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English 430
The Roman Coin Project
These coins were purchased from http://www.forumancientcoins.com as part of their program to provide free and discounted coins for educational use. Thanks to Joseph Sermarini and Forum for this program.
Uncleaned Roman Coins, TOP ROW: OBVERSE ("Heads"); BOTTOM ROW: REVERSE ("Tails"):
Your mission should you choose to accept it:
1) Clean your coin.
2) Try to “attribute” your coin; i.e., determine to what imperial reign it belongs and offer any other relevant information.
3) Write a paragraph discussing your attribution and comment upon what the coin’s imagery says about how your particular emperor wished his reign to be perceived. If you could not attribute your coin, discuss what you learned about the late imperial world based on your research into classical numismatics.
If you make a good faith effort to clean and attribute your coin, and if you write a paragraph about it, it’s yours to keep! If you would prefer not to bother with your coin, just give it back to me and I’ll try to clean it.
This is not for a grade—just for fun and learning, and perhaps an inexpensive bit of tangible history you can keep concerning the late imperial period we are studying right now. Perhaps on the last day of class everyone can bring in his or her coin and we’ll have a show and tell. Maybe we’ll give awards to the best looking coin, most informative write up, and “most improved” coin.
Happy scrubbing!
Cleaning Tips:
http://forumancientcoins.com/forvm/New_Article.htm
http://www.joviel.com/cleaning.html
http://www.ancient-times.com/info/cleaning.html
Identification Tips:
http://forumancientcoins.com/forvm/Identifying_Your_Ancient_Coin.htm
Guides to abbreviations found on Roman coins:
http://www.davidrsear.com/academy/roman_legends.html
http://www.ancientcoinmarket.com/ds/abbreviation/1.html
Roman coin mint marks (usually found on reverse bottom center):
http://www.ancient-times.com/info/mints.html
A discussion of how to “read” a Roman coin:
http://www.calgarycoin.com/reference/articles/anatomy/anatomy.htm
Click here to download a 2x2 coin flip insert template in Microsoft Word with a sample attribution.
Links to some of my uncleaneds: