon 1986: 94; Blackburn and Pagan 1986, no. 172; Besly 2006: 715, no. H5. 160

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

12. Abbey Cwmhir, Powys, before 1978 (late 12th century-mid-13th century) French deniers; at least 13 coins. Value: ? Brand 1978.

23. Llandeilo’r Fan, Powys, c. 1800 (1279-1351?) English (only?) attributed to Edward I; 20 coins. Value: 1s. 8d. Boon 1986: 114 n. 1; Allen 2003: 142, no. 201/W. 24. Morlais Castle, Mid Glamorgan, 1859 (1279-1351?) English and Scottish; ‘several silver pennies of Edward I and one of Alexander I of Scotland’. Value: ? Besly 1993: 87; Allen 2003: 147, no. 227/W.

13. Slebech, Pembrokeshire, 1991 (c. 1200) English Short Cross to class 4a; 12 coins. Value: 11d. Besly 1993: 86. 14. Llanharry, Rhondda Cynon Taf, 2007 (c. 1236-1247) English Short Cross to class 7c; 8 coins. Value: 7d. Numismatic Chronicle 169 (2009), 355, no. 72.

25. Cae Castell, South Glamorgan, 1980 (c. 1290) English to Edward I class 4e; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 64 coins. Value: 5s. 4d. Boon 1986: 83-90; Allen 2003: 119, no. 64/W.

15. Northop, Flintshire, 2000 (c. 1236-1247) English to Short Cross class 7cA; 3 coins. Value: 3d. Treasure Annual Report 2000, 126, no. 272.

26. Swansea, 1840 (early 14th century) English, Irish, Scottish and Continental; at least 160 coins. Value: 13s. 4d. or more. Thompson 1956: 131, no. 348; Boon 1986: 111-12; Allen 2003: 158, no. 291/W.

16. Wrexham, 1926 (c. 1245) English Short Cross to class 8; Irish, Scottish and Continental; c.120 coins? Value: c. 10s.? Lewis 1970; Boon 1986: 105-9.

27. Llanfaredd, Powys, in or shortly before 1771 (130051?) English (only?) including Edward I class 9b; nearly 200 coins. Value: c. 16s. Boon 1986: 113 n. 1; Allen 2003: 143, no. 202/W.

17. Beddgelert, Caernarvonshire, 1853 (1247-79) English Long Cross (only?); 24 coins. Value: 2s. Thompson 1956: 14, no. 39.

28. Upper Killay, Swansea, 2002 (c. 1310-1351?) English to Edward II class 11; 3 coins. Value: 3d. Treasure Annual Report 2002, 140, no. 220.

18. Cilgerran, Pembrokeshire, in or before 1859 (124779) English ‘Henry III’ (Long Cross?) and Scottish; 14 coins. Value: 1s. 2d. Boon 1986: 109, n. 1.

29. Ysceifiog, Flintshire, 2007 (c. 1310-1351?) English to Edward II class 11; 3 coins. Value: 3d. Numismatic Chronicle 169 (2009), 362, no. 76.

19. Wenvoe, Vale of Glamorgan, 2006 (c. 1250-79) English Long Cross to class 5b; 2 coins. Value: 2d. Treasure Annual Report 2005/6, 230, no. 230.

30. Caernarvon Castle, Gwynedd, 1911 (c. 1320) English to Edward II class 14; 31 coins. Value: 2s. 7d. Woodhead 1970: 78-80; Boon 1986: 112-14 and 119-20; Allen 2003: 119-20, no. 65/W.

20. Pencarreg, Carmarthenshire, 1846 (1279-1544) English (only?); ‘One coin said to be ‘a shilling’ of Edward II, but too worn to be identified’; uncertain no. of coins. Value: ? Thompson 1956: 114, no. 307.

31. Cefn Coed, Mid Glamorgan, 1986 (c. 1321-44) English to Edward II class 15c, Irish and Scottish; 31 coins. Value: 2s. 7d. Besly 1993: 86-7; Allen 2003: 121, no. 76/W.

21. Llysfaen, Conwy, 1825 (1279-1544) English (only?) attributed to Stephen, Henry I, John, Edward I and Edward III; ‘a great number of coins’. Value: ? Boon 1986: 114 n. 1; Allen 2003: 143, no. 204/W.

32. Llanddona, Anglesey, 1999-2000 and 2005-6 (c. 1321-44) English to Edward II class 15c, Irish, Scottish and Continental; 970 coins. Value: £4 0s. 10d. Besly 2002; Treasure Annual Report 2005/6, 230, no. 1255.

22. Derwen, Denbighshire, 1788 (1279-1351?) English (only?) including Edward I; about 8 pounds (in weight?) Value: c.£8-£9? Boon 1986: 113-14 n. 1; Allen 2003: 126, no. 100/W. 161

Martin Allen

33. Neath Abbey (I and II), Neath Port Talbot, 1956 and 1957 (1326-7?) English to Edward II class 15c; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 166 coins. Value: 13s. 10d. Dolley 1955-7a; Dolley 1955-7b; Boon 1986: 109-11 and 114-19; Allen 2003: 148, nos. 233/W-234/W.

44. Llandwrog, Gwynedd, 1827 (1351-1412 or 1412-65?) English (only?); 2 gold coins. Value: ? Boon 1986: 124 n. 8 no 5. 45. Glyn Tarell, Powys, 2011 (1412-64?) Edward III Pre-Treaty; 4 silver coins. Value: 1s. 4d. Information from Edward Besly; Treasure Wales 11.14.

34. Llysdinam, Powys, 1996 (1345-1351) English to Edward III Florin coinage halfpence and Scottish; 105 coins. Value: 8s. 7d. Besly 1997; Allen 2003, 143, no. 203/W.

46. Presteigne area, Powys, 2011 (1412-65) English to Henry IV; 5 gold + 4 silver coins. Value: £1 0s. 10d. Information from Edward Besly; Treasure Wales 11.5.

35. Penllyn, Vale of Glamorgan, 2010 (1351-1412) Edward III Pre-Treaty; 2 silver coins. Value: 8d. Information from Edward Besly; Treasure Wales 10.3.

47. Caerleon, Newport, 2002 (1412-c. 1420) English to Richard II and Scottish; 40 silver coins. Value: 5s. 1d. Treasure Annual Report 2002, 142-3, no. 227.

36. Llanllawddog, Carmarthenshire, 1893 (1351-61?) Edward III Pre-Treaty; 15 silver coins. Value: 3s. Boon 1986: 124 n. 8 no. 7.

48. Llay, Wrexham, 2005 (1412-c. 1420?) English to Edward III Post-Treaty; 1 gold + 30 silver coins. Value: 11s. 11d. Treasure Annual Report 2005/6, 230, no. 1256.

37. Bonvilston, Vale of Glamorgan, 2007 (1351-61?) Edward III Pre-Treaty; 3 silver coins. Value: 10d. Treasure Annual Report 2007, 204, no. 557.

49. Barmouth, Gwynedd, c. 1906 (1422-65) English (only?) including Henry VI Annulet issue; c. 20 gold coins. Value: c. £6 13s. 4d. Boon 1986: 121 and 123.

38. Portskewett, Monmouthshire, 2008 (1351-1412?) English (Edward III?); 3 silver coins. Value: 6d. Treasure Annual Report 2008, 219, no. 597.

50. ‘Between Tywyn and Aberdyfi’, Gwynedd, 1825 (1422-65) English (only?) including Henry VI Annulet issue; ‘a few gold + 220 silver coins. Value: ? Boon 1986: 123-4 n. 8 no. 4.

39. Monknash, Vale of Glamorgan, 2002 (1368-late 14th cent.?) Edward II Pre-Treaty Series Gc and Enrique II of Leon and Castile (1368-79); 5 silver and billon coins. Value: ? Besly 2010.

51. Borth, Ceredigion, 1930 (1422-30) English to Henry VI Annulet issue; 31 gold coins. Value: £10 6s. 8d. Brooke 1931; Boon 1986: 121 and 123.

40. Neuaddfach (or Llangynllo), Radnorshire, 1804 (c. 1400?) English to Henry IV (or later?); 80-90 gold coins. Value: £26 13s. 4d. - £30. Thompson 1956: 85, no. 238; Boon 1986: 123 n. 8 no. 1.

52. Llantwit Major, Vale of Glamorgan, 2006 (c. 144564) English to Henry VI Leaf Pellet issue; 5 silver coins. Value: 1s. 8d. Treasure Annual Report 2005/6, 230, no. 1257.

41. Mountain Ash, Glamorgan, before 1910 (c. 1400?) English including Richard II; 3 gold coins. Value: £1. Thompson 1956: no. 274; Boon 1986: 120-2. 42. Bagillt, Flintshire, 2010 (1351-1412 or 1412-64?) English to Edward III or Richard II; 4 silver coins. Value: 9½d. Information from Edward Besly; Treasure Wales 10.7.

53. Llanarmon-dyffryn-Ceirog, Merioneth, 1845 (14651544) English (only?) including Edward IV; ‘nearly 100 gold + silver coins. Value: ? Thompson 1956: 85, no. 236; Boon 1986: 123 n. 8 no. 3.

43. Llanelli, Carmarthenshire, 1820 (1351-1412 or 141265?) English (only?); 16 gold coins. Value: £5 6s. 8d. Boon 1986: 123 n. 8 no. 2.

54. Cynffig, Bridgend, 2005 (c. 1470) English (Edward IV first reign light coinage); 4 silver coins. Value: 1s. 4d. Treasure Annual Report 2005/6, 230, no. 1258. 162

Coin hoards in England and Wales, c. 973-1544

55. Eglwys Brewis, Vale of Glamorgan, c. 1900 (c. 150044?) English (only?) including Edward IV and Henry VII privy mark Pansy; 1 gold + c. 50 silver coins. Value: c. £1 3s. 0d. Boon 1986: 124.

Allen, M. 2003, The Durham Mint, British Numismatic Society Special Publication 4 (British Numismatic Society, London). Allen, M. 2006, ‘The volume of the English currency, c. 973-1158’, in Cook, B. and Williams, G. (eds), 487-523. Allen, M. 2012a, ‘The currency and the economy in late medieval England’, Yorkshire Numismatist 4, 179-86. Allen, M. 2012b, Mints and Money in Medieval England (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Baker, A. R. H., 1976, ‘Changes in the later Middle Ages’, in Darby, H. C. (ed.), 186-247. Beresford, M. 1956-8, ‘The Poll Taxes of 1377, 1379 and 1381’, Amateur Historian 3, 271-8. Besly, E. 1993, ‘Recent coin hoards from Wales, 19851992’, British Numismatic Journal 63, 84-90. Besly, E. 1997, ‘A mid-fourteenth-century hoard from Llysdinam, Powys’, British Numismatic Journal 67, 104-5. Besly, E. 2002, ‘A fourteenth-century hoard from Llanddona, Anglesey’, British Numismatic Journal 72, 169-71. Besly, E. 2006, ‘Few and far between: mints and coins in Wales to the Middle of the thirteenth century’, in Cook, B. and Williams, G (eds), 701-19. Besly, E. 2007, ‘The Milford Haven hoard of Henry I’, British Numismatic Journal 77, 277-9. Besly, E. 2010, ‘The Monknash find and other foreign medieval coins from South Wales’, British Numismatic Journal 80, 196-9. Blackburn, M. 1994, ‘Coinage and currency’, in King, E. (ed.), The Anarchy of King Stephen’s Reign, 145-205 (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Blackburn, M. and Pagan, H. 1986, ‘A revised check-list of coin hoards from the British Isles, c. 5001100’, in Blackburn, M. A. S. (ed.), AngloSaxon Monetary History. Essays in memory of Michael Dolley, 291-313 (Leicester University Press, Leicester). Bolton, J. L. 2011, ‘Howard Linecar Lecture 2009. Was there a ‘Crisis of Credit’ in fifteenth-century England’, British Numismatic Journal 81, 14464. Bolton, J. L. 2012, Money in the Medieval English Economy: 973-1489 (Manchester University Press, Manchester). Boon, G. C. 1986, Welsh Hoards 1979-1981 (National Museum of Wales, Cardiff). Boon, G. C. 1987, ‘A second penny in the name of John from the Wenallt find’, Spink Numismatic Circular 95, 253. Brand, J. D. 1978, ‘A find of late 12th century French coins at Abbey Cwmhir in Mid-Wales’ Bulletin de la Société Française de Numismatique 33, 372-4. Britnell, R. H. 1996, The Commercialisation of English Society, 1000-1500, 2nd ed. (Manchester University Press, Manchester). Britnell, R. 2004, ‘Uses of money in medieval Britain’, in Wood, D. (ed.), Medieval Money Matters, 16-30 (Oxbow Books, Oxford).

56. Carmarthen Priory, Carmarthen, 1855 (c. 1500-44?) Henry VII Facing Bust issue; hoard or parcel of 2 silver coins. Value: 4d. or more. Boon 1986: 125. 57. Cefn Garw, Tregaer, Monmouthshire, 1962 (1536-44) English to Henry VIII and Jane Seymour, and Portuguese; 9 gold coins. Value: c. £3 6s. 8d. Boon 1986: 125-6. Acknowledgements The listing of Welsh hoards in the Appendix would not have been possible without the considerable assistance of Edward Besly. The maps were drawn by Daniel Pett. Endnotes {1} Figs. 1 to 6 exclude 14 English and seven Welsh hoards not attributable to one the six periods with reasonable certainty. {2} The sixth hoard is from Monmouth, close to the border with England. {3} Kelleher 2012: 256-9 compares data from singlefinds of coins of 1066-1544 with the evidence of the lay subsidies, Domesday Book, Pope Nicholas IV’s taxation of the English Church in 1291 and the poll tax of 1377. {4} Jenks 1998: 29-30 lists official exemptions from 1275 to 1334. {5} See pp. 147 and 150. {6} See pp. 147, 148 and 150. {7} Table 5 includes all hoards with information about the value of all or nearly all of the hoard. When there is range of possible values for a hoard the lower limit has been used in calculations of hoard medians. {8} For example, the Tutbury hoard was probably all or part of a treasure of £1,500 belonging to Thomas, earl of Lancaster, in 1322 (Kelleher and Williams 2011: 67-9, 78). {9} Moore 1997: 332-4 estimates the population of England at 1,943,200-2,008,200 in 1086, and Hinde 2003: 15-19 calculates an estimate of 1.4-1.9 million. {10} Campbell 2008: 927-8 observes that available estimates of the population of Wales are generally about one-twelfth of the English population. Bibliography Allen, M. 2001, ‘The volume of the English currency, 1158-1470’, Economic History Review new ser. 54, 595-611. Allen, M. 2002, ‘English coin hoards, 1158-1544’, British Numismatic Journal 72, 24-84. 163

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Brooke, G. C. 1931, ‘A find of nobles at Borth (Cardiganshire)’, Numismatic Chronicle 5th series 11, 53-61. Buckatzsch, E. J. 1950, ‘The geographical distribution of wealth in England, 1086-1843: an experimental study in certain tax assessments’, Economic History Review new ser. 3, 180-203. Campbell, B. M. S. 2000, English Seigniorial Agriculture 1250-1450 (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Campbell, B. M. S. 2008, ‘Benchmarking medieval economic development: England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, c. 1290’, Economic History Review new ser. 61, 896-945. Cazel, F. A., 1961, ‘The fifteenth of 1225’, Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 34, 66-81. Cook, B. and Williams, G. (eds), Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. AD 500-1200. Essays in honour of Marion Archibald (Brill , Leiden). Cornwall, J. 1970, ‘English population in the early sixteenth century’, Economic History Review, new ser. 23, 32-44. Crafter, T. C. R. 1998, A re-examination of the classification and chronology of the Cross-andCrosslets type of Henry II’, British Numismatic Journal 68, 42-63. Darby, H. C. (ed.) 1976, A New Historical Geography of England before 1600 (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Darby, H. C. 1977, Domesday England (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Darby, H. C., Glasscock, R. E., Sheail, J. and Versey, G. R. 1979, ‘The changing geographical distribution of wealth in England: 1086-13341525’, Journal of Historical Geography 5, 24762. Day, J. 1978, ‘The Great Bullion Famine of the fifteenth century’, Past and Present 79, 3-54 [reprinted in idem, The Medieval Market Economy, 1-54 (Oxford, Basil Blackwell, 1987)]. Day, J. 1981, ‘The question of monetary contraction in late medieval Europe’, Nordisk Numismatisk Årsskrift, 12-29 [reprinted in idem, The Medieval Market Economy, 55-71]. Dobson, R. B. (ed.) 1983, The Peasant’s Revolt of 1381, 2nd ed. (London, Macmillan). Dolley, R. H. M. 1955-7a, ‘A find of pence of Edward I and II at Neath Abbey’ British Numismatic Journal 28, 294-8. Dolley, R. H. M. 1955-7b, ‘A further find of Edward pennies at Neath Abbey’, British Numismatic Journal 28, 555-9. Dolley, R. H. M. 1959, ‘Two unpublished English finds of eleventh-century pence’, Numismatic Chronicle 6th series 19, 187-92. Dolley, R. H. M. 1962, ‘The 1962 Llantrithyd treasure trove and some thoughts on the first Norman coinage of Wales’, British Numismatic Journal 31, 74-9. Dolley, R. H. M. 1964, ‘Two further coins of Henry I from Llantrithyd’, British Numismatic Journal 33, 169-71.

Dolley, M. 1966, The Norman Conquest and the English Coinage (Spink, London). Donkin, R. A., 1976, ‘Changes in the early Middle Ages’, in Darby, H. C. (ed.), 75-135. Franklin, P. 1995, ‘Gloucestershire’s medieval taxpayers’, Local Population Studies 54, 16-27. Given-Wilson, C. 1991, ‘Wealth and credit, public and private: the earls of Arundel 1306-1397’, English Historical Review 106, 1-26. Glasscock, R. E. 1975, The Lay Subsidy of 1334, British Academy Records of Social and Economic History, new ser. 2 (Oxford University Press for British Academy, London). Glasscock, R. E. 1976, ‘England circa 1334’, in Darby, H. C. (ed.), 136-85. Hadwin, J. F. 1977, ‘Evidence on the possession of “Treasure” from the lay subsidy rolls’, in Mayhew, N. J. (ed.), Edwardian Monetary Affairs (1279-1344): a symposium held in Oxford, August 1976, British Archaeological Reports British Series 36, 147-65 (British Archaeological Reports , Oxford). Hadwin, J. F. 1983, ‘The medieval lay subsidies and economic history’, Economic History Review new ser. 36, 200-17. Hatcher, J. 1977, Plague, Population and the English economy, 1348-1530 (Economic History Society, London and Basingstoke). Hinde, A. 2003, England’s Population: a history since the Domesday survey (Hodder Arnold, London). Hoyle, R. W. 1998, ‘Taxation and the mid-Tudor crisis’, Economic History Review new ser. 51, 649-75. Jenks, S. 1998, ‘The lay subsidies and the state of the English economy (1275-1334)’, Vierteljahrschrift fűr Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 85, 1-39. Kelleher, R. M., 2012, ‘Coins, monetisation and re-use in medieval England: new interpretations made possible by the Portable Antiquities Scheme’, unpublished PhD thesis, Durham University. Kelleher, R. and Williams, G., 2011, ‘The Tutbury hoard’, in M. Hislop, M. Kincey and G. Williams (eds), Tutbury: ‘A Castle Firmly Built’: Archaeological and Historical Investigations at Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire, British Archaeological Reports British Series 546, 62-87 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Lewis, J. M., 1970, ‘A Short Cross hoard from Wrexham’, British Numismatic Journal 39, 1923. Mitchell, S. K. 1914, Studies in Taxation under John and Henry III (Yale University Press, New Haven). Mitchell, S. K. 1951, Taxation in Medieval England (Yale University Press, New Haven). Moore, J. S. 1997, ‘“Quot homines”: the population of Domesday England’, Anglo-Norman Studies 19, 307-34. Naismith, R. 2013, ‘The English monetary economy, c. 973-1100: the contribution of single-finds’, Economic History Review new ser. 66, 198-225. Nightingale, P. 2004, ‘The lay subsidies and the distribution of wealth in medieval England, 164

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1275-1334’, Economic History Review new ser. 57, 1-32. Ormrod, W. M. 1991, ‘The Crown and the English economy’, in Campbell, B. M. S. (ed.), Before the Black Death: studies in the ‘crisis’ of the early fourteenth century, 149-83 (Manchester University Press, Manchester). Rigby, S. H. 1990, ‘Urban society in the early fourteenth century: the evidence of the lay subsidies’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 62, 169-84. Schofield, R. S. 1965, ‘The geographical distribution of wealth in England, 1334-1649’, Economic History Review new ser. 18, 483-510. Sheail, J. 1972, ‘The distribution of taxable population and wealth in England during the early sixteenth century’, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 55, 111-26. Sheail, J. 1998, The Regional Distribution of Wealth in England as indicated in the 1524/5 Lay Subsidy Returns, Hoyle, R. W. (ed.), List and Index Society Special Ser. 28-9, 2 vols. (Kew). Spufford, P. 1988, Money and its Use in Medieval Europe (Cambridge University Library, Cambridge). Thomas, H. M. 2008, Violent disorder in King Stephen’s England: a maximum argument’, in Dalton, P. and White, G. J. (eds), King Stephen’s Reign (1135-1154) 139-70 (Boydell Press, Woodbridge). Thompson, J. D. A. 1956, Inventory of British Coin Hoards A.D. 600-1500, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication 1 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Willard, J. F. 1913, ‘The taxes upon movables of the reign of Edward I’, English Historical Review 28, 517-21. Willard, J. F. 1914, ‘The taxes upon movables of the reign of Edward II’, English Historical Review 29, 317-21. Willard, J. F. 1915, ‘The taxes upon movables of the reign of Edward III’, English Historical Review 30, 69-74. Willard, J. F. 1934, Parliamentary Taxes on Personal Property 1290 to 1334: A Study in Mediaeval English Financial Administration, Monographs of the Medieval Academy of America 9 (Cambridge, Mass.) Woodhead, P. 1970, ‘Two finds of Edward pennies: Caernarvon (1911) and Grittleton (1903?), British Numismatic Journal 39, 78-83. Wrigley, E. A. and Schofield, R. S. 1981, The Population History of England, 1541-1871: A Reconstruction (Edward Arnold, London).

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England’s Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351) Barrie Cook Across the medieval period, the decades from the 1280s to 1350s rank as probably the most productive for English coin hoards and the silver pennies of the age are the most common medieval coin finds. Yet in 1976, when Michael Metcalf reviewed the relevant numismatic research as part of his contribution to the important conference and volume Edwardian Monetary Affairs, he pointed out the illusionary impression given by a casual look at the hoard record (Metcalf 1977: 8). Once the Scottish and poorly-recorded finds were removed, as he noted, the evidence from England itself was surprisingly limited. Over thirty years on, the picture has changed substantially.

have been a distinct reluctance to ascribe hoards to the unfortunate Edward II, despite his reign being most conducive to the deposition and non-recovery of hoards and dominating the better-recorded hoards.{2} Often even the number of coins found is not recorded – about 10 % of these nearly 100 hoards are of ‘uncertain number’. In many other cases, including relatively recent ones, we often do not know if the record of a given hoard is complete, or if we just have a parcel, subject to some or other degree of selection after discovery. There are around ten finds recorded or interpreted as a parcel or ‘a hoard or parcel’; there are also over a dozen hoards whose numbers have a ‘circa’, ‘nearly’ or ‘more than’ qualification. All this gives our knowledge an extensive frontier zone of imprecision to accommodate.

There are on record almost a hundred coin hoards recovered from within the territory of the medieval kingdom of England and deposited between about 1279 and 1351 (see Appendix below). This was the final stage of the over half a millennium in which the silver penny had dominated the English currency. Several hundred thousand silver pennies from this period survived into modern times in hoards or as single finds. It is true that the bulk of these come from just one enormous source: the great Tutbury hoard, which, thanks especially to the recent work of Jennifer Rowley (2000), Richard Kelleher and Gareth Williams (2011), we can be reasonably sure consisted of over 200,000 and perhaps even 360,000 coins.{1} But there are probably no periods in which a small number of big hoards do not have a defining impact on the overall record, from Hoxne and the great radiate hoards in the Roman period, to Cuerdale and Fishpool.

Yet recent decades have made a healthy difference. Over the last quarter-century or so there have been about 25 new hoards to add to the accumulating total, giving us the figure of nearly 100; in fact about as many hoards were reported in the 15 years since the passing of Treasure Act in 1996 as in the previous half-century, which itself saw a great increase from previous eras. The explanations are probably the obvious ones: first the advent of metaldetecting as a popular hobby and then the widening of the definition of Treasure with the passing of the Act. These newer hoards, by and large, offer better information, though there are always cases where the fact or rumour of escapees is a frustrating component of the record. In raising the question of how to deal with this range of material, in all its disparate quality, the unremarkable answer is probably to do it a bit at a time and see where things lead. There are four main aspects to a coin hoard: its location; the number of coins present (and, deriving from this, its face value); the details of the coins that give us its date of deposition; and the condition of the material – the sort of currency that it represents. The very variable nature of the recorded data for English sterling hoards has implications for which of these areas can be more completely addressed. For the overwhelming majority of cases, there is a location, if sometimes a general one. Information becomes less complete for the other three aspects, broadly in the sequence set out above: size, deposit date and condition. Taking this all on board, what is the current level of knowledge of English hoarding in this period? And have recent finds changed our perception?

There could conceivably be something around £1,000 in pennies of this period to have survived into modern times, which is potentially one seven-hundredth of the estimated English currency of c.1300 and the amount of coin easily produced by the London mint in a poorish year. These figures will perhaps not bear a lot of interrogation, but can give a sense of the modern legacy of what was at least one of England’s silver ages. But with Tutbury at one end of the scale and micro-hoards of a handful of coins at the other, what use can be made of this accumulation of information, bearing in mind that the quality of said information varies enormously? For, as Michael Metcalf well pointed out, when examining the record, a lot of problems do emerge. For the ten or so hoards discovered before 1800 and quite a number of the early 19th-century finds, there is barely any information beyond a general find-spot and an attribution of the coins to a ‘King Edward’, sometimes specified as Edward I or Edward III, but probably not accurately and certainly not reliably. There does seem to

First of all, given that the tempo of hoard recovery has clearly been rising, has this affected distribution? In outline, it seems not.

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Fig. 1 Map of medieval coin hoards c. 1279-1351 (Drawn by Richard Kelleher). Geographical spread of hoarding

still top of the list overall. The next most prolific regions are a broadly defined East Anglia (Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex and Cambridgeshire), and the East Midlands, which both account for 16 hoards. Behind these in this division comes the South East (Kent, Surrey, Sussex and Hampshire), with 12 hoards, nearly half discovered since the 1970s. The South West, Wiltshire and beyond, has a modest 6 hoards, little different from the West Midlands and Thames Valley areas.

The Appendix below lists the hoards considered here in regional groups. What is clear is that some things have not changed, despite the new material that has come to light. Just two tiny finds for Worcestershire and Staffordshire join the record for the West Midlands and the majority of the region’s hoards are still from Warwickshire, the extraordinary Tutbury hoard being the main exception (see Kelleher and Williams 2011). Thus, there remain next to no Edwardian hoards from the length of the Welsh Marches (Gloucestershire, Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Shropshire). For the North West, there is little to add to the older evidence for Lancashire and Cheshire, but there are three useful hoards joining the Cumbrian finds, two of them sizable. In fact all seven recorded Cumbrian hoards are from historic Cumberland – only Yorkshire and Northumberland have more. No new finds join the meagre and poorly-recorded Thames Valley/Home Counties record (Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Berkshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire). However, there are several new finds to enhance the North East (Yorkshire, Durham and Northumberland) – the latter area, now with 23 hoards, is

Now, is this sort of analysis meaningful in any way at all? Obviously, one could cut the county cake in quite a different way and get different results. The three counties of Warwickshire, Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire are above included in different regions, for the purposes of the survey, but they are abutting counties relatively productive of hoards, while sitting within a sort of county horseshoe where there are slim pickings indeed, west, south or east. Similarly, if one divided the Midlands north/ south, instead of west/east the pattern would be different, with the emphasis on the north rather than the east, with 14 hoards from the counties running from Staffordshire to Lincolnshire, against 11 from the south, 168

England’s Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351)

virtually all from Warwickshire and Northamptonshire. Treated as one area, the Midlands, with 24 hoards, would even be ahead of the North East. But however one manages the evidence, there is in essence confirmation and more evidence in depth of the older picture. This brief overview of hoard deposition by region does, of course, ignore the chronological element: when, rather than where, were hoards deposited?

is a risk of drawing the demarcation lines in a subjective way, but we do seem to have – very broadly – two principal levels of hoarded material: one around a shilling or two and one around a pound or two. Do these represent different aspects of saving or different monetary functions? Might the large groups be accumulated savings or (relatively) large capital sums, and the smaller groups lost purses or money for daily business? Or do these groups simply represent the saved money of different levels of society?

Chronological spread of hoarding Looking at the chronological spread gives a result that might seem a little surprising. Across the period from 1279 to 1351, the hoards of sterling pennies that can be dated in any way were deposited fairly evenly, at 9 to 10 per decade: so there are 12 hoards from the 1280s (ending in classes 2-4); 9 from the 1290s (ending in classes 5 to 9); 9 from the 1300s, ending in class 10; there are 15 hoards from the 1320s to mid 1340s, ending with class 15; and 10 hoards from the mid-1340s to early 1350s, ending with Florin type pennies or just after. The exceptional period is that from 1310 to 1320, hoards ending with classes 11 to 14, of which there are 20, double the usual level. There are some risks of distortion of course, in such a rough assignment of hoards. It is possible and perhaps likely, as discussed below, that one or two of the hoards assigned to the 1280s on the basis of them concluding in class 4 might in fact be 1290s hoards. There is also a group of four hoards that can be dated generally to ‘class 10 or later’, which thus could belong to – probably – between about 1300 and 1320. Nevertheless, one can make a case for the overall of deposition being reasonably clear: fairly level across the sterling period, but with a surge between, say, 1314 and 1320.

The idea of the ‘purse hoard’, a relatively small body of material interpreted as an accidental loss, has often been the way small groups of medieval pennies have been regarded. It is a little ironic that one of the few hoards, or pair of hoards, of this period we can categorically say do represent purse hoards are coins found with a skeleton in what was almost certainly the burial of an early Black Death victim in London (Cook 2008a and 2008b). There were about 180 coins with the body, in two separately housed batches of material – one found by the waist and the other under the shoulder. Their value came to about 10 shillings. The obvious interpretation of them is that they were on the person of an individual buried hastily and carelessly in difficult times, but such a number of coins and such a sum would not normally be interpreted as an accidentally-lost purse hoard. On the other hand, several of the very small groups of coins, four or five pennies in total, are of good weight, nearly up there with the level found in quite large hoards and could easily be interpreted on this basis as saved rather than circulating money. Returning to the London ‘Black Death’ hoard, the material was found around two different areas of the body: most of the hoard consisted of pennies located around the shoulder area, so presumably in some sort of pouch round the neck or under the shoulder; while there was another batch, mostly of farthings, at the waist. The implication here is of different types of money held separately, rather as nowadays coins and banknotes are often kept separately. Given that sterling hoards are overwhelmingly of just pennies, even the smallest ones, this may be another reason for allowing a greater possibility of these finds representing reserves or stores of money, rather than accidental losses. Perhaps the assumption of small hoards being ‘lost’ and not saved or deliberately concealed material is not one that should be made unless the evidence is compelling.

Hoard values Another aspect to think about is the size and thus the value of the hoards. The variation is enormous, especially because with the Tutbury hoard we have an example of that rare phenomenon, a hoard originally belonging to a member of the super-rich; in this case Thomas, earl of Lancaster, cousin and rival of Edward II (Rowley 2000; Kelleher and Williams 2011: 67-9). The only other later medieval hoard with a similar claim is the 15th-century gold hoard from Fishpool, probably originating as part of the Lancastrian party’s war treasury during the Wars of the Roses (Archibald 1966: 140).

These are the broad outlines of the hoards of the sterling period by geographic distribution, by chronology of deposition and by value of content. Obviously, the three need to be put together to see what, if any, patterns emerge.

Most of the Edwardian sterling hoards are in fact relatively low in value: 51 of the total represent sums under 5 shillings and within this group there are 28 finds under 1 shilling (12 pence) in value, and 23 between 1 and 5 shillings – actually only 8 are over 3 shillings and only 1 definitely over four, so the emphasis is clearly on quite small sums. There is a fairly small body of 13 hoards with values between 5 shillings and one pound. However, there are 20 hoards of between £1 and £5 in value. While there is only one hoard in the £5-£10 range, there are also a few big hoards (excluding Tutbury) of over £10. Again, there

Patterns of hoarding In the South East, the record of the 12 hoards is pitched fairly early, from Broughton to Mayfield; there are no unambiguous hoards from Edward II’s reign, with the substantial hoard, over £12 in value, from Newport on the Isle of Wight deposited after 1314 but possibly as late as 169

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the mid 1340s. Then there are two hoards excavated at the Tower of London, from the late 1340s, one at least to be associated with the Black Death. Seven of the hoards are fairly small, with 3s.1d. the highest level, while five are over £1 in value, the broad value split suggested above as observable across the board is echoed in this region clearly enough.

ending in classes 13, 14, 15 and the Florin period. In terms of value, the Midlands hoards broadly reflect the overall picture, with six hoards of over £1 in value, plus four mid-range ones, and 13 low-value ones (about 5s. or less).

East Anglian hoards have a somewhat different look. There are four or five from the 1280s-90s (all small), but all of the other ten at all datable hoards were deposited from at least 1305, two ending with class 10, two with class 11, two with class 14 and two in class 15; although with only one from the Florin period after 1344. The value break across the region is: eight small finds, with 3s. 4d. the most valuable of these - the King’s Lynn hoard; five larger hoards, four between £1 and £5, and then the Braintree, Essex hoard, not well-recorded but at least £20 in value, and thus the most valuable English hoard of the period after Tutbury. All the larger hoards Gorefield, Great Yarmouth, West Rudham, Braintree and (probably) Benacre - are later in date.

As already noted, for the North West little can be said of the hoards from Cheshire and Lancashire, only one of which is known in any detail, a hoard or parcel from Chester from the Florin period. Cumbria, or rather Cumberland, is better served. There are a couple of small early hoards, from Wigton and Bowness, and one large one (Maryport, over £1); a pair of mid-range hoards from Edward II’s reign, and the large and late Stanwix hoard (c. £10), deposited pretty much at the very end of the sterling penny period in about 1352. Both Maryport and Stanwix share the unusual feature of a significant number of halfpennies and farthings. Unfortunately we will probably never know more about the Burgh Marsh hoard, found in around 1860, which reportedly contained ‘several pounds weight of silver coins’ and was attributed to Edward I.

There is not a lot to say about the five hoards from the area defined here as Thames Valley/ Home Counties: four are from Oxfordshire, the other being a large hoard or parcel from Newbury in West Berkshire, certainly deposited after about 1300. There are no recorded hoards at all from Buckinghamshire, Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire. Relatively little good information survives about any of the hoards from this region. There is a new hoard reported in Oxfordshire as yet not identified in detail, but its contents extend just into Edward III’s Fourth Coinage.{3} Frustratingly, its actual find-spot is not known, and theoretically it could be from anywhere. Unusually, only one of these finds is small, the others ranging in value from 8s. to over £14. The West Country hoards are better recorded, although five out of the six are small, under 5 shillings, with the Boyton, Wiltshire hoard the only sizable find: at over £17 a very high value in non-Tutbury terms. All the hoards from the South West are Edward II or III deposits, with two Wiltshire hoards ending in class 15c and two Florin hoards from Devon concluding the regional run.

In the North East (Durham, Northumberland and Yorkshire), there is the usual balance of small and large hoards, 10 down under 5 shillings, two mid-range and nine over £1, with two of these over £5: the hoard from Knaresborough Priory, North Yorkshire, of around £7 and the Middridge hoard, from Durham, which was over £12 in value and is the only Durham hoard we have any content information about (indeed, there is only one other Durham hoard in the record). There are 11 hoards from Yorkshire and nine from Northumberland, which does seem to over-represent Northumberland. In both counties the record is weighted heavily towards Edward II’s reign, although Yorkshire does have a couple of small hoards from the 1280s and 90s. Among the 20 or so reasonably datable hoards, there are no silver hoards of the Florin period from anywhere in the north-east, giving an unusual concentration to the period c. 1305/10 to the early to mid-1340s.{4} It does not seem unreasonable to conclude that the sustained Anglo-Scottish conflict of the period was a factor here, though this is obviously a far from new or radical suggestion.

The West Midlands is a region with, it seems, an early bias, few though the hoards are. (The lack of hoards from the Welsh Marches and the dominance of Warwickshire has already been noted.) Of the eight known, four are likely to be deposited under Edward I and only Coventry (Gosford St) and Tutbury definitely belong to a later period, both ending within class 15, the Coventry hoard running into Edward III’s early reign. In the East Midlands, Warwickshire’s neighbour Northamptonshire is similarly weighted early, with none of its five hoards definitely later than class 10. Otherwise from the east, and more north than south, there are two hoards from Derbyshire, three from Nottinghamshire and four from Lincolnshire. These hoards are generally later than the Warwickshire/Northamptonshire hoards, with only Skegby (Notts) from the 1290s and certainly predating Edward II’s reign from 1307, alongside a run of hoards

Moving from this larger-scale review of the Edwardian period, the following sections will look in more detail at a few of the finds of the last couple of decades, putting them into the context of the overall pattern of sterling hoards outlined above.{5} The focus will be on the start of the period under review, on hoards of Edward I from the 1279 recoinage to around 1299, and the partial recoinage that was a response to the invasion of crockards and pollards. A relatively detailed approach to a few cases will allow the demonstration of another aspect of the later medieval hoarding record: the greater capacity to integrate the find evidence with that of documentary sources.

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Small hoards

halfpenny each towards a new house after a fire; and a halfpenny each if a fellow member’s house is robbed of goods worth over half a mark (Richardson 2005: 390).

One of the biggest changes to the hoard record of the later medieval period in England since the passage of the Treasure Act in 1996 has been the much better recording of small hoards – about half of the total on record of nearly 50 low-value hoards (i.e. worth no more than a shilling or two) have been reported since the passage of the Treasure Act. So, for example, there is a group of four coins found at Oxborough in Norfolk in 2010, catalogued by Adrian Marsden. All four of these coins were pennies of class 3d, and thus produced within 1280-1, three from the London mint and the fourth from York. All are in crisp and barely-circulated condition; apparent wear on a couple of coins being due to areas of flat striking. It is probably reasonable to assume a deposit of some point in the early 1280s. The mean weight of these four coins is 1.37 g, which is a pretty good weight for such a small group, since hoards of hundreds of coins regularly produce a mean weight of between 1.37 and 1.4 g. What is the context of a small hoard like this – can we say anything useful about such a sum functioned in its local world?

We do not know if Oxborough already had any active fraternities around the later 13th century, when this little hoard was hidden or lost, and it would be a bit much to associate this small find with such a notional association or even necessarily with the active market life of the village and wider region. However, recognizing the role of such institutions can help us understand the possible role of small monetary accumulations in medieval rural life. So, with this in mind, one can move to Northamptonshire, to another small hoard from 2010 from Preston Capes. Initially there were six coins, but a two more have since been reported. Though small, the find has some interest as including sterling imitations, crockards and pollards: among the earliest finds to do so. The importation of these coins into English currency in large quantities in the 1290s was one of the most significant aspects of English currency in this period. Two coins out of eight is a high level. Considering the lack of continental sterlings in relatively large hoards like Skegby and Ickham (see below), perhaps this means that the small Preston Capes group was deposited well into the 1290s. Unlike Oxborough and indeed quite a lot of the other small groups, the English coins from Preston Capes had a fairly poor weight, with a mean of 1.27 g.

Oxborough stands inland from King’s Lynn on a tributary of the River Wissey, about 11 km (7 miles) SW of Swaffham. It forms one of the communities at the periphery of the so-called Breckland of north-west Norfolk, where the core Breckland’s sandy-soiled and relatively infertile region meets the fenland. About equidistant between the principal regional centres of King’s Lynn and Thetford, Oxborough was one of several villages on the fenland borders to have a market founded in the 13th century. Oxborough’s market was introduced in 1249, ahead of its near neighbours Ickburgh (1257), Brandon (1271), Feltwell (1283) and Gooderstone (1286). The existence of so many rural markets, all within the larger catchment area of the great markets of King’s Lynn and Thetford, suggests an active commercialisation and streamlined local trade in the late 13th century (Bailey 1989/2008: 114).

The two continental sterlings, from Flanders/Namur and Cambrai, are both early. Nick Mayhew suggests that sterlings of William, bishop of Cambrai, were probably produced towards the end of his episcopate, so in the years immediately before 1296, which would imply that the deposit date of the Preston Capes find is unlikely to be before the early to mid-1290s (Mayhew 1983: 46). The earliest English hoard to contain sterlings of William is the King’s Lynn hoard, which concludes with class 5 and which Mayhew proposes was deposited c. 1296-7 (Coin Hoards 1 1975: 91). King’s Lynn also contained a sterling of Gui de Dampierre among its four early continental issues.

Once established, this local activity seems to have been maintained, as evidenced by the survival of information about rural confraternities in the village in the national corporate census organized in 1388. Although many villages had such fraternities, Oxborough had more than most. In fact, this one village held six different fraternities at the time of the census (Smith 1870: 121-2). The rural areas of later medieval England were full of fraternities – most villages had them by the later 14th century. Although the surviving information for the six Oxborough fraternities is, as usual, late-14th century in date, some fraternities came into existence well before this period.

Again, it is worth paying some attention to the local context. The village of Preston Capes lies at c. 180 m OD (600 feet) on the Northamptonshire Heights, an extension of the Cotswolds, and it is not far from an old Roman road, later known as the Portway. South of Daventry, the village sits in at the centre of a rough triangle formed of Daventry, Towcester and Banbury. Given its commanding local location, it is unsurprising that it was the site of an early wooden castle. In the mid-13th century the existing manor of Preston was purchased by Hugh de Capes. A small Cluniac priory originally founded there had already been shifted to Daventry by the 13th century, but the prior of Daventry remained a significant local figure with control over the parish church; the surviving building seems to have significant 13th-century remains. In the 1291 Taxatio of Pope Nicholas IV, the church was valued at £6 and the

The role of these institutions, apart from social cohesion, was to offer levels of mutual financial support within the community in times of hardship. A Lincolnshire village fraternity in 1310 offered a halfpenny contribution from each brother and sister of the fraternity towards helping acquire a new beast, should a fellow member lose one; a 171

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vicarage at £3, so an ecclesiastical levy on these holdings at the usual rate of a tenth would have raised 18s.{6}

of St Michael’s Church at Rendham in 1268, the abbey holdings around the area included a 3-acre wood and the village was assessed among the temporalities of Sibton in the Taxatio of Nicholas IV of 1291, in which Rendham was rated at £10 13s.4d.. At some point a grange was established to manage the Sibton lands at Rendham. In the early 14th century free tenants of the Berneys manor at Rendham paid annual cash rents of between 2d. and 10d. A small hoard like thus could therefore represent an important store of surplus cash in terms of the scale of operations of tenant farmers at this level of rural life. The phenomenon of the good weight of many of these small groups might encourage the thought that they represent coins being saved up both as good money in itself and as good money available when a lord or tax-collector might insist on it.

The manor of Preston Capes seems to have been part of the honour of Leicester by the later 13th century, in the hands of Edward I’s younger brother Edmund, who died in 1296. However, at some point, perhaps in 1296, the manor passed elsewhere. In the returns for the tax of a fifteenth on moveable goods levied in 1301, Preston Capes had 37 taxable individuals who between them were to pay £5 14s. 5¾d.{7} Between 1293 and 1307, there were six levies of the fifteenth, taxation on a wholly new level for England (Maddicott 1987; 2006: 290). The fifteenths were taxes paid by all but the very poorest (with the proviso that the moveables assessed did not include those for domestic use), but these 37 would be heads of households or at least property-holders to some degree and only three of them were women, so naturally the figure does not represent the whole community. This level was comparable to other similar-sized communities in the Northamptonshire Hundred of Fawsley, with only Daventry and Barby out of the Hundred’s 19 listed settlements with taxable populations of around 100 and assessments in the £9-£10 bracket.

Hoards and the Kentish scene Now the focus will shift to another way of thinking about hoards: location. The period concerned will still be the reign of Edward I, which inevitably involves some further engagement with the impact of continental sterlings. There are 11 hoards from the south-east of England, defined as Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire and London. Two are London finds from the Florin period of the late 1340s, found quite close to each other at the Tower of London in excavations of 1987. There are three hoards from c. 1300-1310, one each from Kent, Surrey and Sussex; and two hoards probably from 1315-20, including the large hoard of over 3,000 coins from Newport on the Isle of Wight. There are five hoards from the 1290s, four from Kent and the fifth from Broughton, Hampshire, about midway between Salisbury and Winchester.

At Preston the biggest taxpayer by far was Eustace de Hache, who seems to have been the current holder of the manor. He was a prominent household knight of the king and his principal landholdings were in Surrey. He was summoned to parliament as Lord Hache from 1297. He was assessed at Preston Capes at £2 1s. 3½d. and was by far the highest payer in the whole Hundred (due to pay nearly twice as much as the next highest) and even one of the highest in the county, with only two other estates assessed like his at about £2 and the only higher payer being the bishop of Durham, Antony Bek, for a substantial manor at Lilford, which was assessed at £3. Without de Hache, Preston Capes’s assessment would only have been about £3 12s. The lowest assessment at Preston was for 5d., and there were six individuals assessed at under a shilling. (Even lower assessments of 3d. and 4d. are found in other villages in the Hundred.) The sum of 8d. represented by the Preston Capes hoard, therefore, could easily have paid off someone’s tax dues at the lower end of the taxable population.

In fact, the four hoards from Kent are all from one relatively short period, c. 1290 to 1300, and all but one are relatively recent finds: East Langdon, Ickham and Pluckley. The 1955 Dover hoard is the exception (Dolley 1955 and 1955-7). The first hoard – the Ickham Treasure Trove – is by far the largest of the newer finds. It was discovered on various occasions across 1990-1991 and is now part of the collections of Dover Museum. The site of the find was part of Appleton Farm, Wingham, though in the parish of Ickham, just a few kilometres from the city of Canterbury. The total number of coins found was 522 silver pennies: 456 English issues of Edward I, 23 Irish issues, 41 sterlings of Alexander III of Scotland and 2 counterfeits. Thus, when deposited the hoard had a face value (assuming all has been recovered) of £2 3s.6d.

Returning to East Anglia, there is a small hoard from Rendham of six coins found in 2006. Again the coins all belong to the early classes 1 to 4. Their mean weight of 1.34 g is relatively poor for hoard coins but it is only the presence of one very light-weight piece that pulls it down from 1.37 g. The median value of 1.36 g might be a better indication of condition. The small number of coins again means it is hard to say when deposition occurred within a quite broad time-scale of perhaps c. 1287/9-c. 1299.

The latest coins present are of class 7a, a feature shared by only one other hoard on record, the East Langdon find, itself another Kent find. The mean weight of the six class 7 coins is an excellent 1.41 g, 98 % of the official standard. The other important Kent find of the later 13th century is the Dover hoard, the English coins of which concluded with class 8, the only recorded hoard to do so. It appears as though hoards were being concealed and

On a tributary of the River Alde, and 5 km (three miles) from Saxmundham on the road to Framlingham, the village of Rendham was never more than a small rural community. Any wider links were probably due to its being held by Sibton Abbey, the only Cistercian house in Suffolk. The abbot of Sibton was granted the advowson 172

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then not recovered in Kent to an unusual degree in the 1290s. The Dover hoard was anomalous in practically every respect, so the appearance of other more ‘normal’seeming hoards, in terms of what we know of the currency, may give a more acceptable sense of some degree of disturbance in the county in the 1290s.

difference in internal structure might plausibly suggest it was somewhat earlier in deposit date than these other early hoards. She preferred this interpretation to the obvious alternative, that there was a significantly large importation into England of continental sterlings over a relatively short period. However, it could simply be the case that the period in question was not so short.

The sequence of classes 6-7 of the Edwardian classification has been subject to revision in recent years and awareness of the two Kent hoards, Ickham and East Langdon, has been part of this (see Allen 2003: 173-4). It seems largely accepted now that coins of class 7 were in fact issued before class 6. One of the first to propose this in print, David Greenhalgh, also proposed that subclass 7b was the earliest, in the sequence 7b-7a-6a-6b (Greenhalgh 1989). The Ickham and East Langdon hoards, each with coins of class 7a, but none of 7b or 6, in part support this conclusion, although they would seem to better fit a sequence in which class 7a sat at the start. Greenhalgh also proposed a revised dating of these classes and in general terms this seems to match the evidence, and similar, if slightly less precise date ranges, have been utilised by Martin Allen and Lord Stewartby: for class 7, c. 1290-c.1293, and for class 6, c. 1293c.1294 (Allen 2003: 178 and Stewartby 2009: 172-3).

The relative scarcity of coins of classes 5-7 might well suggest that, although the presence of these coins is useful for dating purposes, their absence is less so. A hoard, especially a small hoard, concluding with class 4e could well be deposited after – perhaps several years after - one concluding with class 5 or even class 7. For example, Mayhew has suggested, seemingly on the basis of its continental sterling component, that the King’s Lynn hoard (41 coins, but only 29 English pennies, concluding with a coin of class 5), might not have been deposited until c. 1296-7, rather than the c.1290-1 suggested by the English coins alone (Mayhew 1983: 166). Skegby could, thus, stand as among the earliest of a run of hoards deposited at the time when continentals were only beginning to appreciably affect the English currency. It is also the case that in hardly any surviving large hoards do continental sterlings feature as anything more than a very minor element in their composition: less than 1 % of Middridge, 2 % of Broughton, 4 % of the recorded coins of Coventry (a selection that may well over-represent this element of the find). The main exception is King’s Lynn, with the continentals a whopping 11 % of the total – of a small hoard with worn coins that have seen some currency. Now however, we also have the small hoards from Preston Capes, discussed above, and another of 20 coins from the Wigton area in Cumbria, with 2 continentals out of 20 coins, ending with class 4e, to give us perhaps more of a sense of their impact.

All this would suggest a deposit date for the Ickham hoard of c. 1290-c.1295. It is a noteworthy feature that no continental sterlings were included in this hoard, unlike reasonably substantial hoards such as Broughton, Hampshire (332 coins, latest class 5b) and Coventry (c. 500 coins, latest class 5) and indeed they are to be found in several considerably smaller finds, as already noted. They are also very modestly present in the large Middridge, Co. Durham, hoard of just over 3,000 coins, which is essentially a hoard of the mid 1290s, but with a later component (about 370 of its coins) added after c. 1310 (see Stewart 1989). The very first continental sterlings to reflect English designs on both sides seem to have commenced issue in about 1288 or slightly before, according to Mayhew’s interpretation, and the English government began to take measures against their importation and use in 1289 (Mayhew 1983: 19-23).

None of this, of course, accounts for the absence of continental sterlings in the Ickham find, since it was evidently put together at a time when continentals were present in English currency in reasonable quantities. Archibald’s suggestion that Skegby might represent a cache of money that somehow reflected official activity – on its way to or from the king’s coffers – might well be true, but it might be an even better explanation of the relative purity of Ickham (see below). The English coins in both Skegby and Ickham have a mean weight of 1.39 g, 96.5 % of the standard, but in the absence of metrological information for Broughton and Coventry it is hard to know whether this is significant. It is better than the smaller hoards King’s Lynn and East Langdon (see below), but that is hardly unexpected.

Like the Ickham hoard, the Skegby, Nottinghamshire, hoard (450 coins, latest class 5a) is similarly lacking any continental issues at all (see Archibald 1971). However, it is the case that, in comparison to most other early hoards, including Ickham, the Skegby hoard does end rather weakly, with only 15 % of its English coins of class 4 and its single coin of class 5, whereas Broughton, Coventry, Middridge and Ickham all have over 30 % of class 4 and similar quantities of class 5 (between 2 and 4 % of the coins, with Ickham sitting in the middle with 3 %). Even fairly small early hoards, such as King’s Lynn, with 41 coins, ending in class 5 (Coin Hoards I 1975: no. 93) and Cae Castell, Rumney, near Cardiff, with 64 coins, ending in class 4e (Boone 1986), end much more strongly.

Apart from the ‘missing’ continental sterlings, the general content of the Ickham hoard is broadly in line with other hoards of the period, that is, the 1290s before the partial recoinage of c.1299-1301, always excepting that other major Kentish find, the Dover hoard. The representation of Irish and Scottish material in Ickham seems to be at the level expected, at 3-4 % for Ireland and 6-11 % for Scotland. All the Irish coins appear to belong to the first

In her interpretation of the Skegby hoard, Marion Archibald (1971) favoured the idea that it represented relatively ‘clean’ money, even while accepting that the 173

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period of activity under Edward I, c. 1280-c.1284, with none from the renewed activity that began in c. 1292 (North 1997). As Marion Archibald (1971: 46) has pointed out, the high proportions of Scottish coins in early sterling hoards and the subsequent decline in Scottish representation echoes the restricted output of Scottish coins after the recoinage of Alexander III of c. 1280 and his death in 1286. Stewart and North similarly suggest a level of about 10% for Scottish coins in pre1300 hoards (Stewart and North 1990: 37). The absence of any coins of John Balliol (1292-6) is unlikely to be significant, in the light of the general date of the Ickham hoard.{8} The mean weight of the 42 Scottish coins present, 1.39 g, was identical to that of the overall mean weight of English coins.

valuable of these, as evidenced by the Taxatio of Nicholas IV of 1291. Here it was given a valuation of a little over £425, of which nearly £250 was represented by Wingham manor itself, one of the two most valuable and extensive of the diocesan holdings. The total value of Canterbury’s demesne holdings recorded in the Taxatio was £1,913 (Du Boulay 1964: 427-432). The 13thcentury archbishops frequently visited Wingham, where they maintained a residence. Archbishop Winchelsey hosted Edward I here in 1294. Archbishop Pecham had detached some lands from the manor on which to build an educational college of secular canons at Wingham, a process begun in 1287 and for which he received papal approval in 1292 (Sutcliffe 1935: 66). Wingham had had its own market since the 1250s, despite the handy proximity of Canterbury. Ickham manor, on the other hand, belonged to the cathedral priory and functioned as an intensively-farmed specialist supplier of malting barley for the direct use of the priory itself. It was an area of prime loam soil and very productive (Campbell 2010: 35 and 39).

There seem no obvious biases or unexpected elements in the proportions of English mints represented. Roughly half the currency present originated at London and about 15% at Canterbury. The level of London against Canterbury in Ickham might seem slightly high for a hoard deposited practically on the doorstep of the Canterbury mint, but this is certainly not beyond the probabilities for such a consistently integrated currency as that of England over a decade after a major recoinage. Furthermore, the Canterbury mint’s output declined precipitously after 1292/3; it did not receive any new dies after 1294 and closed completely for several years from September 1296 (Allen 2003: 173). The depositor or depositors of the Ickham hoard might not have been able to stock up on recent Canterbury coin, had they even wanted to.

Southern England was reasonably productive of sterling hoards across the period, but the chronological variations bear some examination. Conditions in Kent in particular in the mid 1290s were somewhat more confused and dangerous than was normal and the Kentish economy took a number of buffets (see Mate 2010: 6-7). In 1294 war broke out between Edward I and Philip IV of France over problems in Aquitaine, and hostilities would last until 1298. Michael Dolley associated the Dover hoard with the French attack on Dover of 2 August 1295 (Dolley 1955-7: 154-5). On top of this, 1294 also saw a rising in Wales. While the Welsh aspect would have had little impact in Kent, the county unsurprisingly became a focus of the English defence against France: for instance Londoners provided twenty men-at-arms to serve in Kent in 1296, for a four-week period, at a cost of 20 marks (£13 6s. 8d.) per man, so £3 5s. per man per week (Prestwich 1988: 407). Royal purveyors moved across the county in search of provisions and taxation was relatively high in 1295-7.

Of the lesser mints it seems clear from the evidence of Ickham and other early hoards that it was Bristol and York which were the most significant in the first part of the Edwardian coinage, each providing 6-8 % of the currency, about on a par with the Scottish element and about the same as Bury St Edmunds, Chester, Durham, Lincoln and Newcastle all put together, even though it was Durham and Bury that continued output into class 4, after the other mints terminated activity with the conclusion of class 3g in c. 1282.

The financial needs of the forthcoming campaign led the king to take measures which aroused alarm and resistance, particularly from the tough-minded new archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Winchelsey, as the tax burdens to be placed on the church were enormous. There was great concern about the king's order of 16 June 1294 that royal commissioners were to examine all deposits of money in churches and religious houses in England, ostensibly to search out clipped and counterfeit money, but interpreted (probably correctly) as a search for possible funds (Prestwich 1988: 403). Savers accustomed to depositing valuables in the chests of the cathedral or the monasteries of Canterbury might have hurried to reclaim these at this time and then conceal them in a more improvised way. Eastern and coastal Kent was thus the scene of exceptional activity, with the presence of the king himself with his household in 1294, with the passage or temporary local residence of soldiers and royal administrators, tax-collectors and purveyors.

The site of the find was at Appleton Farm, itself a property known to have existed in the 13th century. Appleton lies in the south-east corner of Ickham parish, close to the border with Wingham. Ickham and Wingham both lie only a few kilometres directly east of Canterbury and they were tightly integrated into the ecclesiastical landholding of the area. Wingham was an ancient manor of the archbishops of Canterbury and Ickham was one of the home estates of Christchurch Cathedral Priory, directly servicing the refectory. These were the two most substantial landowners in Kent, the archbishopric holding 45 manors and the priory 31, out of a total of about 1,348 manors for the whole of the county, and each had annual revenues of over £2,000. Wingham was one of the seven bailiwicks of the archdiocese’s landed holdings established by Archbishop John Pecham (1279-92) and was one of the two most 174

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In the medium term, these were just temporary dislocations, weathered by Kent quite well. Indeed, high grain prices combined with exceptional harvests created something of a boom for local landowners, especially the great monasteries (Mate 1982: 778). Nevertheless, it was a period of significant local disruption, with unusually transient populations, and enhanced local royal expenditure. This may offer a solution to the question of the lack of continental sterlings in the Ickham hoard, if the cash it contained had originated as a relatively recent disbursement from an official source – payment for supplies, the wages of a soldier or the working money of an administrator. The sum involved, a little over £2, seems to fit such a suggestion. Deposited for safety at Appleton between Ickham and Wingham, just off the high road from Canterbury to Deal and Sandwich on the coast (now the A257), a location perhaps suggesting an owner in transit (as is not uncommon with hoards), one of the accidents of life prevented that owner, who might therefore not have been a local at all, from recovering it.

from the road running from Dover to Deal (the modern A258). The main landowner here, and patron of the church, was St Augustine’s Abbey, Canterbury: Kent’s third largest landowner, after the archbishop and the cathedral priory. It is an area as much as, or even more likely than Ickham to have experienced emergency and dislocation in the mid-1290s, especially at the time of the French sacking and burning of Dover on 2 August 1295. For whatever reason, a purse of good money was hidden or lost more or less at this time. The third of the recent Kentish finds (and the fourth known for the Edwardian period) comes from Pluckley. The four coins were in good condition and, with a mean of 1.38 g, of almost as good weight as is possible to get, particularly two coins of class 9, the latest coins present, which had not seen any significant currency and were essentially as good weight as is possible. The coins were reportedly found close together, and no coins from other periods were in the vicinity. It seemed legitimate to conclude that this find was deposited as a group probably in about 1300, before the onset of the very large issues of class 10. Unlike the sites of other Kentish sterling hoards, Pluckley is not coastally-oriented, but is a Wealden village. It lies west of Ashford in the direction of Maidstone, with the old road (now the M20) between these running a little to the north of Pluckley. Ashford itself and Westwell, across the Maidstone road, were the local markets.

Turning from the relatively large Ickham hoard, there is the similar but much smaller East Langdon hoard. This small hoard did not enter the Treasure Trove process, but it was shown at and recorded at the British Museum. Initially, the information provided was no more that an origin in the Kent area, where it had been purchased, but a more certain find-spot was later revealed and published by Martin Allen (most recently Allen 2012: 481). The contents of the East Langdon find echo that in the Ickham hoard very closely, allowing for its much smaller scale. It consists for the most part of English pennies of classes 2-4, with a single 7a as its latest piece. It has a representation of Irish and Scottish coins much as would be expected, despite the small number of coins, though again there are no continental sterlings. The only unusual feature is that the balance of the classes is weighted more towards class 4, 44 % of the coins, over class 3, 33 %, a profile different from other hoards of the time. Even the King’s Lynn hoard, 41 coins but only 29 full pennies, preserved the more usual proportions of classes 3 and 4 (48 % and 31 % respectively of the English pennies). With a respectable mean weight of 1.36 g, despite the small number of coins, the East Langdon find aligns more with the larger hoards than King’s Lynn, which averaged at 1.16 g for its English pennies. It is tempting, therefore, to allow the possibility that this find, like Ickham, represents reasonably good money not too far removed from official coffers.

To sum up the Kentish material: there are four hoards, three of them quite recent, all deposited within a decade of each other, with no other hoards so far known from the county throughout the six decades or so of the sterling period. The Dover and Ickham hoards are relatively large, over £3 and over £2 respectively, while the other two are 34 pence and 4 pence. The mean weights of all of the English coins in the hoards, regardless of size, lie between 1.36 g and 1.39 g, and the smallest is not the worst. Conditions in Kent in the 1290s were more confused and active than at any other point in the period. The purpose of this fairly detailed examination of a few small hoards and of the Kentish hoards has been to consider how far one can go in such investigations in the medieval period, even if the examples have involved potentially pushing the evidence hard in some aspects. The hope has been to create quite a strong sense of the role of groups of coins, even of a comparatively low value, in the world that used them. The next stage, of course, is to link the hoard record with the single find record accumulated in the PAS. Do the hoards fit easily and well into this body of evidence, or is there divergence, perhaps in regions and across time? One might expect this, but until now, there has not been the evidence to demonstrate it.

This is another definite purse hoard, because the purse itself survived with the coins. This probable container was a leather pouch, examined at the British Museum along with the coins. It consisted of two pieces of leather sewn together to make, as it were, three semi-circles, two of which formed the pouch and the third, of equal size, a covering flap, to give a container 155 mm across and 95 mm deep. Yet does the fact of this necessarily mean that the hoard was deposited as the result of accident and panic, rather than deliberate concealment? East Langdon itself lies c. 5.5 km (3½ miles) NNE of Dover, not far

Appendix: hoards by region An extremely useful and thorough list of medieval English hoards in chronological order appears as Appendix E in Martin Allen’s Mints and Money in 175

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Medieval England (Cambridge, 2012), the most recent of the author’s several excellent hoard surveys. It should be consulted for bibliographical information about the hoards, which is not included here, on the principle that one should only steal so much. The following list groups hoards of the sterling period by region, then chronologically within this structure. Allen’s list is referenced in the form ‘A272’. This appendix also includes a few additional hoards reported in 2011-2012. SOUTH-EAST (Kent, Surrey, Sussex, Hampshire, London) Broughton, Hampshire: 1964 (c. 1290) A272 English to 5b; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 332 coins (£1 6s). 2. East Langdon, Kent: 1992 (early/mid-1290s) A277 English to 7a; Irish and Scottish; 34 coins (2s.10d.). 3. Ickham, Kent: 1990-1 (early/mid-1290s) A278 English to 7a; Irish and Scottish; 522 coins (£2 3s.6d.). 4. Dover, Kent: 1955 (mid/late 1290s; 1295?) A279 English to 8; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 686 coins (£3 3s. 7¾d.). 5. Pluckley, Kent: 2005 (1300-c. 1310?) A284 English to 9b; 4 coins (4d.). 6. East Langdon, Surrey: 2003 (c. 1306-07) A297 English to 10cf 2(b); Irish and Scottish; 42 coins (2s. 6d.). 7. Mayfield, East Sussex: 1968 (c. 1307-09) A299 English to 10cf 3 and French; 355 coins (£1 10s. 9d.). 8. Oxted, Surrey: 2005 and 2006 (mid/late 1310s?) A315 English to 13; 8 coins (8d.). 9. Wallington, Sutton: Surrey in or before 1933 (1300-c. 1310) A283 English to 10 and Scottish; 37 coins (3s.1d.). 10. Newport, Isle of Wight: 1849 (c. 1314-1344) A310English to 13 or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; over 3,000 coins (£12 10s.+). 11. London (East Smithfield) I (or ‘Tower I’): 1987 (1349-50) A344 English to Edward III Florin coinage farthings, Scottish and Continental; 181 coins (12s. ½d.). 12. London (East Smithfield) II (or ‘Tower II’): 1986-88 (1349-50) A345 English to Edward III Florin coinage; 8 coins (8d.). 1.

EAST ANGLIA (Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire) 13. Long Meadow, Cambridgeshire: 1995 (1280-1351) A264 English to 2ab or later; 5 coins (5d.). 14. Willingale, Essex: 2005 (1280-1351) A265 English to 3e or later; c. 20-25 coins (c. 1s.8d.2s.1d.). 15. Oxborough, Norfolk: 2010 (1280s) English to 3d, 4 coins (4d.). 16. King’s Lynn, Norfolk: 1972 (c. 1290) A274 English to 5; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 41 coins (3s.3½d.). 17. Rendham, Suffolk: 2006 (c. 1290) A275

English to 4e; 8 coins (8d.). 18. Great Yarmouth (or Yarmouth), Norfolk: 1857 (c.1305-1351) A296 English to 10ab 6 or later and Scottish; 700-1,000 coins (c. £3-£4). 19. Gorefield, Cambridgeshire: 1998 (c. 1312-14) A306 English to 11b 3 ; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 1,084 coins (£4 8s. 10½d.). 20. South Elmham, Suffolk: 1998 (mid-1310s?) A313 English to 11c and Scottish; 19 coins (1s. 7d.). 21. Deopham area (Great Ellingham), Norfolk: 2007 (c. 1306-c. 1320) A298 English to 10cf 2 and Irish; 8** coins (8d.). 22. Combs, Suffolk: 2008 (c. 1312-14) A308 English to 11b3 and Continental; 11 coins (11d.). 23. East Bergholt, Suffolk: 2000 (c. 1317-1351) A318 English to 14; 11 coins (9½d.). 24. West Wratting, Cambridgeshire: 2007 (c. 1317-1351) A342 English to 14 and Continental; 13 coins (1s. ½d.). 25. Downham, Essex: 1999 (c. 1320-1351) A322 English to 15b and Continental; 9 coins (9d.). 26. West Rudham, Norfolk: 1994-5 (c. 1321-1344) A331 English to 15c; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 393 coins (£1 12s. 9d.). 27. Braintree, Essex: between 1819 and 1853 (1344-51) A337 English to Edward III Florin coinage; more than 5,000 coins (c. £20 +). 28. Benacre, Suffolk: 1767 (1280-1351?) A267 English attributed to Edward I and II and Irish; nearly 400 coins (c. £1 10s.). THAMES VALLEY/ HOME COUNTIES (Oxfordshire, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire) 29. Oxford (Town Hall), Oxfordshire: 1751 (after 1309) A300 Continental; hoard or parcel of 2 coins (2d. +). 30. Newbury, West Berkshire: 1756 (1300-51) A288 English to 9b or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; hoard or parcel of 3,530 coins (£14 14s. 2d.+). 31. Thame, Oxfordshire: 1889 (1314-51) A312 English attributed to Edward I and II; Irish, Scottish and Continental; more than 500 coins (c. £2). 32. Oxford (St Clement’s), Oxfordshire: 1868 (1344-51) A340 English to Edward III Florin coinage; Irish, Scottish and Continental; parcel of 225 coins (17s. 1½d.). 33. Faringdon, Oxfordshire: 1816 (1279-1351) A349 English to 1d or later; c. 100 coins (c. 8s.). SOUTH WEST (Wiltshire, Somerset, Dorset, Devon, Cornwall)

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34. Avebury, Wiltshire: 1937 (c. 1305-1351) A295 English to 10cf and Continental; 3 coins (3d.). 35. Carlidnack, Cornwall: in or shortly before 1965 (c. 1312-1351) A309 English to 11b; 4 coins (4d.). 36. Boyton, Wiltshire: 1935 (c. 1321) A324 English to 15b/15c mule; Irish, Scottish and

England’s Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351)

Continental; 4,155 coins (£17 6s. 3d.). 37. Grittleton, Wiltshire: in or before 1903 (c. 1321-1344) A328 English to 15c and Continental; 51 coins (4s. 3d.). 38. Ottery St Mary, Devon: 1998 (1344-51) A339 English to Edward III Florin Coinage and Continental; 11 coins (11d.). 39. Portbridge (or Staverton), South Devon: 1999 (134451) A341 English to Edward III Florin coinage and Irish; 37 coins (3s. 1d.). EAST MIDLANDS (Lincolnshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Northamptonshire, Huntingdonshire) 40. Northampton, Northamptonshire: 1873 (1280s) A262 English to (no later than class 3? and Scottish; 199 coins (16s.7d.). 41. Preston Capes, Northamptonshire: 2010 (1280s) English to 4b; 8 coins (8d.). 42. Skegby, Nottinghamshire: 1967 (c. 1290) A276 English to 5a; Irish and Scottish; 450 coins (£1 17s.6d.). 43. Watford, Northamptonshire: 1985 or 1986 (c. 1300?) A282 English attributed to Edward I and Scottish; 28 coins (2s.4d.). 44. Lincolnshire: in or shortly before 1800 (c. 1305-10) A292 English to 10ab6 or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; hoard or parcel of 1,142 coins (£4 15s. 2d. +). 45. Rothersthorpe, Northamptonshire: 1996 (c. 1305-10) A294 English to Edward I/II class 10cf; Irish and Scottish; 32 coins (2s.8d.). 46. Freeby, Leicestershire: 2011 (c. 1310) English to 10cfs, Scottish Baliol, 8 coins (8d.). 47. Thrapston, Northamptonshire: 1778 (1300-51) A291 English to 10 or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; parcel of 360 coins (£1 9s. 11d. +). 48. Boston, Lincolnshire: 1984 (mid/late 1310s) A314 English 13; 26 silver coins (2s. 2d.). 49. South Somercotes, Lincolnshire: 2008 (mid/late 1310s) A316 English to 13 and Scottish; 11 coins (8½d.). 50. Low Apley, Lincolnshire: 2007 (c. 1317-19) A317 English to 14; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 146 coins (12s. 2d.). 51. Doveridge (or Ashbourne), Derbyshire: 1987 (c. 1319-1320s) A320 English to 15a or 15b; 61 coins (5s. 1d.). 52. Gainsborough, Lincolnshire: 1985 (c. 1320-1351) A323 English 15b; 7 coins (6½d.). 53. Haughton, Nottinghamshire: 2008 (c. 1321-44) A329 English to 15c, Scottish and Continental; 39 coins (3s. 3d.). 54. Nottingham: 1786 (1333-51) A335 English, including Berwick class 8b; Irish and

Scottish; c.100 coins (c. 8s.). 55. Derby: 1927 (1345-51) A343 English to Edward III Florin coinage pence and halfpence; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 640 coins (£2 12s. 6d.). WEST MIDLANDS (Staffordshire, Warwickshire, Shropshire, Worcestershire, Herefordshire) 56. Ansley, Warwickshire: 2012 (early 1280s) English to class 3 and Scottish; 4 coins (4d.). 57. Coventry (Coventry and Warwickshire Hospital): 1937 (c. 1290) A273 English to 5; Irish, Scottish and Continental; c.500 coins (c. £2). 58. Coventry (Hales Street): 1847 (1280-c. 1300) A263 English to 3g or later; Irish and Scottish; 100-200 silver coins (c. 8s.-17s.). 59. Great Whitley, Worcestershire: 2011 (c. 1300) English to 9, 4 coins (4d.). 60. Tutbury, Staffordshire: 1831 (1322) A325 English to 15b; Irish, Scottish and Continental; c. 120,000, 240,000 or 360,000 coins (up to £1,500). 61. Coventry (Far Gosford Street): 2006 (1329-44) A334 English to 15d1 (London) and Continental; 38 coins (3s. 2d.). 62. Rugeley, Staffordshire: 2005 (1280-1351?) A268 Scottish; 2 silver coins (2d.). 63. Salisbury (Cathedral Chapter House): 1854 (12791351) A351 English attributed to Edward I; uncertain no. of coins. NORTH WEST (Cumbria, Lancashire, Cheshire)

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64. Bowness, Cumbria: 1884 (c. 1287-1300?) A271 English to 4e and Scottish; 21 or 22 coins (1s.9d. or 1s. 10d.). 65. Wigton, Cumbria: 2010 (1280s) English to 4e; 20 coins (1s. 8d.). 66. Maryport, Cumbria: 2010 (c. 1314) English to class 10cf 5 , Irish, Scottish to John Baliol, Continental, 293 coins with 17 fragments (£1 3s. 1¼d.+). 67. Chester (Lion Brewery), Cheshire: in or shortly before 1899 (1300-51) A285 English attributed to Edward I and II; 24 coins (2s.). 68. Silverdale, Lancashire: 1997 (1300-51) A290 English to ‘Edward I or II’ and Irish; 16 coins (1s.4d.). 69. Abbey Town (Holme Cultram parish), Cumbria: c. 1895 (c.1312-14) A304 English to 11b; Scottish and Continental; 81 coins (c. 6s. 7½d.). 70. Derwentwater, Cumbria: between 1856 and 1862 (1300-51) A286 English to 10 or later and Irish; 34 coins (2s. 10d.). 71. Chester (Pepper Street), Cheshire: in or before 1946 (1344-51) A338 English to Edward III Florin coinage; Irish, Scottish and Continental; parcel of 100 coins (7s. 11½d. +). 72. Burgh Marsh, Cumbria: c. 1860 (1279-1351) A348 English attributed to Edward I; ‘several pounds’

Barrie Cook

weight’ of coins. 73. Lancaster (Friarage), Lancashire: c. 1800 (12791351) A350 English attributed to Edward I; uncertain no. of coins. 74. Stanwix, Cumbria: 1986-7 (1351-c. 1352) A362 English to Edward III, pre-Treaty C, Irish, Scottish and Continental, at least 2,267 coins with fragments (c. £10). NORTH EAST (Northumberland, Durham, Yorkshire) 75. Hartlepool: in or before 1841 (c. 1283-1351?) A270 English to class 4b or later and Scottish; uncertain no. of coins. 76. Beverley (Dominican Priory), East Yorkshire: between 1986 and 1989 (1292-1351) A280 English to 2a and Scottish; 5 coins (5d.). 77. Skipton Castle, North Yorkshire: 1958 (c. 12831300?) A269 English to 4b; Irish and Scottish; 5 coins (5d.). 78. Newminster Abbey, Northumberland: 1925 (c. 130510) A293 English to 10cf; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 486 coins (£2 0s. 6d.). 79. Hesleyside (Shaw Moss), Northumberland: 1852 (1300-51) A287 English 10 or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 340 coins (£1 8s. 4d.). 80. West Whelpington, Northumberland: 1976 (c. 13101351) A301 English to class 11; 5 coins (5d.). 81. Middridge, Durham: 1974 (c. 1311) A302 English to 11a; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 3,072 or 3,080 coins (£12 15s. 7d. or £12 16s. 5d.). 82. Whittonstall, Northumberland: 1958 (c. 1311) A303 English to 11a; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 1,206 coins (£5 0s. 5¼d.). 83. Cramlington, Northumberland: 2009 (c. 1312-14) A305 English to 11b2 and Scottish; 122 coins (10s. 2d.). 84. Ilkley Moor (Weary Hill), Bradford: 1967 (and 19601?) (c. 1312-14) A307 English to 11b; Scottish and Continental; 43 (+6?) coins (3s. 7d. or 4s. 1d.). 85. Tadcaster, N Yorks: 2010 (c. 1312-14) English to 11b; 8 coins (8d.). 86. Wyke, Bradford: 1836 (c. 1314-1344) A311 English to 13 or later; Irish, Scottish and Continental; c. 2,000 (?)coins (c. £8?). 87. Warkworth, Northumberland: 2005 (c.1317-1351) A319 English to 14; 6 coins (6d.). 88. Scotton, North Yorkshire: 1924 (c. 1319-1344) A321 English to class 15; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 319 coins + uncertain no. of fragments (£1 6s. 7d.). 89. Amble, Northumberland: 1988 (c. 1321-1344) A326 English to 15c; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 1,027 coins (£4 5s. 7d.). 90. Bootham (School), York: 1953 (c. 1321-1344) A327 English to 15c; Irish, Scottish and Continental; 908 coins (£3 15s. 8d.). 178

91. Knaresborough Priory, North Yorkshire: 1805 (c. 1321-1344) A330 English to 15c; Scottish and Continental; c. 1,600 coins (c. £17). 92. York (Coppergate): 1978 (c.1321-1351) A332 English to 15c and Continental; 5 coins (5d.). 93. Newcastle upon Tyne (River Tyne): c. 1857 (1344) A336 English Florin coinage, first period; 2 gold coins (12s.). 94. Boltby, N Yorkshire: 2012, (c. 1452) English to Edward III, pre-Treaty D, 23 coins (1s. 11d.). 95. Huggate, East Yorkshire: 2006 (1279-1351?) A261 English (only?); c. 37 coins (c. 3s.1d.). 96. Barnard Castle Moor, Durham: in or before 1794 (c. 1280-1351) A266 Scottish (and English?); uncertain no. of coins. 97. Newcastle upon Tyne (Butcher Bank): 1860 (1300-51) A289. English attributed to Edward I and II; parcel of 8 coins (8d.). 98. Uncertain location, before c. 1870 (late 1320s) A333 English, Scottish and Continental; hoard or parcel of c. 271 coins (c. £1 2s. 7d. or more). Endnotes {1} It is of course likely that much of the contents of the Tutbury hoard was melted down relatively soon after discovery. {2} Very roughly, from Edward I’s reign (from 1279) and Edward III’s reign (up to c. 1351) the surviving hoards average out at one per year or less, while for Edward II’s reign there are more than two per year. {3} Nicholas Mayhew, pers comm. {4} There is, of course, the find of two of the three known examples of the gold florin of Edward III of 1443, reportedly discovered in the River Tyne in the 1850s. {5} Much of the material that follows is taken from drafts of a volume of sterling hoards in preparation by the author. {6} For the Taxatio, see ‘The Taxatio Database’, http://www.hrionline.ac.uk/taxatio/ {7} For the Northamptonshire subsidies, see http://www.medievalgenealogy.org.uk/subsidies/index.sh tml. {8} A new study (Holmes and Stewartby 2010) suggests Balliol’s coinage was relatively extensive, for the period, but that has no significant implications for interpreting the Ickham hoard. Bibliography Allen, M. 2003, The Durham Mint, British Numismatic Society Special Publication no. 4 (British Numismatic Society, London). Allen, M. 2012, Mints and Money in Medieval England (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Archibald, M. M. 1966, ‘Fishpool, Blidworth (Notts.), 1966 hoard’, Numismatic Chronicle 7th series, 7 (1067), 133-145. Archibald, M.M. 1971, ‘The Skegby, Notts., 1967 hoard’,

England’s Silver Age: new and old hoards from England under the three Edwards (c. 1279-1351)

British Numismatic Journal 40, 44-56. Bailey, M.1989/2008, A Marginal Economy? East Anglian Breckland in the Later Middle Ages (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge). Bailey, M. 2010, Medieval Suffolk (Boydell Press, Woodbridge). Boon, G. C. 1986, Welsh Hoards 1979-1981 (National Museum of Wales, Cardiff). Campbell, B. M. S. 2010, ‘Agriculture in Kent in the high middle ages’, in Sweetinburgh 2010, 25-54. Coin Hoards I 1979 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Cook, B. J. 2008a, ‘Medieval coins excavated at the Tower of London’, Numismatic Chronicle 168, 233-240 Cook, B. J. 2008b, ‘The coins’, in Grainger, I., Hawkings, D., Cowal, L. and Mikulski, R. The Black Death Cemetery, East Smithfield, London, Museum of London Archaeology Service Monograph 43, 15-16 (Museum of London Archaeology Service, London). Denney, A. H. (ed.) 1960, The Sibton Abbey Estates: Select Documents 1325-1509 (Suffolk Records Society, Ipswich). Dolley, R. H. M. 1955, ‘The 1955 Dover treasure trove’, Archaeologia Cantiana 69, 62-8. Dolley, R. H. M. 1955-7, ‘The Dover hoard: the first English hoard with groats of Edward I’, British Numismatic Journal 28, 147-68. Du Boulay, F. R. H. 1964, ‘A rentier economy in the later middle ages: the archbishopric of Canterbury’, Economic History Review 16, 427-438. Greenhalgh, D. 1989, ‘The Fox class seven pence of Edward I’, British Numismatic Journal 59, 7783. Holmes, N. M. McQ. and Stewartby, Lord, 2010, ‘The coinage of John Baliol’, British Numismatic Society 80, 107-30. Kelleher, R. and Williams, G. 2011, ‘The Tutbury hoard’, in Hislop, M., Kincey, M. and Williams, G., Tutbury: ‘A Castle firmly built’. Archaeological and historical investigations at Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire, British Archaeological Reports British Series 546, 62-87 (BAR Publishing, Oxford). Maddicott, J. R. 1987/2006, ‘The English peasantry and the demands of the crown, 1294-1341’, reprinted in Aston, T.H. (ed.), Landlords, peasants and politics in medieval England, 285-359 (Past and Present Publications, Cambridge). Mate, M. 1982, ‘The impact of war on the economy of Canterbury cathedral priory, 1294-1340’, Speculum 57, 761-778. Mate, M. 2010, ‘The economy of Kent, 1200-1500: an age of expansion, 1200-1348’, in Sweetinburgh 2010, 1-10. Mayhew, N. J., 1983, Sterling Imitations of Edwardian Type, Royal Numismatic Society Special Publication, no. 14 (Royal Numismatic Society, London). Metcalf, D. M. 1977, ‘A survey of numismatic research into the pennies of the first three Edwards’, in

Mayhew, N. J. (ed.), Edwardian Monetary Affairs (1279-1433), British Archaeological Reports British Series 36, 1-31 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). North, J. J. 1997, ‘The Anglo-Irish halfpence, farthings and post-1290 pence of Edward I and III’, British Numismatic Journal 67, 11-19. Prestwich, M. 1988, Edward I (Methuen, London). Richardson, G. 2005, ‘The Prudent Village: risk pooling institutions in medieval English agriculture’, Journal of Economic History 65, 386-413 Rowley, J. 2000,The Tutbury Coin Hoard, unpublished MPhil thesis, Keele University. Sweetinburgh, S. (ed.) 2010, Later Medieval Kent, 12201540, Kent History Project 9 (Boydell Press, Woodbridge). Smith, T. 1870, English Gilds: The Original Ordinances of More Than One Hundred Early English Gilds, (Early English Text Society, London). Stewart, I. 1989, ‘Scottish sterlings from the Middridge hoard’, British Numismatic Journal 59, 84-119. Stewart, I. and North J. J. 1990, ‘Classification of the single cross sterlings of Alexander III’, British Numismatic Journal 60, 37-64. Stewartby, Lord 2009, English Coins 1180-1551, (Spink, London) Sutcliffe, D. 1935, ‘The financial condition of the See of Canterbury, 1279-1292’, Speculum 10, 53-68. ‘The Taxatio Database’, http://www.hrionline.ac.uk/taxatio/

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Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War Edward Besly In Coins and the Archaeologist, first published in 1974, the late John Kent touched on the question of the interpretation of the structure and distribution of coin hoards in the context of a well-documented period (Kent 1974: 190-2). Using the English Civil War as an example, he plotted the distributions of pre- and post-war hoards and compared these with that of hoards terminating with issues of 1641-1649. He found much to be cautious about and in the latter case commented that in general ‘the distribution would be subject to grave risk of misinterpretation if we had not a full historical record’. Kent’s comments formed the starting point for this paper, which in contrast to the broad sweep of most other papers presented at the Conference, concentrates on a single decade, the 1640s, which in England and Wales saw a massive increase in hoarding activity – or, at very least, the non-recovery of hoards. From 1642-6 and in 1648-9, the country witnessed the most destructive war, both in

human life and damage to property that it had yet experienced. Kent’s original maps are reproduced as Fig. 1: the first has 61 hoards and Kent drew attention to peace time concentrations in Cheshire and the Thames valley. The Civil War map has 38 hoards, divided between those which close with coins of the opening year of the war and the rest; here Kent comments that ‘the distribution is entirely different, though no easier to understand. The London area is relatively empty of hoards and the notable storm centres, apart from Newark, are scarcely to be discerned’. He also drew attention to the hoarding in the north, early in the war. He was forced to conclude ‘movements of armies stand out not at all. We are left with a very large increase in the deposition of hoards in this period, an accepted symptom of crisis’.

Fig.1: Distributions of peacetime and Civil-War hoards, from Kent 1974, figs 1-2. By permission of the Institute of Archaeology, UCL.

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Edward Besly

Fig. 2: Hoards closing with coins of Charles I.

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Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War

How have things changed since then – and is it possible to say whether the hoards reflect in any way the welldocumented course of the war, perhaps indeed specific events? Thanks to a spate of new finds and the help of regional museums chasing up old ones, a survey published in 1987 listed and plotted 98 comparable hoards that close between 1641 and 1649 (Besly 1987); a quarter of a century later, we now have 135 (the solid circles in Fig.2) – well over three times as many as were available to John Kent – and a further 82 probable CivilWar hoards known only from old reports (the open squares in Fig.2), the exact termini of which are not known but which sometimes provide useful information. There is a scatter up and down the centre of the country: the mountainous areas of the north and west, unsurprisingly, produce few hoards – but so too does the area south and east of a line from the Wash to the Solent, mostly in secure and prosperous Parliamentary territory.

1643 saw important royalist successes, notably the conquest of most of the West Country and the capture of Bristol. The Marquess of Newcastle, having finally overrun all of Yorkshire (except Hull) advanced into Lincolnshire, but his reluctance to move further afield cost the King his only opportunity to make inroads into East Anglia, where an anti-parliamentarian rising at Kings Lynn (July-August) finally withered for lack of royalist support. The royalist advance on London was halted by the drawn first battle of Newbury (20 September). Meanwhile parliamentarian strongholds such as Plymouth, Lyme Regis and especially Gloucester tied down forces and always threatened the royalist rear. Both sides sought help from outside, the King from Ireland, where an English army was countering the rebellion which had broken out in 1641, and Parliament, at great expense, from the Scots. An Anglo-Irish force of about 3,000 men arrived in north-east Wales late in November 1643, but after several successful skirmishes was routed at Nantwich on 25 January 1644. The arrival of the Scots, however, was to prove one of the decisive factors that swung the war towards Parliament.

The progress of the war, 1642-6

In 1644, although their western army was halted at Alresford in Hampshire on 29 March, the King’s forces held their own in the south. One parliamentarian force was beaten at Cropredy, north of Oxford (6 June) and the invasion of the West by the Earl of Essex ended in disaster when the King trapped his army in Cornwall, though the royalists were again forced to waste men, materials and time in the unsuccessful siege of Taunton. A second battle at Newbury (27 October) was again inconclusive. In the north, however, a major royalist defeat at Selby (11 April) was followed by the arrival of the Scots and the siege of York. Despite the best efforts of Prince Rupert, the King’s nephew, his army was shattered on 2 July at Marston Moor, the largest set-piece engagement of the war. The royalists thereby lost the entire north of England. The winter saw a thorough overhaul of parliamentarian forces, with the creation of the New Model Army led by Sir Thomas Fairfax, Commander-inChief, with Oliver Cromwell as commander of the horse. Peace negotiations at Uxbridge came to nothing.

Fig. 3: England and Wales during the Civil War (from Besly 1990: 112; drawn by Colin Williams).

The 1645 campaign seemed to start well for the royalists, but on 30-31 May Prince Rupert stormed and sacked Leicester, provoking a parliamentarian response which led to the battle of Naseby on 14 June. The King’s field army was destroyed and his baggage and secret correspondence captured. The battle of Langport (10 July) and the fall of Bristol on 11 September opened the way to the West Country. A brilliant campaign for the King in Scotland by the Marquess of Montrose ended at Philiphaugh, south of Edinburgh, on 13 September. Pendennis in Cornwall was the last English garrison to surrender, on 17 August 1646; in Wales, Harlech held out until 13 March 1647. The King had handed himself over to the Scots army near Newark on 5 May 1646.

Charles I left London on 10 January 1642 and in March established his court at York. War broke out formally on 22 August, when the King raised his standard at Nottingham and proceeded to Shrewsbury to recruit in Wales and the Marches. It was generally expected that a single campaign would settle matters, but the first major battle, at Edgehill on 23 October, was inconclusive. The royalists advanced on London, sacked Brentford on 12 November, but were then turned back by the capital’s trained bands drawn up at Turnham Green. Charles established his wartime capital at Oxford. {1} 183

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An uneasy peace was shattered early in 1648 when royalists and disgruntled former parliamentarians combined in a series of risings, the ‘Second Civil War’, with fighting in the north, in South Wales and in the south-east, which ended with the siege of Colchester (June-August). Retribution was savage: ringleaders were shot and the King himself placed on trial. Charles I was executed in Whitehall on 30 January 1649.

several from the Thames valley appear on Kent’s first map as pre-war deposits, but may well relate to the war and thereby fill out the gap perceived in his second. One mixed hoard was found at Tregwynt in Pembrokeshire in 1996, its 33 gold coins (£24) forming nearly half of its value (Fig. 5); buried around 1648, its latest gold coin was produced in 1633-4 (J10; Besly 1998). Gold accounted for over half (52%) of the value of the hoard found at Ackworth, Wakefield in 2011 (H23).

The hoards

Eighty per cent of hoards ending with Charles I contain only silver. Silver hoards range in size from a few shillings to over £300, perhaps the equivalent of £30,000 in RPI terms today, but based on average earnings perhaps around half a million pounds. Half a crown (2s 6d/30d) paid a cavalryman for a day, 8d a foot soldier; cheese cost 2-3d a pound.

The vast majority of hoards are of coins, though occasional deposits of plate (not plotted on Fig. 2) have been recorded, most recently from Nether Stowey in Somerset (Payne 2009: 191-4 and others cited at p.194); frequently these include spoons – a typical silver spoon might weigh 40 g or more: 7-8 shillings in money terms. There is the occasional mixed hoard: Dersingham, Norfolk, found in 1984 comprised 129 silver shillings in the bowl of a silver cup, itself worth about thirty shillings (D6); an ill-recorded hoard from Marlborough, Wiltshire, comprised 300+ coins and seven or more silver spoons (D18). Hoarded coins are mostly silver: shillings and sixpences of Edward VI, Philip and Mary, Elizabeth, James I and Charles I; half crowns of James I and, increasingly prominent, of Charles I. Smaller denominations are frequently absent, but many hoards contain worn groats (4d) from the 1550s; the occasional survivor from before Henry VIII’s debasement is encountered. Other minor elements include coins of James I struck for Ireland (lightweight shillings and sixpences allowed to circulate in England and Wales at 9d and 4½d), Scottish issues of James VI and Charles I (thistle merks of the former, rated at 1s 1½d and coins of both monarchs that matched English half crowns and shillings) and a few worn Spanish silver reals, which had been legal tender briefly under Mary Tudor and continued to be tolerated in early Stuart times. During the war, this mix of existing currency was augmented by new output from the Tower, issues from royalist mints and by foreign coinage, mostly from the Spanish Netherlands.

Fig. 4: Hoards containing gold.

Where gold is present, it is often only as a very small part of a mainly silver hoard. Gold dominated Tower mint output between 1612 and 1632, but the reverse was the case from 1632 to 1647, following an arrangement whereby large amounts of Spanish silver were coined in London. The silver passed into circulation in England and Wales, against bills of exchange payable on the Continent; as a correspondent noted in 1652, ‘we have in Amsterdam more English gold than you yourselves have in all England, this gold hath been all sent within twenty years…’, and this would appear to be as concise an explanation as any for the typical composition of a Civil War hoard (Thirsk and Cooper 1972: 647).

Dating Civil War coin hoards Coins issued by the Tower Mint were normally not explicitly dated, but privy-marks applied to the dies for audit purposes were changed, usually annually in line with the official year, which ran from Lady Day (25 March), at which point a ‘trial of the pyx’ was organised (Fig 6). A branch mint was set up under Thomas Bushell at Aberystwyth Castle to coin newly-refined Welsh silver from January 1639. It struck coins using Tower-made dies until September 1642 with an open book as its sole privy-mark; its coins appear occasionally in hoards and could potentially date a few of them.

Nevertheless, about one hoard in 12 contains only gold and there are a few mixed hoards where gold forms a significant proportion of the overall value. Fig. 4 shows all hoards closing with Charles I that contain gold;

When the royalists issued coins, many of these did bear dates: ‘Old Style’, changing on 25 March. Mostly, these were the ‘Exurgat’ money, as it was known to 184

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contemporaries from the legend ‘Exurgat Deus (et) dissipentur inimici’ (may God arise, may his enemies be scattered), which on the reverses surrounded an abbreviated summary of the King’s stated war aims: ‘the Protestant Religion, the laws of England and the liberty of Parliament’. Other series used Tower-type designs and may be dated, to a degree, by known evidence for the operation of the mints in question; dates were added to some of them (Fig. 7).

royalist mint outputs were tiny compared with the Tower, but they nonetheless do provide the latest datable coins in several hoards. With the rapid circulation and mingling of coin resulting from military procurement and the movement of armies, taxation and military pay, the date of deposit is taken to lie reasonably close to the period of issue and thereby, allowing a modest time lag, give a roughly year-by-year sequence to the hoards under study; and enough of them are now known to justify a more detailed breakdown than was formerly possible. What do we see?

Either side’s coins (or both) might therefore serve to give a terminal date to a hoard at least to the nearest year;

Fig. 5: Part of the 1996 Tregwynt (N Pembs) hoard. (NMW/Jim Wild). On the lead sheet (probably used as a lid) are a gold 20s of Charles I, a gold Unite (22s) and quarter-laurel (5s) of James I; royalist silver half crowns from Oxford, ‘W’, Shrewsbury (dated 1642) and ‘SA’; and a Tower shilling with privy-mark Sceptre, the latest coin in the hoard. Other coins include a 1643 half crown from Bristol, a crown (5s) issued by the Lords Justices in Dublin, 1643 (‘Ormonde money’ with crowned CR design) and a Scottish gold sword-and-sceptre piece of James VI dated 1602 (current in England and Wales at 11s). Internal diameter of gold posy ring: 18.5mm. 185

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Privy-Mark Date of Pyx Trial Likely period of operation Triangle-in-circle 29 May 1643 25 March 1641 – 24 March 1643 (P) 15 July 1644 25 March 1643 – 24 March 1644 (R) 12 May 1645 25 March 1644 – 24 March 1645 Eye 10 November 1645 25 March 1645 - ?September 1645 Sun 15 February 1647 ?October 1645 - ?December 1646 Sceptre 9 November 1649* ?January 1647 - ?January 1649 * Charles I executed 30 January 1649; Pyx trial for ‘Sceptre’ ordered on 16 May Fig. 6: Tower Mint privy-marks and pyx trials, 1643-9 (New Style dates). Products (OS dates) ‘Exurgat’, dated 1642 ‘Exurgat’, dated 1642-6 ‘Exurgat’, dated 1643-5 Tower types, undated Tower types, undated Tower types, undated; also dated 1644, 1645; rare ‘Exurgat’ dated 1644, 1645 W(orcester) June 1644 - ?July 1646 Tower types, undated* Chester June 1644 - ?January 1646 Tower types, undated* * At each mint a single ‘Exurgat’ die dated 1644 was used at the head of the series of half crowns Shrewsbury Oxford Bristol Truro York Exeter

Active (NS dates) September - ?November 1642 January 1643 – May 1646 July 1643 – September 1645 Nov/Dec 1642 – August 1643 late January 1643 – July 1644 September 1643 - ?March 1646

Signature unsigned unsigned; OX BR monogram unsigned unsigned; EBOR unsigned; EX W; unsigned CHST; unsigned

Fig. 7: The major royalist mints. Forty-six hoards close with this issue (Fig. 8), the biggest single group, some perhaps hidden in 1641-2, but most no doubt later and all unrecovered for much the same reasons. They are well scattered, but already we see some groupings. The town of Newark stood at the lowest crossing of the river Trent, a strategic point held by the royalists and the subject of three sieges; already the area stands out in the hoard record. There is also quite a cluster in Yorkshire. The lines of royalist advance towards London from the north-west late in 1642 and from the south-west in 1643 are peppered with unrecovered hoards.

The chronology of the hoards The mark current at the Tower of London in the summer of 1642 was a triangle in a circle. Already in production for over a year, large quantities would have been in circulation when the war broke out and more was to come because in the chaos of 1642 no pyx trial was carried out and the mark continued in use into 1643; eventually, over £2 million-worth of silver coinage bore this mark.

In 1643-4, twenty-nine hoards give us, perhaps, several groupings (Fig. 9): in Yorkshire, the northern March and the south and west; and there are hoards in the vicinity of Newark (again), but also near Gloucester and Taunton, two Parliamentarian-held towns, besieged in 1643 and 1644 respectively. Moving into 1644-5 (Fig. 10, closed circles), there are fewer hoards (22). There are no hoards at all in the north, which was lost by the royalists after Marston Moor, fought on 2 July 1644, but there seems to be a distinct cluster of hoards across the Midlands and a looser group in Gloucestershire and the near west. Are we in fact seeing the Naseby campaign (May-June 1645) and its aftermath, reflected in hoarding? There are, of course, many reasons an owner might fail to recover a hoard, death being the most obvious; disruption and destruction in the actual areas of fighting may well also be a factor. The whole country suffered massive physical damage during the war, not just because of fighting; much was the result of military preparations, for instance as towns refurbished their defences, clearing buildings in extramural suburbs to provide clear lines of fire and deny shelter to an attacker (Porter 2011). One such suburb was

Fig. 8: Hoards closing with p.m. Triangle-in-circle or royalist coins dated 1642. 186

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St Sidwells in Exeter, where around 1767 workmen digging foundations found ‘some old plate, many gold and several hundred silver coins... mostly of James and Charles I coins: none being of a later date’ (K18). In the summer of 1643 parts of Exeter’s suburbs were demolished on the orders of the Earl of Stamford, ahead of the expected royalist assault (the city fell on 4 September); in St Sidwells the job was finished in 1645 by Sir John Berkeley and Lord Goring, defending the city in their turn for the King. The prosperous, but much more secure and less damaged Parliamentary hinterland of the south east has produced very few hoards. However, a large find (£63 6s 1d; F2) buried around 1645 near Ashdon in north Essex had plenty of new money from the Tower mint and shows that significant hoards were being hidden in that area, well away from any action. In passing, it is worth noting that while it is perhaps possible to discern trends, it is quite another matter to link individual hoards to specific events; this will be discussed further, below. Four hoards close with the mark Eye (Fig. 10, open circles), introduced in 1645 but replaced after perhaps six months. Its replacement mark, a smiley sun (the original emoticon, for a happy Parliament?), was used until around the end of 1646; hoards ending with this mark (Fig. 11) may therefore relate in part to the quieter conditions which began to prevail in that year. They turn up in a broad scatter, though with a westerly bias.

Fig. 10: Hoards closing with p.m. (R)/1644 and Eye/1645.

Fig. 9: Hoards closing with p.m. (P)/1643.

Fig. 11: Hoards closing with p.m. Sun/1646.

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Fig 12a: Hoards closing with p.m. Sceptre.

Fig 12b: Hoards closing with p.ms Sun and Sceptre.

The final mark of the reign, a sceptre, was used for about two years in 1647-8. At first sight (Fig. 12a) the distribution of hoards is dramatically different: are we looking at the events of 1648, the rising in Pembrokeshire that led to the battle of St Fagans near Cardiff (8 May), fighting in the north, where royalists seized and held Pontefract Castle for several months and the major hostilities in Kent and Essex? Tower output during this

period was, however, much reduced and sceptre-marked coins are scarce; it is quite possible that a number of the apparent 1646-7 hoards in the previous map were buried a little later and could also relate to the period of the 1648 risings, a likelihood increased, perhaps, by the slowing down of military-related circulation following the King’s surrender.

Fig. 13: Percentage composition of silver in Civil War hoards ([X] = number of hoards; ‘Other’ = royalist, Scottish, Irish and Continental coins).{2} 188

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Taking ‘Sun’ and ‘Sceptre’ hoards together (Fig. 12b), the distribution is less dramatic, though there is, relative to earlier hoards, a distinct increase in hoarding in the south-east, which in 1648 saw serious fighting for the first time; and there are once again hoards in Yorkshire. A couple of awkwardly-placed new discoveries could, of course, radically change the picture. However, recent finds have served to underline observed trends: as the evidence stands it would seem that the hoards do indeed ‘follow the action’. Though the failure to recover a hoard might result from an event several years after its burial, fresh hoarding appears nevertheless to have continued throughout the war.

Royalist issues The icing on the cake in Civil War hoards, numismatically speaking, is provided by small numbers of wartime royalist issues, which appear in many hoards (Fig. 14), though they rarely exceed 5 % of any single deposit (more usually, 1-2 %) and certain coins from the Continent – virtually unknown in peacetime but quite widespread here (see below). The King’s principal wartime mint started life as the Aberystwyth branch, summoned at the outset to Shrewsbury in September 1642, moving to Oxford by December 1642 under Thomas Bushell and Sir William Parkhurst, Warden of the Tower Mint, where it remained until May 1646, spawning a branch at Bristol under Bushell in the summer of 1643 (Boon 1981: 82-121; Boon 1984). The coinage of all three mints was of the ‘Exurgat’ type and bore explicit dates; from 1643 abbreviated versions of their mint names appeared on most. Their distributions are much as expected (Fig. 15ac). Shrewsbury was the campaign mint for Edgehill, but may also have coined for local use towards the end of its short life. Oxford was by far the biggest of the King’s mints and its products are widely distributed, though only appear exceptionally in south-eastern hoards, such as Ashdon, Essex (1644-5; F2) and Guildford, Surrey (1647-9; J3). Bristol, a much smaller operation, has few hoard provenances, all of them western. It is worth noting that these royalist ‘Exurgat money’ issues, though sometimes crudely made, were generally the equal of Tower coins in their weights and fineness; there was no intrinsic reason to reject them (Besly and Cowell 1991). However, their propagandist message marked them out, making a distinct impression on observers such as the Venetian ambassador of the day: sufficient reason for a non-royalist to avoid them.

The compositions of the hoards are highly repetitive: principally Tower Mint shillings and sixpences of Elizabeth, James and Charles, plus half crowns of the latter, with a few Scottish and Irish issues. There is some interesting chronological variability in the proportions which suggests that hoarding took place on a scale large enough to distort the circulating medium: coins of Elizabeth and James drop disproportionately in 1643-5. (Fig. 13) We should remember that the coins hidden by one hoarder are those that are not available to the next; it is perhaps little wonder that even the well-resourced Parliamentarians were unable to pay their armies properly – there simply was not enough specie available above ground. There is also some evidence for recovery – dishoarding and rehoarding: hoards of 1643-5 increasingly comprise new money; from 1645-6 the old coinages of Elizabeth and James rise again as a proportion of the whole, even though large amounts of fresh coinage in Charles’s name were still coming into circulation.

In November 1642, faced with an extended conflict, the King also franchised mints in two other areas his forces controlled; these produced coins of conventional designs. In the west Sir Richard Vyvyan set up shop at Truro but as Sir Ralph Hopton’s army advanced eastwards, the mint moved to Exeter in September 1643 (Besly 1992). Its products went to the army’s treasurer and here perhaps, though the sample is small, we can follow Hopton’s progress: Hampshire was the furthest he got before defeat at Alresford on 29 March 1644 (Fig. 16). We also know from its receipt books, however, that this mint served local citizens in coining their plate, so the presence of Exeter coins in Devon hoards may be the result of this.

Fig. 14: Hoards containing royalist issues.

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Fig. 15a: Hoards containing royalist coins from Shrewsbury.

Fig. 15c: Hoards containing royalist coins from Bristol.

Fig. 15b: Hoards containing royalist coins from Oxford.

Fig. 16: Hoards containing coins from Truro and/or Exeter.

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In the north, William Cavendish, Earl of Newcastle, was empowered to coin. A mint at York had been intended all along, but for various reasons did not finally open until late-January 1643, managed by William Martin, a multitasking local attorney who also manufactured pistols (Besly 1984; 1991). York’s coins were made by simple machinery, often maladjusted, but sometimes achieving a high technical standard. They are found widely (Fig. 17), including in south-eastern hoards, but with a strong local bias, one factor perhaps being local military procurement during 1643-4. Fresh York half crowns seem to have formed at least one third of the value of a hoard found around 1848 at Pocklington (East Riding; E13), and York coins are present in all five Yorkshire hoards that close in 1643-4. The mint building, ‘Sir Henry Jenkins house in the Minster Yard’, still stands, as St William’s College.

Fig. 18: Other royalist issues in hoards. An enigmatic series of ‘Exurgat’ coins signed A or B or with a small feathers badge, dated 1645 and 1646, was struck from dies of Bristol type after the city’s capture in September 1645. The mint or mints remain unlocated and the few hoards containing such coins are somewhat scattered (Priorslee, H11; Ackworth and Middleham, North Yorkshire, H23 and J9; Tregwynt, J10); the high fineness (above sterling) of analysed specimens hints at the use of Welsh silver. George Boon’s reasoned guess of the royal garrison at Ashby, Leicestershire for ‘A’ remains the best to date and is consistent with this pattern, such as it is (Boon 1981:122-32). The only siege pieces from a hoard (two Newark ninepences) come from a purse found on a skeleton at Newark (H9) – by definition, their currency really was highly local. While this paper relates only to hoards, single finds do amplify and confirm this picture for all three of these series.

Fig. 17: Hoards containing coins from York. These distributions become of particular interest in the cases of those coins whose origins are not attested (Fig. 18). For many years it was thought that half crowns signed with a W and others related to them were made at Weymouth: the few hoard provenances (Penybryn, Wrexham, F13; ‘Cotswolds’, G2; Priorslee, Telford, H11; Tregwynt, Pembrokeshire, J10) tell us differently and we now attribute them to the mint-franchise awarded to Sir Thomas Cary in May 1644, to coin in the counties of Chester, Shropshire, Worcester and Hereford. Chester coins are known (present at Penybryn and Ackworth, Wakefield, H23) and Shrewsbury may have reopened. Hereford is attested as a mint in October-November 1644 but we are not sure quite what it produced; Worcester is not attested, but ‘W’ and related coins are reasonably numerous.

By way of examples an ‘A’ shilling of 1645 in the National Museum of Wales was found near Dolgellau, Gwynedd; and in 2006 another Newark coin was recorded in Lincolnshire, about 40 km (25 miles) from Newark itself. Amongst some very small issues is a half crown signed HC, with privy-marks resembling the pears of the armorials of Worcester; examples in hoards from the Cotswolds and Telford, Shropshire and a single find at Hanbury, (Worcestershire) tend to support an attribution to Hartlebury Castle, one of the collection centres for local taxes in the county. Even rarer is a half crown dated 1644, signed CH; its sole hoard provenance is Penybryn (Ruabon, Wrexham; F13), leaving its origin uncertain for now.{3}

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‘A little barrel of ducatoons’

There is perhaps a story to tell: when war broke out in 1642 the Queen, Henrietta Maria, set out for the Continent to raise money for arms and equipment; on return, she landed at Bridlington on 22 February 1643, spent over two months at York, then headed south; after two weeks at Newark, she proceeded rapidly through the Midlands to the field of Edgehill, where she was reunited with the King on 13 July. That night they stayed at Wroxton, 3 km (2 miles) from Broughton, before heading to Oxford, the king’s wartime capital. A year later, she left for the Continent via Exeter. The Queen’s 1643 itinerary is sketched in Fig. 19: is it a coincidence, or do the ducatons and patagons turn up in hoards roughly in proportion to the time spent in the various areas by the Queen and her entourage? The Venetian secretary in England certainly thought that she had brought large sums of money from the Continent. Whatever the truth, this gives us a third possible context for the Broughton hoard, which could now date as early as mid-1641, or as late as mid-1643.

During peaceful times, foreign coinage was largely excluded from general circulation, though it was familiar in ports that traded with the Continent. In March 1644, The King proclaimed several foreign coin types to be legal tender, among them the ‘ducatoon’ at 5s 6d and the ‘cross dollar’ at 4s 6d.{4} These may be identified as large silver coins from the Spanish Netherlands: the ducaton and the patagon, which with their fractions have turned up in 12 hoards (Fig. 19); unspecified ‘dollars’ are recorded in several others. These finds do seem to be a feature of royalist areas, notably Yorkshire – and we know from a ‘little barrel’ received by the Earl of Newcastle that some ducatons were imported in the north around October 1642 (Firth 1886: 22).

Nevertheless, if specific links to events are to be sought, the following can be offered. The royalist (strictly, antiparliamentarian) rebellion at King’s Lynn in August 1643 – about the only actual fighting to take place in Norfolk – provides a likely occasion for the burial of a hoard of that year at nearby Dersingham (D6); and perhaps the nonrecovery of a hoard of 1644-5 from a basement in the Market Place at Leicester may be linked to Prince Rupert’s sack of the town on 30 May 1645 (F11). The Tockwith hoard (D45; terminus 1641-3) was likely lost on the battlefield of Marston Moor (2 July 1644) and the Sibbertoft find (F17; 1644-5) lay within 1.5 km of the centre of the Naseby battle (14 June 1645). There are few others. Tregwynt, for instance, fits beautifully with the Pembrokeshire rising in 1648 – but was it buried at the outset in February, several months later as Cromwell closed in on Pembroke, or to avoid subsequent exactions? And why was it not recovered, granted that the farm’s owner Llewellin Harrie lived to see King Charles II’s Restoration?

Fig. 19: Hoards with foreign coins.

Money in the bank? Hoards and hoarders

This brings us back to the difficulty of linking individual hoards to specific events, even in a well-documented period. We can only date a hoard by its latest coin – thus to the nearest 12 months or so, 24 in the case of the triangle-in-circle mark – and then only as a terminus post quem. As a case in point, the small hoard found near Broughton Castle in Oxfordshire in 1996 ends in English terms with triangle-in-circle, thus 1641-3 (D37; Mayhew and Besly 1998); it could have been deposited any time from the spring of 1641, while its find spot suggests a possible link with the capture of the castle by the Royalists in October 1642. It is also one of the earliest Civil War hoards to contain coins from the Spanish Netherlands – a patagon, a half-patagon and a halfducaton. What were these doing there?

The conference in which this paper played a part was predicated on the motives of hoarders. Who were the Civil-War hoarders, where did they deposit their hoards, and why? To take the second question first: hoards turn up almost anywhere, but particularly in or around buildings: under the floor, upstairs or down; under the hearth; in the basement; behind the skirting; up the chimney; in the roof (there have been several discoveries when replacing old thatch in the later 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries). This is inevitable in urban contexts, though the occasional hoard was buried in the yard or garden. A hoard amounting to £35 7s 9d in gold was found in 1874 by workmen demolishing buildings in the

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Fig. 20a: Values in sterling of Civil-War hoards (note non-linear scale)

Fig. 20b: Values in sterling of sums of money mentioned in probate inventories. Sources: Steer 1950 (mid-Essex); Vaisey 1969 (Lichfield, Staffs.); Machin 1976 and Olive n.d. (Dorset).

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Old Court of Pembroke College, Cambridge (C4); it is paralleled neatly by the ‘£40 in gold’ recovered by the royalist Sir Henry Slingsby on a clandestine visit to his house near York in 1645 (Parsons 1836: 173). The hiding place of choice for country people of modest means appears to have been the roof; those of greater means tended to use outbuildings/barns or their gardens; one hoard (Allington, Wiltshire; F1) was hidden beneath the capstone of a well. Quite a few hoards have been found in or near farms, several with the name ‘Manor’. The ruins of Fountains Abbey, near Ripon in North Yorkshire provided shelter for a hoard of silver buried in 1643-4 (E8), discovered during excavation of the monks’ dormitory in 1850.

sums of money found in contemporary probate inventories, from the artisan to the gentleman; two-thirds of the hoards are sums of less than £10 (Fig. 20a). In the inventories, sums of ready money are specified only occasionally – they are usually combined with ‘apparel’; Fig. 20b represents specified sums of money from inventories in three areas during the reigns of Charles I and Charles II. For most people, portable wealth comprised current silver coin; at any one time each town or village will have held many such ‘hoards’, which when occasion demanded might be hidden securely, usually very close to home. Henry Kellway, gentleman, died in 1630 with £80 money in his possession and Samuel Fry, fisherman (1628), £1 13s 3d (both Dorset). Beyond that, in view of the find spots, it might be case of ‘cherchez la ferme’: husbandmen and yeomen, such as John Tavener, husbandman (Writtle, Essex, 1639: £11 14s 0d) and Walter Parmiter, yeoman and carpenter (Dorset, 1627: £1 6s 4d); or indeed ‘cherchez la femme’, with widows such as Marie Lees (Lichfield, 1643: £31 14s 6d) and Elizabeth Toope (Dorset, 1640: 38 0s 0d) holding a high proportion of their assets in ready money.

Away from buildings, hoards have been concealed in banks and lynchets, walls, the roots of trees (perhaps planted or used as markers?) and in stream and river banks. Nine have been found in woodland or coppice {5}; it is possible, of course, that the contemporary vegetation may have differed in some of these cases. Boundaries might form significant markers: in June 1867 a boy found a hoard of 280 silver coins under the ‘stem’ of an oak tree, recently cut in Lovers’ Coppice, on a bank which divided the parishes of Aldbourne and Ramsbury in Wiltshire (‘Crowood’, K12). Hoards from Breckenbrough, North Yorkshire (E2) and Ampney St Mary, Gloucestershire (H1), were both buried just inside a farmyard wall and marked by large stones. Occasional finds are made through agricultural activity, such as ploughing on open ground, sometimes known to be on the site of a former building.

As to motivation for hoarding, one need look no further than what was going on: forced or voluntary absence from home as men joined the armies; levies such as the Excise (a ‘temporary’ measure by Parliament, imitated by the royalists – and still going strong!) and local taxes (‘contributions’), introduced as both sides desperately sought money; and anyone might be looted. Reasons enough to bury or hide one’s portable wealth. Later in the 1640s came retribution as royalists were forced to compound for their ‘delinquency’, paying fines usually set at a sixth of their estates, occasionally if lucky only one-tenth. Sir Richard Vyvyan, royalist mint-master and soldier, was fined at one-tenth, indemnified under the Articles of Surrender of Exeter and with the support of Sir Thomas Fairfax, no less. Those who bore arms again in 1648 were hammered to the tune of one-third of their estates, one such being William Martin, whom we met above, running the York mint. Two of the very biggest hoards were buried in or after 1647: Middleham (N Yorks) and East Worlington (Devon) – see below; and Tregwynt is at £51 9s 0d the largest hoard from Wales. If sequestration (‘compounding’) were not enough, the Commonwealth made a determined effort in the early 1650s to get its hands on unpaid taxes and other monies thought to have been raised in the royalist cause. (Bennett 1997: 350-1).

Since 1800, an average of one hoard from the reign of Charles I has been discovered every year. There was a peak in the 1930s, another in the 1950s, the result perhaps of pre-war construction and post-war reconstruction; since around 1970 the rate has been boosted by metal detecting. Nevertheless, because so many Civil-War hoards were buried in or near buildings, they remain one category of find where old-fashioned chance, often allied to construction work or home improvement, plays a significant rôle in discovery. Metal detecting’s main contribution is the location of many smaller hoards, pursefuls of coins, often amounting to a few shillings, found away from habitation, presumably lost in transit, such as West Crewkerne, Somerset (2007, £0 3s 8d; C14) and Trellech, Monmouthshire (2010; £0 14s 0d; H22); the Tockwith hoard (£1 9s 8d) was found during a detecting rally in 2005 on the battlefield of Marston Moor. Nevertheless, it was metal detecting that uncovered the biggest reliably-recorded Civil War hoard of all to date, the three pots making up £313 in silver found near Middleham, North Yorkshire in 1993 (J9; Barclay 1994).

Tales of buried wealth fuelled a small boom in treasure hunting under the Commonwealth and after the Restoration (Beard 1933: 251ff). In at least two cases local treasure legends have proved to have some basis in fact. At East Worlington, Devon, a tradition was handed down for generations of money concealed by a family named Cobley on a local farm (Grueber 1897: 145-6); in 1895 workmen repairing a hedge bank brought to light three earthen vessels which between them contained 5,188 silver coins, amounting to £242 18s 10½d (J2) – numerically the largest recorded Civil War hoard, though its value has since been overtaken by the £313 7s 3d of

From the foregoing, it would appear that virtually everyone was at it, from the meanest to the grandest. The 614 pieces of ‘broad gold’ found by a boy in a coppice at Tunstall in Kent in 1737-8 were probably buried by Sir Edward Hales, Bt, a royalist (K68; Beard 1933: 252-3). Mostly, however, the sizes of hoards mirror those of 194

Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War

the Middleham hoard (5,099 coins, also in three pots). In north Pembrokeshire, treasure was long held to have been buried at Tregwynt mansion, though the context was believed to be the abortive French invasion at nearby Carregwastad Point in February 1797 – perhaps a recycling of a valid tradition from 150 years earlier.

Archaeology & Numismatics, Amgueddfa Cymru – National Museum Wales. Endnotes {1} There are numerous narrative histories of the Civil War, for instance Wedgwood 1958; Bennett 1997. For the coinage of the period see Besly 1990. {2} These figures exclude several hoards that by their very size or exceptional composition could distort what seems to be a reasonably consistent overall picture, such as Ryhall, Rutland (D34; 1641-3: includes an uncirculated batch of £71-worth of T-in-C shillings); ‘Cotswolds’ (G2, one of only three substantial hoards closing with Eye: 100% half crowns of Charles I); Middleham, N. Yorks (J9) and East Worlington, Devon (J2), multi-pot ‘Sceptre’ hoards, each larger than all other ‘Sceptre’ hoards together (and two of the three Middleham deposits close with Sun). {3} The issue is signed ‘CH’; the mint signatures of major royalist mints (OX, BR, EBOR, Ex, W) may be interpreted as abbreviations of the Latin name of the city, though only for York is this expressly so. ‘SA’ on a very rare half crown may be held to be ‘Salopia’ for Shrewsbury under Cary’s franchise; CH by the same logic perhaps ‘Civitas Herefordiae’? However, the English expansion of the ‘HC’ signature, if correct, suggests that other interpretations of CH might be feasible (Chester, for instance). {4} The others were: the ‘rix doller’ (German Reichstaler, 4s 8d), ‘piece of eight (Spanish/SpanishAmerican 8-reales, 4s 6d) and ‘cardecue’ (French quart d’écu, 1s 6d) in silver; in gold the ‘double ryder’ (United Netherlands grote gouden rijder, £1 1s 6d) and ‘double pistoll’ (Spanish double-escudo, £0 15s 6d). {5} A personal favourite in this context is Constable Burton, N. Yorkshire (E6): found in 1909, replanting Wild Wood, which is near Unthank Farm – shades of Stella Gibbons? {6} The term ‘Swede’ in this context could simply signify ‘Protestant’.

Postscript There is little documentary evidence associated with the actual hoards: Weston-sub-Edge, Gloucestershire (D29) was sealed in a lead tube and included a slip of paper reading simply: ‘the hoard is £18’ (in fact £17 12s 0d, its owner apparently no better at calculating in £sd than many of us today), while the owner of Breckenbrough included two receipts for cheese requisitioned by the royalist garrison at York, so we know the hoard was buried on or after 17 January 1644, New Style. For a graphic statement of contemporary hoarding in wartime we must turn to the Continent, where a longer and far more destructive war had been in progress since 1618, and the laconic words of one Bozehartt of Bollingen in Württemberg who in 1634 buried a casket of coins, with the following message: Der Schwedt ist komme / hat als mitgnomme / hat auch walle hawe / i habs vergrabe. The Swede has come; has taken everything along with him; also wanted to beat us up; I’ve buried it. (Anon 1912: 36) {6} There is plenty more to do, for instance on the detailed make up of individual hoards, or possible underlying regional currency patterns. John Kent was perhaps a bit pessimistic, but he had much less information to play with. None of the above actually makes history, but much does appear to reflect it and may perhaps have relevance for the study of other less well-documented periods. Author’s note: A full, updated inventory of hoards has been published in BNJ 83 (2013), co-authored by myself and Stephen Briggs; this includes numerous finds made during the 18th and 19th centuries, recently identified from contemporary newspaper accounts. Readers are recommended to read this paper in conjunction with the new inventory.

Appendix: the hoards The following list summarises the hoards closing with coins of Charles I that form the basis of this paper, current to October 2011. It uses the numbering of the inventory published in Besly 1987, where, unless otherwise indicated, further references are to be sought. Brief references are given for the hoards that have come to light or been published since 1987; they are numbered, italicised, in date order of discovery.

Acknowledgements My thanks to: Roger Bland, for suggesting that I re-visit the topic of Civil-War hoarding; Mark Lodwick and Tony Daly for their computer and graphic skills in creating the maps from my geographical co-ordinates; Caroline Scherf and Bettina Mathes for their help with interpreting Herr Bozehartt’s doggerel.

Note: ‘g’ and ‘s’ represent numbers of gold and silver coins; face values of hoards are given in poundsshillings-pence (£1 = 20 shillings; 1 shilling = 12 pence (d)).

Text and figures © National Museum of Wales, except for Fig. 1, reproduced by permission of the Institute of Archaeology, University College London. All maps apart from Figs 1 and 3 created by Tony Daly, Department of 195

Abbreviations: BNJ: British Numismatic Journal; NC: Numismatic Chronicle; TAR: Treasure Annual Report; PTAR: Portable Antiquities Scheme and Treasure Annual Report; TBGAS: Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society.

Edward Besly

C14

A: closing with coins issued before 1639 A1 Botley, Bucks, 1888: about 200 g, £?. A2 Farmborough, Somerset, 1953: 3 g + 517 s, £26-2-0d. A3 Horncastle, Lincs, 1884/5: 15 g, £?. A4 Muckleford, Bradford Peverell, Dorset, 1935: 115 g, £114-18-0d. A5 Oxford, unknown site, 1797: 3 g, £2-1-0d. A6 Rye, Sussex: 1 s, 5 copper, £0-1-1¼d, beach find. A7 Shrewsbury, Shropshire, 1823; 9 s, £0-9-9d? A8 Upton, Didcot, Oxon (Berks), 1960: 7 s, £0-5-0d. A9 Warminghall, Thame, Oxon, 1894; 2+ g, £?, small hoard. A10 York (Coppergate), 1970: 12 s, £0-15-0d. A11 Mynydd Fochriw, Merthyr Tydfil, Glamorgan, 1991: 8 s, £0-9-0d. BNJ 63 (1993), 88. A12 Fressingfield, Suffolk, 1997: 17 s, £0-14-4d. BNJ 69 (1999), 146-7. A13 Warmsworth, S. Yorks, 1999: 122 s, £4-6-8d. NC 2000, 325, no.54. A14 Warmington, Northants, 2001: 10+ s, £0-9-0d+. TAR 2003, 168, no.399. A15 Hazel Grove, Stockport, 2004: 10 s, £0-6-8d. TAR 2004, 190, no.476. A16 Wymington, Beds, 2008: 4 s, £0-3-6d. PATR 2008, 228, no.620.

C15

West Crewkerne, Somerset, 2007: 10 s, £0-3-8d. PATR 2007, 210-11, no.574. Lapley Stretton/Wheaton Aston, Staffs, 2011: 4 s, £0-6-6d. Unpub. (Not plotted in Fig. 2)

D: closing with p.m. Triangle-in-circle (1641-3) or royalist issues dated 1642 D1 Abingdon, Oxon (Berks), c.1870-5: ‘about two gallons’ s, £?. D2 Bingley, W. Yorks, 1948: 320 s, £13-10-6d. D3 Crigglestone, W. Yorks, 1928: 170 s, £7-6-8d. D4 Denby, Barnsley, W. Yorks, c.1887: 51 s, £1-13-2d. D5 Derby, 1879: 76 s, £?. D6 Dersingham, Norfolk, 1984: 129 s, £6-9-0d in silver cup (bv £1-9s-4d). D7 Donnington, Wellington, Shropshire, 1938: 522 s, £21-5-10d (in 2 pots). D8 Elland, W. Yorks, 1932: 1,187 s, £57-8-0d. D9 Foscote, Bucks, 1955: 199 s, £8-5-0d. D10 Glewstone, Herefs, 1980: 87 s, £4-18-0d. D11 Great Lumley, Co. Durham, 1950: 677 s, £26-8-6d. D12 Harlaxton, Lincs, 1968: 1 g + 141 s, £6-18-0d. D13 Hartwell, Aylesbury, Bucks, 1835: 2,436(+) s, £94-0-0d(+). D14 Kidlington, Oxon,c.1940: 20? s, £0-14-3d? D15 Long Bennington, Grantham, Lincs, 1944?: 980 s, £?. D16 Lutton, Northants, 1961: 183 s, £7-0-0d. D17 Maidford, ,Northants, 1979: 41 s, £1-5-6d (= K43, part?). D18 Marlborough, Wilts, 1901: 2(+) g + 300(+) s, £?. D19 Newark (Crankley Point), Notts, 1957: 17 g + 466 s, £31-19-4d. D20 Orston, Notts, 1952: 2 g + 1,411(?) s, ~£57-6-0d. D21 Painswick, Gloucs, 1941: 34 g + 8 s, £22-15-1d. D22 Preston Candover, Hants, 1914: 14 s, £0-10-6d+. D23 Reading (Yield Hall), Berks, 1934: 17 g, £1015-0d. D24 Temple Newsam, Leeds, 1959: 216 s, £8-4-6d. D25 Thorpe Willoughby, N. Yorks, 1939: 1 g + 2,678 s, £107-2-10d. D26 Trysull, Staffs, 1877: 4 s, £0-7-0d. D27 Wardour Castle, Tisbury, Wilts, 1643: £1,200 in money, plate and jewels. D28 Water Orton, W. Midlands, 1979: 1 g + 25 s, £1-17-10½d. D29 Weston-sub-Edge, Gloucs, 1981: 2 g + 307 s, £17-12-0d. TBGAS 105 (1987), 213-22. D30 Wheathampstead, Herts, 1974: 8 g + 24 s, £9-8-6d. D31 Winterslow, Salisbury, Wilts, 1910: 50 s, £2-10-0d. D32 Unknown (Waltham Abbey area, Essex?): 24 s, £1-0-6d. D33 Fishtoft, Lincs, 1935: 18 s, £0-16-6d. Unpub, m/s in BM. D34 Ryhall, Rutland, 1987: 1 g + 3,262 s, £160-1-0d. BNJ 58 (1988), 96-101. D35 Revesby, Lincs, 1989: 109 s, £4-7-0d. BNJ 60 (1990), 89-90.

B: closing with Tower privy-mark Triangle (1639-40) B1 Childrey Manor, Wantage, Berks, 1937: 44 g, £46-2-0d. B2 Newark (Balderton Gate), Notts, 1961: 97 g, £61-0-0d. B3 Poplar, Tower Hamlets, 1878: 2(+) g, £? B4 Pontypridd, Glamorgan, 1988: 35 s, £0-16-9d. BNJ 63 (1993), 88-9. B5 Lower Brailes, Warwicks, 1999: 9 s, £0-7-6d. NC 2000, 325-6, no.55. C: closing with p.m. Star (1640-1) C1 Aller, Devon, 1982: 10 s, £0-4-6d. C2 Alresford, Hants, 1871: 17 s, £0-10-6d. C3 Bracknell, Berks, 1956: 9+ s, £0-17-6d+. C4 Cambridge (Pembroke College), 1874-5: 41 g, £35-7-9d. C5 Congleton, Cheshire, 1956: 18 g, £18-0-0d. C6 Egton, N. Yorks, 1928: 23 s, £1-1-0d. C7 Lambourn, Berks, 1949: 60 g, £54-15-0d. C8 Messing, Colchester, Essex, 1975: 2,223 s, £118-12-6d. C9 Reading (Ashampstead), Berks, 1935: 62 s, £2-8-0d. C10 Whitchurch, Shropshire, 1945: 4 g + 39 s, £4-19-9d. C11 Wyke, Bradford, W. Yorks, 1985: 27 s, £0-17-8½d. C12 West Acre, Norfolk, 2000: 3 s, £0-2-6d. TAR 2000, 131-2, no.290. C13 Hincaster, Cumbria, 2004: 6 s, £0-6-0d. NC 2007, 269-70, no.77. 196

Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War

D36 D37 D38 D39 D40 D41 D42 D43 D44 D45 D46 D47

E23

Wortwell, Norfolk, 1989-91: 82 s, £3-14-10d. Norfolk Archaeology 42 (1994), 84-9. Broughton, Oxon, 1996: 16 s, £0-18-10d. BNJ 68 (1998), 154-7. Tidenham, Gloucs, 1999: 1 g + 118 s, £6-9-6d. BNJ 72 (2002), 100-3. Thorncombe, Dorset, 1999: 10 s, £0-9-0d. BNJ 72 (2002), 99-100. Llanbedr, Gwynedd, 1999: 11 s, £0-7-6d. TAR 2000, 130-1, no.287. Fovant, Wilts, 1999: 135 s, £5-3-6d. TAR 2000, 131, no.289. Gargrave, N. Yorks, 2004: 6 s, £0-6s-0d. TAR 2004, 192, no.479. Prestbury, Cheshire, 2004: 1 g + 1,365 s, £53-19-1½d. TAR 2004, 191-2, no.477; BNJ 82, forthcoming. Loddiswell, Devon, 2005: 11 s, £0-7-0d. TAR 2005/6, 217, no.1211. Tockwith, N. Yorks, 2005: 37 s, £1-9-8d. TAR 2005/6, 217, no.1212. Bedale area, N. Yorks, 2009: 731 s, £27-6-9d (in two pots). Unpub. Finstall, Worcestershire, 2011: 5 s, £0-3-6d. Unpub. (Not plotted)

E24 E25 E26 E27 E28 E29 E30

West Hatch, Somerset, 1874: 15 s, £0-19-6d. Som ANSH Procs 135 (1991), 170-2. Manaton, Devon, 1879: 14 s, £0-15-6d. Report and Trans Devonshire Assocn 12 (1880), 36578. Hawkstone, Shropshire, 1930s?: 142 s, £5-18-0d. BNJ 72 (2002), 180-3. Caunton, Notts, 1988: 1,571 s, £62-14-9d. BNJ 60 (1990), 91-6. Grewelthorpe, N. Yorks, 1991: 302 s, £16-10-6d. BNJ 61 (1991), 76-81. Wroughton, Wilts, 1998: 219 s, £9-15-8d. BNJ 69 (1999), 147-50. Wolverhampton, 1999: 83 s, £4-5-4d. BNJ 72 (2002), 104-6. Bitterley, Shropshire, 2011: 138 s, £9-16-6d. Unpub.

F: closing with p.m. (R) (1644-5) or royalist issues dated 1644 F1 Allington, All Cannings, Wilts, 1925: 106(+) s, £6-19-6d(+). F2 Ashdon, Saffron Walden, Essex, 1984: 2 g + 1,201 s, £63-6-1d. F3 Berkeley, Gloucs, 1985: 4 s, £0-10-0d. F4 Bridgnorth, Shropshire, 1908: 144 s, £5+(?). F5 Buckfastleigh, Devon, 1932: 36 s, £2-2-9d. F6 Catford, Kent, 1937: 110 g, £91-10-0d. F7 Chesterfield (Prestige), Derbys, before 1939: 18 s, £0-17-6d. F8 Enderby, Leics, 1865: 88 s, £6-1-5d. F9 Erdington, Birmingham, 1955: 30 s, £1-2-6d. F10 Idsworth, Horndean, Hants, 1861: 240 s, £16-1-0d. F11 Leicester, 1937: 79 s, £4-3-10d. F12 Old Marston, Oxford, 1937: 65 s, £4-6-9d. F13 Penybryn, Ruabon, Clwyd, 1979: 105 s, £6-12-1d. F14 Trehafod, Rhondda, Glamorgan, 1941: 28 s, £1-10-0d. F15 Ewenny, Glamorgan, 1983: 3 s, £0-3-0d. F 16 Totnes, Devon, 1930s?: c.500(?) s, c.£24(?). BNJ 69 (1999), 151-4. F17 Sibbertoft, Northants, 1991-2: 44 s, £2-3-6d. NC 1996, 296-7, no.139. F 18 Chilton Foliat, Wilts, 1997: 75(+) s, £4-9-0d(+). BNJ 69 (1999), 154-5. F19 Winchcombe, Gloucs, 1997: 251 s, £12-15-1½d. NC 1999, 355, no.63. F20 Monwode Lea, Warwicks, 1999: 9 s, £0-13-0d. NC 2000, 327, no.59. F21 Stowe (area), Staffs, 2004: 10 s, £0-8-6d. NC 2007, 270, no.79. F22 Castle Cary, Somerset, 2006: 152 s, £7-1-6d. Som ANHS Procs 152 (2009), 189-95.

E: closing with p.m. (P) (1643-4) or royalist issues dated 1643 E1 Askerswell, Bridport, Dorset, 1958: 25 s, £1-1-9d. E2 Breckenbrough, Kirby Wiske, N. Yorks, 1985: 30 g + 1,552 s, £93-5-0d. E3 Barton, Preston, Lancs, 1967: 5 s, £0-10-3d. E4 Canterbury, Kent, 1947: 39 s, £0-9-10d. E5 Chesterfield (Vicar Lane), Derbys, 1934: 32 s, £2-3-6d. E6 Constable Burton. N. Yorks, 1909: 236 s, £8-13-6d. E7 Flawborough, Notts, 1877: 327 s, £13-7-6d. E8 Fountains Abbey, N. Yorks, 1850: 354 s, £?. E9 Glascoed, Gwent: 11 s, £0-7-9d (?deposited much later: not plotted) E10 Glympton, Oxon, 1948: 44 s, £2-14-0d. E11 Itchen Abbas, Hants, 1914: 234 s, £12-1-6d. E12 Oswestry, Shropshire, 1904: 4 g + 401 s, £16-7-10½d. E13 Pocklington, E. Yorks, 1848: 161(+) s, £17-6-6d(+). E14 Prestatyn, Flintshire, 1934: 519 s, £20-14-0d. E15 Preston Candover, Hants, 1917: 118 s, £5-14-4d(+). E16 St Anne’s, Lancs, 1961: 7 g + 376 s, £20-15-11d. E17 Sowerby, W. Yorks, 1818: 22 g, £11-18-6d(+). E18 Sturminster Marshall, Dorset, 1981: 15 s, £0-17-6d. E19 Taunton, Somerset, 1980: 277(+?) s, £14-10-0d(+). E20 Welsh Bicknor, Herefs, 1980: 3 g + 151 s, £10-13-0d. E21 Winsford, Cheshire, 1970: 243 s, £9-2-5½d. E22 Monmouth, 1868: unknown number s, £?

G: closing with p.m. Eye (1645) or royalist issues dated 1645 G1 Atherstone, Warwicks, 1957: 184 s, £9-18-10d. G2 ‘Cotswolds’/’South Midlands’, c.1900: 168 s, £21-0-0d. G3 Emborough, Somerset, 1930: 18 s, £0-14-6d. 197

Edward Besly

G4

K: other hoards apparently closing with Charles I, likely to be Civil War deposits

Nuneaton, Warwicks, 1977: 223 s, £11-16-1½d.

H: closing with p.m. Sun (1645-6) or royalist issues dated 1646 H1 Ampney St Mary (Ashbrook), Gloucs, 1935: 347 s, £16-12-6d. H2 Barton upon Irwell, Lancs, c.1880: 131 s, £7-13-11½d. H3 Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, 1956: c.45 s, £2-5-0d(?). H4 Gloucester, 1972: 21 s, £1-7-6d. H5 Kent(?): 62(+?) s, £5-13-1d(+). (Not plotted) H6 Kettering, Northants, c.1927-8: 63 s, £2-10-0d. H7 Lighthorne, Warwicks, 1972: 93 s, £4-15-3d. H8 Netherton, W. Yorks, 1892: 82 s, ££1-17-10½d. H9 Newark, Notts, 1960: 14 s, £1-1-0d (incl. two siege pieces). H10 Pershore area, Worcs, 1983: 18 s, £0-14-0d. H11 Priorslee, Telford, Shropshire, 1982: 367 s, £26-8-6d. H12 Salford, 1928: 31 s, £1-4-0d. H13 Lewisham (‘Southend’), 1837: 420(+) g, £420-0-0d(+) (in 2 pots). H14 Stow-on-the-Wold, Gloucs, 1950s?: 26 s, £1-4-0d. H15 Uttoxeter, Staffs, 1875: 154 s, £?. H16 Washbrook, Suffolk, 1979: 1 g + 299 s, £13-4-4½d. H17 Wolvercote, Oxon, before 1937: 9 s, £0-10-6d. H18 West Country(?): 480 s, £15-5-2½d. (Not plotted) H19 Aston, Shropshire, 1851: 39 s, £1-17-6d. DNW Sale 22, 24 April 1996, 48 and 56. H20 Tanworth-in-Arden, Warwicks, 2006: 3 s, £0-4-6d. TAR 2005/6, 217, no.1214. H21 Solihull, Warwicks, 2009: 5 s, £0-12-6d. Unpub. H22 Trellech United, Mon, 2010: 7 s, £0-14-0d. Unpub. H23 Ackworth, Wakefield, 2011: 52 g + 539 s, £6813-9d. Unpub.

Note: these are plotted on Fig. 2, but can only provide a partial picture: current research carried out elsewhere (see Briggs 2012, which includes several hoards not recorded here) appears to indicate that significant numbers of other similar finds, mainly during the nineteenth century, were recorded in the local newspapers of the day. K1 Abernant, Carms, 1809: 60 s. K2 Armston, Northants, 1841: 13 g, £6(+). K3 Bath, Somerset, 1831: no further details. K4 Battle Abbey, Sussex, 1815: 1,600 s(?), c.£80(?). K5 Birstwith, N. Yorks, 1853: forged farthing tokens. K6 Bodfari, Flintshire, 1927: 11(+?) s, £0-7-6d(+?). K7 Bolam, Morpeth, Northumberland, before 1845, g. K8 Bovey, Devon, 19th c.?: 1(+) s, £0-2-6d(+). K9 Brampton, Hunts, 1839: 454 s. K10 Church Hanborough, Oxon, c.1930: 4 s, part of larger hoard. K11 Conwy, 1835: 4 g + 1,174 s, £43-17-6d. K12 Crowood, Ramsbury, Wilts, 1867: 280 s, c.£9-10(+). K13 Devizes, Wilts, 1828: nearly 100 s. K14 Distington, Cumberland, 1811/12: s. K15 Dummer, Hants, 1919: c.200 s. K16 Earith, Hunts, c.1956: 10 s. K17 Easton, Lincs, 1807: 151 s, c.£7-10-0d(?) K18 Exeter (St Sidwells), c.1767: g + s, also plate. K19 Exeter (Old King John Tavern), 1820: s, large. K20 Fontmell, Dorset, 1819: s, large. K21 Forcegarth, Middleton, Co. Durham, 1838, s. K22 Fulwood, Preston, Lancs, 1812: s. K23 Garfoth, Leeds, 1826: 41 s. K24 Grantham, Lincs, 1865: 180 s. K25 Great Shefford, Berks, 1889: s. K26 Hadleigh, Suffolk, c.1841: s. K27 Halesend in Cradley, Herefs (Worcs), 1842: s. K28 Halton Castle, Frodsham, Cheshire, 1658: g + s(?), £506. K29 Hemington, Leics, 1848: 52 s. K30 Heskin, Chorley, Lancs, 1852: g, £200(+?) K31 Hinkley (?), Leics, 1816: s. K32 High Ercall, Shropshire, 1820: 2 g + ? s. K33 Honington, Shipston on Stour, Warwicks, 1741: s, £24(+)? K34 Hopwood, Middleton, Lancs, 1851: 19 s, £2-7-6d? K35 Houghton Conquest, Beds, 1852: c.100 s. K36 Huddington, Worcs, 1903: 32 copper. K37 Hull, 1909: 9+ s, £0-8-1½d+. K38 Lambeth Palace, 1784: 197 g, c.£150? K39 Ludlow, Shropshire, 1785: g + s, large? Coin News June 1993, 38-9. (Not plotted) K40 Lichfield, Staffs, 1788: s, large? K41 Llangunllo, Radnor,1814: ‘many’ s. K42 Llysworney, Cowbridge, Glamorgan, 1910: c.60 s. K43 Maidford, Northants, 1910: c.40(?) s (= D17?). K44 Moulton, Lincs, 1811: 22 s.

J: closing with p.m. Sceptre (1647-8) J1 Boston. Lincs, c.1886: 291 s, £15-14-6d. J2 East Worlington, Devon, 1895: 5,188 s, £24218-10½d (in 3 pots). J3 Guildford, Surrey, 1983: 196 s, £16-15-6d (includes addenda, 1991). J4 Hadleigh, Suffolk, 1936: 97 s, £4-4-0d. J5 Sheerness, Isle of Sheppey, Kent, 1968: 417 s, £22-17-6d. J6 Whittingham, Lancs, 1853: 301 s, £15-12-0d(?). J7 Wyke, Bradford, W. Yorks, 1982: 1,048 s, £38-12-0d (in 2 pots). J8 Wallingford area(?), Oxon: 123 s, £5-1-8½d. BNJ 64 (1994), 130-2. (Not plotted) J9 Middleham, N. Yorks, 1993: 5,099 s, £313-7-3d (in 3 pots). BNJ 64 (1994), 84-98. J10 Tregwynt, Granston, Pembs, 1996: 33 g + 467 s, £51-9-0d. BNJ 68 (1998), 119-36. J11 Haddiscoe, Norfolk, 2003: 316 s, £15-10-6d. TAR 2003, 167-8, no.398. 198

Mapping Conflict: coin hoards of the English Civil War

Anon. 1912, ‘Notes on coin-finds’, American Journal of Numismatics, 35-6. Barclay, C. P. 1994, ‘A Civil War hoard from Middleham, North Yorkshire’, British Numismatic Journal 64, 94-98. Beard, C. R. 1933, The Romance of Treasure Trove (S. Low, Marston & Co, London). Bennett, M. 1997, The Civil Wars in Britain and Ireland 1638-1651 (Blackwell, Oxford). Besly, E. 1984, ‘The York mint of Charles I’, British Numismatic Journal 54, 210-41. Besly, E. 1987, English Civil War Coin Hoards, British Museum Occasional Paper No 51 (British Museum, London). Besly, E. 1990, Coins and Medals of the English Civil War (Seaby/National Museum of Wales. London). Besly, E. 1991, ‘Further notes on the York mint of Charles I’, British Numismatic Journal 61, 12932. Besly, E. 1992, ‘The English Civil War mints at Truro and Exeter, 1642-1646’, British Numismatic Journal 62, 102-53. Besly, E. 1998, ‘A Civil War hoard from Tregwynt, Pembrokeshire’, British Numismatic Journal 68, 119-36. Besly, E. And Cowell, M. 1991, ‘The metrology of the English Civil War coinages of Charles I’, British Numismatic Journal 61, 57-75. Boon, G. C. 1981, Cardiganshire Silver and the Aberystwyth Mint in Peace & War (National Museum of Wales, Cardiff). Boon, G. C. 1984, ‘Provincial and Civil War issues’, in North, J. J. And Preston-Morley, P. J., Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles 33, the John G. Brooker Collection, xxix-xlvi (Spink, London). Briggs, C. S. 2012, ‘Numismatics from newsprint 17531884: some lost Yorkshire hoards exposed’, The Yorkshire Numismatist 4, 277-303. Firth, C. H. (ed.)1886, The Life of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, by Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle (London). Grueber, H. A. 1897, ‘A find of coins at East Worlington’, Numismatic Chronicle 57, 145-58. Kent, J. P. C. 1974, ‘Interpreting coin finds’, in Casey, J. And Reece, R. (eds), Coins and the Archaeologist, British Archaeological Reports British Series 4, 184-200 (British Archaeological Reports, Oxford). Machin, R. (ed.) 1976, Probate Inventories and Manorial Excepts of Chetnole, Leigh and Yetminster. (University of Bristol, Dept of Extra-Mural Studies, Bristol). Mayhew, N. And Besly, E. M. 1998, ‘The 1996 Broughton (Oxon) coin hoard’, British Numismatic Journal 68, 154-7. Olive, G. P. n.d., Unpublished m/s summary of Corfe area, Dorset inventories. Parsons, D. 1836, The Diary of Sir Henry Slingsby of Scriven, Bart (London).

K45 K46 K47

Newby Wiske, Thirsk, N. Yorks, 1858: 270 s. Nottingham (region), c.1783: s. Oldcot, Wolstanton, Staffs, before 1843: 36 g + ‘about 2 lb’ s. K48 Newsam Green (‘Oulton’), Leeds, 1905: 258 s. K49 Pendoylan, Glamorgan, 1907: 27 s. K50 Pudsey, Yorks, 1833: s. K51 Radwinter, Essex, 1851: 602 s, c.£25-30? K52 Rochester, Kent, 1838: 158 s. K53 Ropsley, Lincs, 1820: 125 s, c.£10. K54 Samlesbury, Lancs, 1900: 37(+) s. K55 Salford (‘Sanford’), Chipping Norton, Oxon, 1793?: g + s. K56 Scarborough, Castle well, 1907: forged Copper farthings. K57 Scholes, Leeds, 1824: s. K58 Sheffield, 1855: c.200 s. K59 Shrewsbury, Shropshire, 1825: c.90 s. K60 Sibbertoft, Northants, before 1866: g. K61 South Petherton, Somerset, 1887/8: 34 s, £1-9-6d. K62 Stockton-upon-Tees, 1792: s, large? K63 Stoke sub Hamdon, Somerset, 1808?: s. K64 Suffolk, c.1845: s, large? (=K26?) K65 Taunton, near, Somerset, 1816: s. K66 Tottenham, Middlesex, 1770: g + s, £70(+?). K67 Tresco, Isles of Scilly, 1744: c.500 s. (Not plotted) K68 Tunstall, Kent, 1737/8: 614(+?) g. K69 Wedmore, Somerset, 1891: 57 s, £2-2-6d. K70 Werrington, Peterborough, 1819: s. K71 Whetstone, Leics, 1792: s. K72 Whitburn, Co. Durham, 1777: s. K73 Whitchurch, Bucks, 1897: s. K74 Windsor Great Park, Berks, 1859: 150(+) s. K75 Winterbourne Stoke, Wilts, 1797: 301 s. K76 Wolverhampton, 1815: s, large? K77 York, N.Yorks, 1852: s (in 2 containers). K78 Yorkshire, 19th cent: 226 s, £28-5-0d. (Not plotted) K79 Weymouth/Melcombe Regis, Dorset, c.1820: s, large? [K80-3, 84 hoards probably deposited much later than Civil War.] K85 Tidcombe, Wilts: possible hoard, s? (Not plotted). Inf. M. Sharp. K86 Hartley Mauditt, Hants, 1733: 1500 g? BNJ 63 (1993), 105. K87 Bossall, N. Yorks, 1779: 29 g + 22 s. BNJ 63 (1993), 105. Bibliography Note: Bibliographic references for most of the hoards mentioned in the text of this paper are to be found in the Inventory section of Besly 1987: 76-111, sections A-K, given above as, for example ‘Ashdon (F2)’; some significant hoards published since then are referenced in full here. Inventory numbers of new entries are given in italics, e.g. ‘Tockwith (D45)’: for a summary list, see Appendix. 199

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Thirsk, J. And Cooper, J. P. 1972, Seventeenth-Century Economic Documents (Clarendon Press, Oxford). Vaisey, D. G. (ed.) 1969, Probate inventories of Lichfield and District 1568-1680, Staffs. Record Society, 4th Series, vol. 5. Wedgwood, C.V. 1958, The King’s War, 1641-1647 (Macmillan, London).

Payne, N. 2009, ‘Two recently-discovered Civil War hoards from Somerset’, Somerset Archaeology and Natural History 152 (for 2008), 189-95. Porter, S. 2011, The Blast of War: destruction in the English civil wars (History Press, Stroud). Steer, F. W. (ed.) 1950, Farm and Cottage Inventories of Mid-Essex 1635-1749, Essex Record Office Publication No. 8.

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Summary and Conclusions John Naylor The Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) 2011 conference, on which this volume is based, sought to explore themes in current research on hoarding and the deposition of metalwork from prehistory to modern times, and bring together the different perspectives of scholars working on a broad range of material and time periods. The aim of this short conclusion is to briefly draw out a few points which come from considering the volume in its entirety. It is certainly clear from the various contributions that the amount of metalwork and coinage now being reported via both the PAS and the Treasure Act 1996 is truly enormous and these finds are transforming our understanding of past societies, providing much – and more varied – additional data than we could achieve from archaeological excavation alone, especially now that so much is dependent upon pre-development rather than research excavation. This also gives us a vastly more detailed regional context into which the excavated data can be placed and interpreted. Arguments that metaldetected data lacks any meaningful context (or any context at all) are easily countered by many of the papers here: see, for example, Richard Bradley’s exploration of the landscape contexts of Bronze Age hoards, or Colin Haselgrove’s demonstration that the Iron Age hoards recorded through Treasure have helped to define regional patterns of hoarding, not to mention Bland’s discussion of the Frome hoard, which illustrates the positive cooperation between archaeologists and metal-detector users.

safe-keeping during such a period of upheaval. These papers on prehistoric deposition illustrate the general consensus among prehistoric archaeologists that hoarding and the deposition of metalwork (as well as other classes of material) can be better related to expressions of belief, identity and power than functional burial for safe-keeping or storage, although, as Haselgrove says, ‘there will always be exceptions’ (p. 36). The ramifications of this large dataset are also highlighted by Haselgrove in his interpretation of the importance of single objects as well as hoards. In the light of these considerations, the chapters devoted to later periods, from Roman to post-medieval, are very interesting, as they represent both traditional scholarship and a changing focus of attention, the latter more generally among archaeologists, many of whom are heavily influenced by the models and thinking of their prehistorian colleagues. The chapters concentrating on numismatic concerns can mostly be considered within a long history of research into coinage and coin circulation. These present detailed analyses of the composition of hoards allowing us to explore changing patterns (chronological and geographic) of the circulation of currency and its deposition, often seemingly in times of unrest or warfare. As Martin Allen comments (p.147), the vastly increased corpus of stray finds also allows the hoards to be examined within the context of other forms of evidence which may bring new challenges and questions. Barrie Cook also takes advantage of the new levels of data, especially in relation to small hoards of just a few coins which he shows could still have significant value for certain sections of the population. These small ‘purse hoards’ may not simply be accidental losses (as is often assumed) but may provide a store of wealth required for taxes and other payments. Edward Besly’s careful consideration of Civil War hoarding shows that in the 17th-century there was every reason to believe that ‘the hoards do indeed follow the action’ (p 189).

From a theoretical perspective, Roger Bland’s introductory chapter highlights the difficulties in understanding and interpreting hoards, and the broad division between prehistorians – who tend to favour models which emphasise symbolism and ritual as burial factors – and those working in later periods where notions of safe-keeping or storage are often preferred, although inevitably there is also much overlap. The discovery and ongoing research into the Frome hoard has produced interesting new theories regarding the deposition of coinage in a period where a multi-denomination currency formed a monetary economy.

Away from coinage, Kevin Leahy’s chapter considered the Staffordshire hoard within the remits of other precious metal finds reported under Treasure and shows that, although unique in scale, it is by no means unique in regards of the deposition of gold and silver in Early Anglo-Saxon England, and he makes the important point of the need to interpret all finds within broader contexts. Kenneth Painter provides a defined Continental perspective with finds from Roman Germany, again exploring individual hoards within a broader context, favouring the idea that many deposits should be considered either accidental losses, e.g. in rivers, or within the ‘threat-and-response’ model (cf. my chapter for an alternative view from the early medieval period). Although at odds with views from, and influenced by, prehistoric archaeology it emphasises that the evidence we have is rarely clear cut as to reasons for deposition

This general division outlined by Bland can also be seen within this volume. Richard Bradley’s discussion of distinctive patterns of Bronze-Age hoarding complements Colin Haselgrove’s analysis of deposition in the Iron Age. Haselgrove’s comparative approach of exploring deposition within the context of other finds, archaeological evidence and landscape studies to draw patterns from the data strongly illustrates that deposits changed and developed regionally and chronologically, and also that there was little to suggest deposition with the intention to recover. Julia Farley’s consideration of the Iron Age to Roman transition through coin hoards suggests differing regional responses to the Roman conquest in the nature of hoarding practices, and that these were not related to the concealment of wealth for 201

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and there is never a ‘one-size-fits-all’ explanatory model that we should adhere to. Similar deposits could occur – and be interpreted – in very different ways (see Peter Guest’s discussion of the Hoxne hoard, pp. 104-5).

Acknowledgements I would like to thank Roger Bland for his comments on a draft of this paper. Any errors or omissions remain my own responsibility.

Guest’s contribution questions how Roman hoards should be approached and analysed, and that new questions need to be asked in order to further our understanding. Taking an explicitly archaeological approach, his contention that the study of Roman hoards needs ‘greater awareness of the context of deposition – archaeological and topographic as well as historical’ (p. 109) is clearly influenced by research in prehistoric archaeology. I don’t take this to mean that Roman numismatists (and equally their medieval counterparts) have been asking the wrong questions but that there are more questions which can be asked of the data, and one of the problems which is apparent is the lack of archaeologists studying coin hoards from archaeological perspectives (although see Roger Bland’s outline of the ongoing project at the University of Leicester which is trying to do just that). My own contribution aimed to make a similar point regarding the deposition of metal objects in early medieval England. That more researchers across different periods are acknowledging the complex biographies of most hoards and that objects were buried and not recovered for a multitude of reasons can only be welcomed.

Endnotes {1} See references within each paper for much of the recent debates on these topics.

Where, though, does the discussion in this volume leave us? Fundamentally, the papers are simply a snapshot of current research and ideas highlighting new evidence and new interpretations. In that sense they should not be seen in isolation, and all come out of ongoing debates on the ways in which we can understand past societies through their deposition of hoards (and single finds) of metalwork and coinage.{1} The papers as a whole show that there were long periods of continuity of practice, and some elements can be seen to extend across prehistory into the medieval period, such as the deposition of objects in rivers and watery places, or the use of metals or coinage as foundation or abandonment deposits. Alongside this, real differences in the motives behind hoarding through time are very apparent, especially perhaps in the hoarding of coinage due, no doubt, to the change in its use and function over time. In many ways, and certainly speaking as a medievalist, it appears that a most important way forward lies in utilising as much evidence as is available. Too often archaeologists do not use numismatic data well, if at all, while there has long been a tendency for numismatists to study coin hoards as artefacts divorced from their contexts, leading to interpretations of the data which specialists in a different field will find unconvincing. Hopefully this volume has made a contribution towards addressing those problems.

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