but littie more of the territory that then remained to the Greco-Roman empire, than the city of Constantinople and its immediate dependencies. These usurpers, Baldwin and his successors, had reduced Constantinople by means of the crusading armies of Europe; but Michael VIII., Paleologus, who, with several predecessors, had made Nicea, in Bithynia, the seat of government during the French occupation of Constantinople, and coined money there, having re-conquered Constantinople, again established the seat of government in the ancient capital, and the coinage of the remaining emperors was minted there.

The monetary system of the Roman empire in the East appears to have undergone a thorough reform in the reign of Anastasius, and it is consequently with that emperor that De Sauley commences his study of the Byzantine series. Indeed, that period, when the Western empire was extinguished, while the Eastern portion still to a great extent remained intact, appears the proper one to commence the Eastern series of Roman coins as a separate series.

The gold money of Anastasius is the solidus and the triens, or third of the solidus; which, in the countries of the

West, became known as Bezants or (Byzantiums). They formed the model of the gold triens of the Merovingian princes of France, the only sovereigns of the new barbaric kingdoms, with the exception of the Gothic princes of Spain, who issued gold money at that early period.

The copper also was reformed in the reign of Anastasius, and an attempt made to issue a large coinage similar to the

old Roman sestertius, as will be seen by the annexed engraving of a copper coin of this reign.

This copper coinage is considered to be a re-issue of the follis increased in size. The large M, the monetary index placed beneath the cross, is thought by some to be the Greek numeral 40, expressing the value of the piece as that of forty noumia; the CON is the abbreviation of Constantinople, and the other types are moneyer's marks. Money continued to be struck in several Greek cities in the reign of Phocas, such as Carthage, Nicomedia, Cyzicus, &c., but the workmanship is very barbarous. On the copper, the large M of the coinage of Anastasius and his immediate successors, disappears in the reign of Phocas, and is replaced by the Italic numerals XXXX. On the obverse of these coins the emperor holds a purse or scroll, and a cross.

The name and titles of the emperor are, at this period, still in Roman letters, and in succeeding reigns the large M reappears on the copper, and the letters expressing the place of mintage are also generally Greek, except those of the Imperial mint at Constantinople. The gold solidus and triens continue the best coins of the Eastern empire.

Eventually the Latin inscriptions become partially Greek and the titles also are Grecianised, as on the coins of Leo the Wise, on which the legend stands, LEOn EnX® EVSEBES BASILEVS ROMAIwn; on some LEOn En EO BASILEVS ROMEN; and on others, IhSVS XRISTV nICA, with the head of Christ.

On the reverse of one gold coin of this reign, 886 to 911, the head of the Virgin Mary appears, with MARIA, and M-R.-Ou, which appears to be a strange jumble of Latin and Greek, both in letters and language, and seems to be intended for M(ate) R. e(n)v.

The emperor Andronicus, a son of Michael Paleologus, changed the type of the Byzantine gold, making the reverse represent a plan of Constantinople with its fortifications. In the centre of which a figure of the Virgin Mary is generally found.

On the obverse the emperor .s seen kneeling to St. Michael. The titles of Basileus-autocrator, or despotos-were, towards the close of the series, generally assumed instead of

* See next Chapter.

Cæsar or Augustus; and the coins engraved below will con vey a good general idea of the style of types, and the treatment of the head of Christ, a frequent type on those coins.

The later inscriptions on this series of coins are in a strange jumble of Greek and Latin characters and terms, being sometimes all Greek.

The last two emperors died bravely, as became the last representatives of the great Roman empire, defending the walls of Constantinople, and the last one has left coins; but the last of his line, Constantine Paleologus, foreseeing his inevitable doom, refused to exercise the privileges of sovereignty, except in dying as became an emperor, resisting to the death his relentless enemy.

A coin of Mahomet II., struck after the taking of Constantinople, appropriately closes the series of the Imperial coinage of the Eastern dominions of Rome.

The inscription-a strange mixture of Turkish and Greek, as those of the later Greek sovereigns had been of Greek and Latin, both in the letters and the language-stands, ΟΜ ΜΗΔΙΚΙΟ ΠACHC ΡΩΜΑΣ ΚΑΙ ΑΝΑΤΟΛΛΕΣ: (the sovereign

of all Greece and Anatolia, Mahomet). The coin is countermarked in Arabic characters.

A list of the Eastern emperors who coined money, with the comparative rarity of the coins, will be found in the Appendix.

CHAPTER XXVI.

ON THE WEIGHTS, METALS, VALUES, TYPES, INSCRIPTIONS, ETC., OF THE ROMAN COINAGE.

THE WEIGHTS, VALUES, AND DENOMINATIONS OF ROMAN METALS,
COPPER OR BRONZE.

*

I HAVE endeavoured to trace, in my article on first Roman copper money, its origin, devices, &c.; it remains, therefore, in this place, only to sum up, in few words, the principal points connected with the adoption of copper as the standard of the Roman coinage. It appears from many detached passages of ancient authors, that the early people of Italy (the Romans among the number) had, like other races in a primitive or barbarous state, used pieces of wood, leather, or shells, as a sort of money. We find the next step to be the adoption of pieces of metal passed by weight, and with the Romans this metal appears to have been copper, which must have been abundant in Italy and Sicily, as its export from those countries is even mentioned by Homer, while copper mines exist at the present day in the neighbourhood of Mount Etna, which till very lately were still worked. Some confusion exists with respect to the Roman copper coinage, in regard to values, sizes, weights, &c., &c., partly in consequence of the undefined terms, brass, copper, and bronze. What the ancients called orichalcum, was similar to the mixed metal now termed bronze. Es, the term from which the name of the first Roman coin was derived, was given to the mixed metal of which these coins were formed. The modern Italian term, ottone, rame, the French airain, and the Engish brass, have been long used to express this metal, Dut are all incorrect, brass being composed of copper and

Not, as among the Greeks, silver.

tin. As no tin is contained in the Roman Es, bronze is now the term generally given by numismatists to this metal, brass being incorrect, as applied to it; and as regards Roman coins, Dr. W. Smith formally recommends the term bronze, instead of brass, in order to prevent confusion.*

The ancients were acquainted with several distinct mixtures or bronzes; there were the Es Corinthiacum, the Es Delicum, the Æs Æginiticum, the Es Hepotizon, and many others. Most of these were considered by the ancients, as appears from Procopius, much more valuable than the red or Cyprian copper (Es Cyprium), and he goes so far as to say, speaking of a statue of Justinian, that "bronze, inferior in colour to gold, is almost equal in value to silver." But this

is strangely at variance with the fact, that four sestertii, which are nearly always of the yellow copper, and weighing each one ounce and a half, were only equal to a silver denarius weighing fifty-eight grains. It is, however, maintained by modern authorities upon the subject, that yellow copper (which with the Romans was a natural product), being a rare and singular combination of copper with Lapis calaminaris, was of twice the value of the red copper; and hence they infer that the yellow and red copper coinages were kept as separate as those of gold and silver; and it is stated that pieces of the same size, the assarius, or third copper, for instance, which was always coined in red copper, are-if in yellow copper, or brass as it is commonly termed -not assaria but dupondii,† in other words, of double the value of the red copper pieces. It is stated, also, that they are of finer workmanship than the red copper assarius, and thus it would appear that the sertertius, or quarter denarius,

* It is still, however, the custom of many numismatists to term this metal brass, and term the sestertius first brass, &c. &c., but recent investigations appear to show that the term bronze is more appropriate.

The best authority upon this point, except the monuments themselves, is the passage of Pliny, in which he says, "The greatest glory of bronze is now due to the Marian, also called that of Cordova: this, after the Livinian, most absorbs the lapis calaminaris, and intimates the goodness of native orichalcum in our sestertii and dupondii, the ases being contented with their own Cyprian copper." The Livian mine here mentioned is thought to have received its name from Livia, the wife of Augustus, and those of her coins of the beautiful yellow bronze are probably of that mine. The Cordova mines were early worked by the Romans.