Living by the Coins
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CRISTIAN GĂZDAC FRANZ HUMER LIVING BY THE COINS Roman Life in the Light of Coin Finds and Archaeology within a Residential Quarter of Carnuntum CRISTIAN GĂZDAC FRANZ HUMER LIVING BY THE COINS roman life in the light of coin finds and archaeology within a residential quarter of carnuntum ARCHÄOLOGISCHER PARK CARNUNTUM. NEUE FORSCHUNGEN 8 Cristian Găzdac and Franz Humer: Living By The Coins. Roman Life in the Light of Coin Finds and Archaeology within a Residential Quarter of Carnuntum. Wien: HOLLITZER Wissenschaftsverlag, 2013 Copy-editing: Paul Delavos, Alison Dunlop (HOLLITZER Wissenschaftsverlag, Wien) Layout: Barbara Ebeling Cover photo: www.kovacs-images.com © HOLLITZER Wissenschaftsverlag, Wien 2013 HOLLITZER Wissenschaftsverlag Trautsongasse 6, A–1080 Wien A division of HOLLITZER Baustoffwerke Graz GmbH Stadiongasse 6–8, A–1010 Wien www.hollitzer.at All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form by any means, digital, electronic or mechanical, or by photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or conveyed via the Internet or a Web site without prior written permission of the publisher. ISBN 978-3-99012-092-7 hbk ISBN 978-3-99012-093-4 pdf ISBN 978-3-99012-094-1 e-pub CONTENTS Introduction 7 Carnuntum – the Reborn City of Emperors 9 Numismatic Comments 35 Abbreviations and Bibliography 63 Technical Abbreviations 76 Photo credits 77 Tables Tab. 1. North Street – Site finds by issuers 79 Tab. 2. North Street – Site finds by periods 82 Tab. 3. South Street – Site finds by issuers 83 Tab. 4. South Street – Site finds by periods 85 Tab. 5. West Street – Site finds by issuers 86 Tab. 6. West Street – Site finds by periods 89 Tab. 7. Baths – Site finds by issuers 90 Tab. 8. Baths – Site finds by periods 93 Tab. 9. “Valetudinarium?” – Site finds by issuers 94 Tab. 10. “Valetudinarium?” – Site finds by periods 96 Tab. 11. Villa urbana – Site finds by issuers 97 Tab. 12. Villa urbana – Site finds by periods 100 Tab. 13. House I – Site finds by issuers 101 Tab. 14. House I – Site finds by periods 103 Tab. 15. House II – Site finds by issuers 104 Tab. 16. House II – Site finds by periods 106 Tab. 17. House III – Site finds by issuers 107 Tab. 18. House III – Site finds by periods 108 Tab. 19. House IV – Site finds by issuers 109 Tab. 20. House IV – Site finds by periods 112 Tab. 21. House V – Site finds by issuers 113 Tab. 22. House V – Site finds by periods 115 Tab. 23. Coin supply in the 4th century AD in the quarter of the “civilian” town of Carnuntum 116 Tab. 24. The quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum – Site finds by issuers 118 Tab. 25. The quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum – Site finds by periods 123 Tab. 26. Coins by phases 125 3 Graphs Fig. 1. Graph of the coins from North Street by issuers 129 Fig. 2. Graph of finds/period of the coins from North Street 130 Fig. 3. Graph of the coins from South Street 131 Fig. 4. Graph of finds/period of the coins from South Street 132 Fig. 5. Graph of the coins from West Street 133 Fig. 6. Graph of finds/period of the coins from West Street 134 Fig. 7. Graph of the coins from baths 135 Fig. 8. Graph of finds/period of reign of the coins from baths 136 Fig. 9. Graph of the coins from “valetudinarium?” 137 Fig. 10. Graph of finds/period of the coins from “valetudinarium?” 138 Fig. 11. Graph of the coins from villa urbana 139 Fig. 12. Graph of finds/period of the coins from villa urbana 140 Fig. 13. Graph of the coins from House I (the hoard is not included) 141 Fig. 14. Graph of finds/period of the coins from House I (the hoard is not included) 142 Fig. 15. The hoard from House I – issuers and mints 143 Fig. 16. Graph of the coins from House II 144 Fig. 17. Graph of finds/period of the coins from House II 145 Fig. 18. Graph of the coins from House IV 146 Fig. 19. Graph of finds/period of the coins from House IV 147 Fig. 20. Graph of the coins from House V 148 Fig. 21. Graph of finds/period of the coins from House V 149 Fig. 22. Graph of the coins from the quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 150 Fig. 23. Graph of finds/period of the coins from the quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 151 Fig. 24. Graph of the 4th century AD coin supply within a quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 152 Fig. 25. Graph of the coin denominations within the quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum (Republic to AD 238) 153 Fig. 26. Graph of the coin denominations within the quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum (AD 238 to AD 284) 154 Fig. 27. Graph of the coin denominations within the quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum (AD 284 to AD 435) 155 Fig. 28. Pie-chart of 4th century AD mint distribution within a quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 156 Fig. 29. Graph of the 4th century AD coin supply within a quarter of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 157 Fig. 30. Coins by phases: House I 158 4 Fig. 31. Coins by phases: House II 159 Fig. 32. Coins by phases: House III 160 Maps Map 1. The Roman Empire pointing out the location of Carnuntum 161 Map 2. The virtual Carnuntum 162 Map 3. The plan of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 163 Map 4. The plan of the quarter under study of the “civilian” town Carnuntum 164 Map 5. A detailed plan of the rooms within the edifices of the quarter under study 165 Map 6. The quarter of the “civilian” town of Carnuntum, nowadays 166 Map 7. House I 167 Map 8. The spot of hoard from the House I 168 Map 9. House II 169 Map 10. The profile through room D of the House II pointing the coin offering 170 Map 11. The Mediterranean World in the mid-5th century AD 171 Catalogues North Street 173 South Street 187 East Street 201 West Street 203 Portico 221 Baths 224 “Valetudinarium?” 238 Building east of the “valetudinarium?” 244 Villa urbana 247 House I 285 House II 310 House III 318 House IV 323 House V 337 Former information centre – today the restaurant Forum Culinarium 343 Stray finds 346 Plates Plate 1. South Street 349 Plate 2. South Street: 1–4; West Street: 5–12 350 Plate 3. West Street 351 5 Plate 4. West Street 352 Plate 5. Baths: 1–8 the coin deposit; 9 –12 coins found in the same layer with the coin deposit 353 Plate 6. Baths: 1–5 coins found in the same layer with the coin deposit; 6 –12 single finds 354 Plate 7. Baths 355 Plate 8. Baths: 1 – 6; “Valetudinarium?”: 7 – 10; Villa urbana: 11 – 12 356 Plate 9. Villa urbana 357 Plate 10. Villa urbana 358 Plate 11. Villa urbana 359 Plate 12. The hoard from “House I” 360 Plate 13. House I: the hoard 361 Plate 14. House I: the hoard 362 Plate 15. House I: the hoard 363 Plate 16. House I: the hoard 364 Plate 17. House I: 1 – 2 hoards; 3 –12 single finds 365 Plate 18. House I 366 Plate 19. House II 367 Plate 20. House II 368 Plate 21. House II: 1 – 6; House III: 7 – 8; House IV: 9 – 12 369 Plate 22. House IV: 1– 4; House V: 5 – 8 370 6 INTRODUCTION After a forty-year gap following the excavations of the 1950s (and even earlier), large archaeological campaigns have been carried out since the 1990s in a quarter (also known as “Spaziergarten”, “insula VI” and “Open-Air Museum”) of the former “civilian” Roman town of Carnuntum. These new excavations have produced a large quantity of coins. Some of these findings have been published in the monumental volume Numismata Carnuntina – FMRÖ III.2 together with the rest of the coins found at Carnuntum in older collections. The new excavations were carried out according to new methodologies, as nowadays it is a desideratum to create numismatic corpora that should gather as much information as possible about each coin, not only from a numismatic point of view but also from an archaeological one. The aim is to provide more details about both general and specific patterns of the Roman economy, society and history of a residential quarter in a Roman town. Thus, the style of publication of coins – with a large scale of archaeological units (e.g. Roman streets, dwellings public edifices) and their stratigraphy – was chosen in this book in order to provide as much information as possible about each coin; in doing so we try to provide scholars with material and evidence that may help them to obtain a realistic picture of monetary circulation. Similarly, the coin as seen through an archaeological context may serve for a better understanding of the dating of archaeological phases, especially to illustrate when the coin may be useful within an archaeological context, as well as to highlight the pitfalls that one may come across if this artefact is misunderstood within the archaeological picture. We hope that this book will be a useful tool for numismatists, archaeologists, historians and any reader interested in understanding Roman life through coinage. It would not have been possible to publish such a large amount of numismatic evidence and work without the tremendous, accurate and difficult work carried out over last decades by our colleagues and friends in the field of archaeology to whom we express our gratitude: Christoph Baier, Claudia Behling, Jasmine Cencic, Dagmar Fuchs, Ágnes Alföldy-Găzdac, Nicole Fuchshuber, Armgart Geiger, Andreas Konecny, Dominik Maschek, Matthias Pacher, Beatrix Petznek, Silvia Radbauer, Alexandra Rauchenwald, Barbara Stark, Barbara Weißmann and Ulrike Zeger.