Coin Alloys of Tauric Chersonese in the Period of Independence

Abstract

This paper presents the results of X-ray fluorescence analysis of the composition of alloys of the two largest collections of coins of ancient Chersonese residing in the State Historical and Archaeological Museum Preserve of Tauric Chersonese and the Yevpatoria Regional Museum. In total, about a thousand coins studied, which, together with the 400 coins previously examined from the State Hermitage Museum, constitutes a solid basis for conclusions. The given paper analyses the data obtained for coins of Chersonese in the Period of Independence, that is from the emergence of local coinage in the early fourth century BC to the wars of Diophantos in the late second century BC. For the first time it has been determined that big dichalkoi were minted from a special coin alloy, two-component high-tin bronze, in the period of economic prosperity of Chersonese in the second half of the fourth and third centuries BC. These coins served as the financial basis for important transformations in the near and distant chora: the land division system of vineyards and territorial expansion of Chersonese into the north-western Taurica. Only in the third century BC, in the period of an unprecedented consolidation of land properties and the transformation of the wine production into a commodity industry, the minting of large silver coins of full metal value began probably for big financial deals and payments in international trade. The crisis in the minting of Chersonese in the late second century BC touched silver drachmae, the overwhelming majority of which were minted from a low-grade silver alloy with the copper comprising more than a third of the composition. Thus, full-weight coins turned to conditional money.