Two Scottish Seventeenth-Century Coin Hoards
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TWO SCOTTISH SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY COIN HOARDS R. B. K. STEVENSON AND J. PORTEOUS Two hoards recently discovered in Caithness and in Islay throw some light on the details of the currency of Scotland during the seventeenth century. The full particulars of these hoards are set out below, together with a table showing the complexion of other seventeenth-century Scottish hoards.1 We are indebted to Mr. A. S. Adamson, Thurso, for his help with the preliminary listing of the foreign coins in the hoard from Hillhead, Wick. A large part of each hoard was retained for various museums by the Queen's and Lord Treasurer's Remembrancer. The earlier (Ardnave) hoard, buried after 1640, is a good example of the mid-century hoards which form almost half the total from the century-—-see pp. 138-9—and which may have been hidden in the Civil War period between 1638 and 1650. There is no way of telling from what has been recorded which silver hoards, if any, were hidden 1650-65, as Commonwealth and Charles II's early English coins do not appear in them. It is noticeable that Scottish silver coins are much less numerous than English, including those of Elizabeth, in hoards deposited in the reigns of Charles I and of James VI/I, except in two placed about 1601. These earliest point back to the very different situation in the last half of the sixteenth century; for in a similar table for 1500-90 (there being no hoards certainly hidden during 1590-1600), the absence of English coins after those of Henry VIII is so striking that it seems unlikely that Elizabeth's coins were circulating in Scotland before 1603, or 1604 when the coinage was harmonized, except in the isles close to Ireland and possibly along the Solway. The continental element, absent from known sixteenth-century hoards after c. 1556, grew rapidly in the first half of the seventeenth century. Crown-sized English or Scottish coins are only recorded then in the Strathblane hoard (SP 23), so it appears that imported 'dollars' supplied much of the need for the larger silver. Most hoards from every part of the country contain them, with no particular emphasis on ports; in this, and in the proportionally high total value of the continental coins compared with their numbers, the Irish hoards listed by W. A. Seaby are similar.2 This element in Scotland seems to have become even more important between c. 1670 and 1696, the time of the second, Wick, hoard (1684- ). The table shows Scottish coins then more numerous than before, while English are strikingly fewer; the Hillhead hoard itself is untypical in these respects and in having two pre-Union coins of James VI, so that part of a rather older cache may have been included in it. A single Charles II crown is recorded in Ayrshire SQ 8, and there was one of William III, with three Scottish 'dollars',3 in Botriphnie SU 5. Soon afterwards, the great recoinage of William of Orange flooded Scotland with English coins and, with the assimilation of the two coinages under 1 Based on a card-index compiled by the late Robert 2 BNJ xxix (1958-9), pp. 404-14 and xxx (1960-1), Kerr preparatory to an Inventory of Scottish Hoards pp. 331-43. after 1500, now made less urgent by I. D. Brown's 3 53s. Ad. Scots till revalued at 56.5. in 1681: BNJ Bibliography. Numbers assigned to hoards in what xxxvii (1968), p. 202; xxxviii (1969), p. 118. follows are their Bibliography numbers. TWO SCOTTISH SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY COIN HOARDS 137 Anne, led to the replacement of both continental and Scottish silver coins by English, to judge from the few eighteenth-century hoards known.1 The continental element in these two hoards is dominated by coins of the Netherlands, as it is in most of those other hoards for which details are available. This is principally a reflection of the predominance of the Netherlands in the monetary affairs of western Europe in the mid-seventeenth century and especially of the stimulus given to the Dutch economy by the flow of money, above all of silver, sent by the Spanish crown to finance the Army of Flanders. This is probably a more important factor in the make-up of these hoards than any special relationship between the Scots and the Dutch fostered by the community of Scots merchants at Yeere in Zeeland. It is not necessary to make any economic distinction between the coins of the United Provinces and those of the Spanish Netherlands, since the coins of both circulated side by side throughout the Netherlands,2 and were exported together.3 The Dutch coins in the earlier (Ardnave) hoard have a decidedly northern European cast. The rijksdaalder was par excellence the United Provinces' coin for export to the Baltic.4 The patagon struck by the Spanish sovereigns, a less valuable coin which com- manded less of a premium in international markets, circulated principally within the Netherlands.5 An examination of the other foreign coins in the Ardnave hoard reveals an interesting geographical distribution of mints. All these pieces come from mints on or near the Spanish Road, the route by which not only men but money was sent by the Spanish Crown into Flanders, or else from mints situated in the silver-bearing Habsburg provinces. It is curious to see in this hoard, deposited in the western islands of Scotland, just a faint outline of the pattern of the financing of the Spanish military effort in Flanders during the Eighty Years War. Scarcely any pattern emerges from an examination of the foreign portion of the Hill- head hoard. Here the ducaton and its United Provinces equivalent, the silver rijder, forms an important element. The ducaton was the most valuable silver coin in common use in Europe in the seventeenth century. It was first minted by the Archdukes Albert and Isabella in 1618. It weighed 32-48 g., was 0-944 fine and was tariffed at three florins.6 The United Provinces' version was first struck at the time of the currency reform and devaluation of 1659.7 Although it was intrinsically a shade more valuable (weighing 32-78 g. and of a fineness of 0-941), it circulated at par with the Spanish ducaton, i.e. at 3fls. 3s. in United Provinces currency. It was already, by the date of this hoard, the staple coin of the East India trade, and makes up almost 100 per cent of the contents of the treasure found in de Liefde, the Dutch East-Indiaman wrecked on the coast of Shetland in 1711.8 There is no question of any of the hoards listed here having any direct 1 BNJ xli (1972), p. 183. All perhaps hidden in the recovered from the wreck of the Dutch East-Indiaman second half of the century. Foreign gold continued 'Hollandia' (sunk 1743), Sotheby & Co., Sale Cata- in circulation, while prohibition of copper 'letter doits' logue, 18 Apr. 1972. by Elgin magistrates in 1737 is recorded by the 4 H. Enno van Gelder, op. cit., p. 109. Dictionary of the Older Scottish Tongue. 5 Ibid., pp. 124-5. 2 H. Enno van Gelder, De Nederlandse Munten 6 H. Enno van Gelder and Marcel Hoc, Les Monnaies (Utrecht-Antwerp, 1960), pp. 124-5. des Pays-Bas Bourguignons et Espagnols 1434-1713 3 Catalogue of Coins of the Netherlands recovered(Amsterdam , 1960), p. 162. from the Dutch East Indiaman 'De Liefde' wrecked off 7 H. Enno van Gelder, op. cit., p. 223. Out Skerries, 7th November, 1711, Glendining & Co., 8 'De Liefde' catalogue, op. cit. Sale Catalogue, 28 Oct. 1969. Catalogue of Coins etc. 138 TWO SCOTTISH SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY COIN HOARDS Scottish 1-jtfi, CenturyZMCjLAWD tfcatds (MDWJZLWD) iQ >1 X 2si O 2K H 3 1« 3 § § §•fc j S 1 1 1 TbuncC 1 1 % % U S SO 7 Cairn6royic, ABercCeemULrc1811 160I- SO 17 i Kyteakin.Sfb/e- 1951160I- 1 1 SO 8 ArdmaddyAryyiC 1955160S- •4 15 1 4 z SO 9 Snizort, Sk.ye-' 18H i6oS~10 7 11 a- 1 6 3 SO 10 j-CeneCj, lnwrnesshite-' 19581621" 6 1 13 z 1 SO 18 Kincarcfineshire- lio$ ~i6i5 SO 18 MrtHUC, Kincardineshire-'e.1&li ST 31 i Cromarty, Hosshice-^ l9l6 1635-1 1 15 6 Z 3 ST 1 3 -Banff, Znnffsfiite— l95l 1636- S? 23 StratfiSCane, StirCinys/iire-1733 X X X X X X SP 12. Irvine, Ayrshire 1923 30 10 114 33 14 16 1 33 z6 SP 11 lnve rgorcCon, 'Kossfiirer- 18511658- X SP 15 T>aacCs,JBerdeetishirer- -i&sl16$9~ SP 35 Ardnave, IsCay 1968mo- 1 23 17 7 3 ST 3 Bankhead,Aberdeenshire^ 1861l6jO- S 6 6 3 1 1 ST 34 4 Loch Vochart,Perthshire-' >~i9o6-16+1 S? If 4 Tow, Orkney i?sS -16+1 4 SP 5 4 TSrimmond^Aberdeenshirer-194-1-16+1 I 1 sa 11 5 Knowehead,3cinffshirer- 1863 1 sai3 <> g-lenbeg,Moray 186+ii fj- 14 Z 15 6 1 <L 3 1 5 SP 21 la.nn.och,Perthshire^ 1875Kf k 10 40 1 3 14 If 48 14 SP 4-0 Chapeltoti, Ayrshire-' liyO 2. 56 66 1 54 5 19 31 z ST +6 Sarbreck,Argyll 1871I6j5~ SF 17 Tishcrrow, Midlothian 195116+6" Z 41 84 Z6 15 zz lot 10 ST 10 7 Grangemouth, Stirlingshire-'1899 16+6- 85 54 11 61 37 271 2.63 17 ST 4 8 1790 2 C >Z 2C C 3C SP 6 S Carluke, Lanarkshire nil X X X % X ST 15 S Kippendavie,Biraston, Stirlingshire-' Stirlingshire—' "1SS5 Z 5 3 6 11 16 1 SO, 1 Stornaway, Lewis 195+lSfa- 17 2.4 1 14 6 10 Z7 3 ST S 9 'Duns, -Berwickshire^ 1858167!-Z 55 67 13 40 s 15 6 4- sa 2.