coinage was further debased until the time of Gallienus and Postumus, after whom the currency collapsed. Eisenschmidt is among the first to outline a scheme that reminds us of the decline and fall of the ‘Augustan’ system, and once again, the period of debasement extended over a period of about thirty years. A more empirical study was Jean-Baptiste-Louis Romé de l’Isle’sMetrologie(1789), which tabulated the weights of hundreds of individual coins (he was later criticised for having privileged the material evidence - the weights of coins - over texts41).he too saw a weight decline of the denarius under the Julio-Claudians, followed by stability afternero. However, he found it difficult to determine weights accurately after Caracalla, probably because it remained unclear whether or not larger coins with radiate portraits should be distinguished from the smaller denarii. Scholars were only just beginning to debate the relationship of this larger radiate coin, which had been introduced bycaracalla and was generally thought to be a denarius, to the smaller laureate denarius.42it was now clear that not only had the larger denarius been the commonest denomination for most of the third century, but by the middle of that century it had also become hugely debased.if not a denarius, what denomination did it represent?eighteenth century scholars were undecided, and a general consensus would only emerge in the middle of the twentieth century, though this would not be a legacy of any of those early opinions.the history of scholarship concerning the value of this coin in many ways encapsulates thinking about the character of change inroman imperial coinage, and even about the function of that coinage, but more on that in a moment. The eighteenth century had, of course, seen the publication of Edward Gibbon’s monumental work,The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, published in six volumes between 1776 and 1789. It was now possible to view Roman decline as a protracted process extending over centuries. Curiously, Gibbon hardly mentions debasement of the coinage at all – possibly because the supporting scholarly evidence for the decadence of the currency had yet to be presented in a coherent fashion.nor does debasement feature in Montesquieu’s 1734 essayConsidérations sur les causes de la grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence(a work which provided some of the inspiration for Gibbon’sDecline and Fall), even though chapter 16 of this work acknowledged the escalating cost of the army.either the parallelism between the condition of coinage and the State had not yet gained wide recognition, or perhaps the notion of debasement to cover war expenses was too banal to be worthy of comment. In the early nineteenth century scientific analyses of Roman silver coins helped to supply that parallelism. Between 1810 and 1815 Marti Heinrich Klaproth published a set of analyses demonstrating that Roman silver coinage had been debased long before the Severans, or Balbinus and Pupienus. His earliest coin, of Domitian, was only 80% fine.43Filippo Schiassi in 1811 confirmed that Augustus’s denarii were as pure as Republican ones (excluding the debased legionary denarii of Mark Antony).44therepublican and Augustan denarii therefore represented roman coinage in its pristine state. As more analyses were conducted, the case for a protracted decline of the imperial coinage arose.45 DEBASEMEnTAnDTHEDECLInEOFROME 41Hussey 1836: 7-8. 42Eckhel 1792: xxvi-xxvii. 43Klaproth 1815. 44Schiassi 1820: 33-7. 45For these analyses see Butcher and Ponting 2015, chapter 3. 187
The evidence was first assembled into a coherent picture by Theodor Mommsen.46his method underpins modern numismatics, and he provided the framework within whichroman numismatists still operate.nevertheless, his explanations for change were broader in scope than those that have come to dominate today, encompassing both monetary adjustments, intended to maintain the stability of the coinage, and fiscal debasements, intended to cover deficits or to make profits. Up to the reign ofnero the denarius had maintained its Republican weight and fineness and had full intrinsic value, but, thanks to the presence of a gold coinage also of full intrinsic value, this system was becoming unsustainable.nero therefore debased the denarius and reduced its weight, creating a kind of token silver coin backed up by a plentiful supply of full-bodied gold coins.47roman currency was thus operating with gold as the standard of value.48 in this way Mommsen posited that the coinage fromnero onwards was a different kind of currency from the strictly ‘Augustan’: it was in part fiduciary. Trajan maintained the weight but reduced the fineness further. This was the first occasion that Trajan had been proposed as a point of change.nevertheless thetrajanic changes would seem to belong to Mommsen’sneronian system, rather than constituting a separate phase. Trajan also recalled and reminted the finer Republican coins still in circulation, and by doing so profited.49However, public confidence in the denarius was sustained because it was backed by plenty of gold of full value.50Mommsen thus made it clear that the value of the silver coinage did not depend on intrinsic worth. A monetary crisis commenced when Septimius Severus debased the denarius to about 50%- 60% fine, threatening the stability of the whole monetary system.51its credibility was further undermined whenelagabalus ordered that all taxes be paid in gold and when emperors began issuing gold coins of varying weight.52 Crucially, Mommsen identified Caracalla’s new coin as the one that precipitated the crisis.53 Although its weight and fineness suggested it was worth one-and-a-half denarii, as earlier scholars had proposed,54he argued that it was ‘einbiniooder Doppeldenar’.55it was thus a form of debasement, albeit one that did not involve reducing the fineness. He also argued that it could not have been called a denarius, and proposed two other possible names, both taken from the Historia Augusta: ‘aurelianus’ or ‘antoninianus’.56neither name is regarded as credible today, but the latter one stuck, while the term ‘aurelianus’ is now applied to the reformed radiates of Aurelian and his successors.in spite of modern scholarly attempts to rebrand the coin as a ‘radiate’, Mommsen’s ‘antoninianus’ remains common currency. the new coin thus took centre stage in the account of the collapse of theroman monetary system. Its introduction by Caracalla had signified a major debasement but subsequent reductions in fineness reduced its value still further. Proof that it was heavily overvalued could be adduced from the number of contemporary forgeries.not only was quality to blame, but quantity too: for Mommsen, the huge size of antoninianus hoards illustrated the oversupply of currency and its general worthlessness.57eventually the coin became a valueless token, like paper money, that confirmed the State’s bankruptcy between the reign of Gallienus and Diocletian’s reforms: Kevin Butcher 46Mommsen 1851; 1860. 471851: 218; 1860: 767-9. 48Mommsen 1860: 767. 491860: 758-9. 501860: 826. 511860: 826. 52elagabalus:SHASeverus Alexander 39; Mommsen 1860: 827; gold of varying weight: 1860: 826. 531860: 830. 54E.g. Pinkerton 1808: 141-2. 551860: 828. 56Aurelianus:SHAProbus4.5-6;antoninianus:SHA Bonosus 15.8. 57Mommsen 1860: 830. 188
‘Das gesammte römische Münzwesen in der Epoche von Gallienus bis auf die Mitte der Regierung Diocletians lässt sich dahin charakterisieren, dass der Bankerott in Permanenz und die Münze, die diesen Bankrott ausdrückte und in der er sich vollzog, das Papiergeld jener Zeit, der Antoninianus war.’58 in the Duc de Blacas’s French translation of theMünzwesenthis passage is faithfully reproduced, but with a significant embellishment: “Le système monétaire romain, depuis l’époque de Gallienus jusqu’au milieu du règne de Diocletien, peut être considéré comme une banqueroute en permanence. La monnaie qui servit à consommer cette banqueroute fut l’Antoninianus que l’on pourrait appeler l’assignatde cette époque.”59 the reference to ‘assignats’ in this context is interesting.these were paper notes issued by the French revolutionary authorities between 1789 and 1796, and initially were backed up by property confiscated from the church and (later) the aristocracy.60to begin with, they were successful in reducing government debt, but later, with the government unable to plug the gap between income and expenditure, the State came to rely on the issue of assignats to cover its debts. With no proper restriction of their supply, the value of the assignats came to surpass the value of the property, and they were seen as the cause of hyperinflation. Like Diocletian, the Government tried to halt rising prices by setting price ceilings in themaximum général of September 1793 and, like Diocletian’s Edict, themaximumultimately failed. Hyperinflation reached 80% in June 1795.61this comparison with the assignat established a direct association between the antoninianus, fiscal deficits, and hyperinflation caused by oversupply of money – themes still associated with the denomination today. not everyone agreed with Mommsen’s argument about the value ofcaracalla’s antoninianus. Friederich Hultsch considered its weight and fineness to be an indicator of its value (which he argued was 1¼ denarii or 5 sestertii), so that its introduction did not represent a debasement.62 The story of third century hyperinflation, so central to modern accounts of the evolution of roman coinage, had yet to achieve notoriety.it seems to have been of little interest to the majority of nineteenth-century numismatists, still less was the idea of the antoninianus as an overvalued double denarius considered a key fact in the history ofroman coinage.henricohen, whoseDescription historique des monnaies frappées sous l’empire romainbecame the standard reference until the publication ofRIC, had almost nothing to say on matters of fineness and metrology.63Stevenson’sDictionary of Roman Coins(1889) has no entry for ‘antoninianus’, nor does he mention the denomination under the entries for ‘caracalla’ or ‘denarius’; the only acknowledgement appears to be under the entry for ‘Balbinus’ (one of the emperors of AD 238 who reintroduced the antoninianus), where he noted that ‘the large-sized silver of this emperor has the head with radiated crown’ whereas ‘the smaller size has the head laureated’, and under the entry for ‘Pupienus’.64Perhaps this lack of interest in the inflationary potential of debasement and overproduction of coins need occasion no surprise.in the late nineteenth century the leading world economies (Britain, the United States and Germany) had no inflation; instead, from about DEBASEMEnTAnDTHEDECLInEOFROME 58Mommsen 1860: 830. 59Mommsen 1873: 147. 60On the assignat inflation, see White 1995; on the objects themselves, see Lafaurie 1981. 61White 1995: 246. 621862: 242-3. 63Cohen 1880. 64Stevenson 1889: 122, referencing Akerman 1834 I: 462. Under Pupienus Stevenson notes ‘the silver is of two sizes, the larger of which exhibits the head of this emperor with the radiated crown’ (1889: 670). 189
1880 to 1913 they were experiencing slight deflation.65the assignats were a distant memory; besides, they had been made of paper, not precious metal. The first volume ofPaulys Real-Encyclopädie(1894) contained an entry on the ‘antoninianus’ by Wilhelm Kubitschek.he reported Mommsen’s idea that it was a double denarius and noted hultsch’s argument that it was worth 1¼, but conceded that there was no agreement on the denomination’s value.66the uncertainty, or indifference, carried over from the nineteenth to the twentieth centuries. George Francis Hill in his handbook of 1899 noted the ‘degradation of the silver coinage in the third century’ but has little to say about its effects.67 however, some were in favour of Mommsen’s interpretation, even if they did not credit him with the idea. Sir John Evans, who published a large mixed hoard of denarii and antoniniani in 1898, argued (without much substance) that the ‘argenteus Antoninianus’ was worth two denarii.68 Francesco Gnecchi’s handbookRoman Coins(which may have influenced Evans) had more to say, and his brief overview owes much to Mommsen.69Gnecchi’s sketch outlined a gradual but continuous degradation of its silver content.nero was the first to lower the weight and fineness of the denarius; then the base metal content rose to 15%-18% under Trajan; 20% under Hadrian; 25% under Marcus Aurelius; 30% under Commodus; and 50%-60% under Septimius Severus: the incremental decline with which we are all familiar.he stated as fact Mommsen’s proposal that caracalla’s new coin was ‘a Double Denarius or Argenteus Antoninianus’, thereby implying that Double Denarius had been its original name. The Double Denarius was only 20% fine (a false claim that even contemporaries could correct), but ‘very soon degenerated until it did not contain more than 5% of silver and at last was hardly to be distinguished from bronze’. A brief mention was made of a loss of public confidence, mainly because of the State’s supposed refusal to accept the debased coin in taxes, but we find none of the drama that pervades twentieth-century accounts.70 Gradually, however, a new consensus appeared to be forming, but it was one that refuted Mommsen’s idea that the antoninianus was a double denarius.in his own contribution to the subject of the ‘decline and fall’ of the coinage, Sir Charles Oman argued that, since the weight of the antoninianus was one-and-a-half times that of the denarius, it had been worth one and a half denarii or six sestertii.71nevertheless, Oman referred to the purchasing power of ‘wretched’ later antoniniani under Gallienus having ‘dwindled away to next to nothing’.72even so, he viewed Caracalla’s coin as monetary adjustment, not a fiscal debasement. More followed.in his important article on theroman monetary system, published in the same year that theDaily Chroniclereported Lenin’s plan to destroy the power of money,e.h. Sydenham followed the opinion of Charles Oman. The antoninianus was worth 1.5 denarii, and its introduction represented an adjustment to the silver and gold coinage.73Sydenham reported that his colleague,harold Mattingly, had proposed accordingly thatcaracalla’s aureus was worth 20 antoniniani or 30 denarii.74it was true that later the antoninianus became ‘a mere apology of Kevin Butcher 65Bordo et al. 2009. 66REi,s.v.antoninianus:‘keineeinigungüberdie ursprüngliche Wertung des A.’ 67hill 1899: 51. 68Evans 1898: 2: ‘It is difficult to say what relation these larger pieces bore in the currency to the smaller ordinary denarii, though not improbably they were doubledenarii’. no mention is made of Mommsen. 69For what follows, see the English translation of Gnecchi 1903 (based on his 1896 Italian version): 121-3. Again, Mommsen is not mentioned. 70Gnecchi 1903: 122-3: ‘The discredit to which this silver coinage had fallen was the result of greed and indeed we may say of the dishonesty of the State which issued these valueless coins but refused to accept them and as early as the reign ofelagabalus ... issued a decree that the public payments of taxes should be made in gold.’ 71Oman 1916: 45. 721916: 51. 73Sydenham
