Collecting Roman Provincial Coinage

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The naming of names.
Originally the coins produced in the colonies and provinces of Rome were named Greek Imperial. There is a certain logic to this name since many of them include greek alphabet characters in the inscription and quite a few of the peoples spoke greek as there native tongue. This can be seen in David Sear's hugely popular 'Greek Imperial Coins and their Values' and his following of this tradition.

Lately, it has been concluded that Greek Imperial does not quite fit the bill since this category of roman coinage includes areas such as Egypt, Spain, and Judea. In other words places where greek was not the native language and whose coins may not include the greek alphabet. Kevin Butcher in his 'Roman Provincial Coins: An Introduction to the Greek Imperials' makes a persuasive argument that the proper name should be Roman Provincial since that covers the whole of the colonies and provinces of the Roman Empire.

John and I have chosen to follow the lead of Kevin Butcher and have adopted the term Roman Provincial for our web pages.

When did it happen and the scene of the crime.

Whether you have decied to call them Roman Provincial or Greek Imperial these coins are a fascinating subject area for the ancients collector. They span the period from the reign of Augustus to the mid 2nd century. And include pretty much any mint outside of Rome itself. Provincial coins were minted under imperial charter all over the empire to meet local needs. Judging by the huge numbers of provincial coins available today, they produced a tremendous volume of coins in an almost bewildering variety. Slowly but surely the provincial mints were shut down until only a handful, such as Antioch and Egypt were left. The last surviving mint at Egypt was closed during the reign of Diocletian.

What don't we know?

One thing we do not know, in general, is what the coins were called. So in the 19th century a compromise was reached where the coins are named for their composition (metallic content) and size. Thus a bronze coin that is 26mm in size is called an AE26. This simplified the task of naming provincial coins tremendously. For silver coins the naming standards follow the Greek tradition. So we have tetradrachms, etc.

Freedom!

It seems the only requirement that the provincial mints had was to include a portrait of the emperor or empress. Other than that they had complete freedom for the reverse design. This lead to a variety of reverses that staggers the imagination of the average roman coin collector who is used to fairly predictable reverse designs. Gods, goddesses, allegorical references, architecturals, plants, animals and many more themes were produced. The coins that are included in 'Greek Imperial Coins' only scatches the surface of the variety of coins produced.

Have fun.

Enter the realm of provincial coinage and take part in a fast growing collector specialty. The coins are relatively inexpensive and can provide a roman coin collector a whole new area of exploration.

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