Roman Coin Hoards Across Frontiers

The spread of Roman coins and their imitations, from Ireland to Thailand, reaches well beyond a modern political map of the Roman provinces. Roman Coin Hoards Across Frontiers provides a broad survey of hoarding of Roman coins beyond the Roman Empire from c. 30 BC to AD 518 and its relevance to our understanding of the commercial, political, and cultural connections between Rome and its neighbours, near and far. Written by nineteen international scholars, it draws on data gathered for the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire Project, an online database cataloguing all known Roman coin hoards.

The volume starts with select studies on aspects of deposition within the Empire, followed by regional analyses covering Southern Scandinavia, Germany, and Eastern Europe, as well as the eastern part of the Roman Empire and its adjacent regions, from the Caucasus up to India. The last section looks outside the Roman hoard evidence itself, offering insights from a later period in the Viking north and from metallurgy. The concluding chapter provides an analysis of the key literary textual evidence for the export of coin outside the Empire. By studying the full reach of Roman material culture beyond the frontiers through the lens of coin hoards, this book reveals the nature of Roman imperialism, the importance of commerce, and the significance of borders.

Benjamin D. R. Hellings is the Jackson-Tomasko Associate Curator of Numismatics and is responsible for the entire numismatic collection at the Yale University Art Gallery. He has published on subjects ranging from ancient coins to colonial and modern American coins, British seventeenth-century coins and medals, and bank notes.


Marguerite Spoerri Butcher is Senior Research Fellow at the Heberden Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford and Scientific Member of the Swiss School of Archaeology in Greece. She is also a Director of the Roman Provincial Coinage online project. Her research interests cover Greek and Roman coinage, with a focus on the Eastern part of the Mediterranean. She is the main author of Griechische Münzen in Winterthur III (2021) and has published widely on Roman Provincial coinages and coin finds from Eretria (Euboea).


Chris Howgego is Research Keeper of the Heberden Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum and Professor of Greek and Roman Numismatics at the University of Oxford. He is the author of Ancient History From Coins, available in six languages, and has written widely on Roman coinage and history. He was the founding Director of Roman Provincial Coinage Online and, with Professor Andrew Wilson, founded and directs the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire Project. He is also an editor of the series Roman Imperial Coinage and Roman Provincial Coinage.