Viking-AgA e Coi Norwaf no y Discovere Shetlann di d by Michael Dolley

Recent researc Swedise th y hb h schola Britr rD a Malme confirmes rha mose th tn d i satisfyin g manner the impression some of us already had that the first Norwegian coinage began shortly ' Abhandlungen zur romischen1 CIL, Religion, xm. , 78 11816 . 2 CIL, m, 4441 (ILS, 3574); CIL, m, 13475, 13497 • Thesaurus Linguae Latinae s.v. caelestis. (ILS, 3575); CIL, in, 14089. • RIB, 1131. ' CIL, xm, 8638. '» CIL, vi, 638 (ILS, 2954). • CIL, xm, 11721. » 27th June 1963 to Dr K. A. Steer. 1 CIL, m, 3393 and 4441 (ILS, 3574); CIL, in, 10394 " J?/£, 2144. (7£S, 3516); C/L, in, 10460 (ILS, 3573). » RJB, 2146, 2148. • Klotz, Pauly-Wissowa, s.v. Silvanus, col. 123. " RIB, 2160, 2161. 194 PROCEEDINGS OF THE SOCIETY 1967-8 befor millenniue eth m wit hvera y limited emissio nassociatee whicb o t s hi d wit famoue hth s Olaf Tryggvason (997-1000).1 No early medieval coin of , however, is on record as having been foun coin-hoara n di d from Great Britai fror no m , single-fino n d 2an sucf do hpieca s ei known to the present writer. From Norway, too, F0rstekonservator Kolbj0rn Skaare of the University Coin Cabinet at Oslo has been kind enough to write that neither he nor his colleagues know of a Viking-age coin of Norway having been found in these islands. Through the kindness of Mr R. B. K. Stevenson, however, it is possible for there to be put on record details of a late eleventh-century coi Norwaf no y which cam ligho et Shetlann ti d befor ware eth , apparentla s ya casual and unstratified find from the eighteenth-century graveyard at the celebrated site t Sumburga southernmose th t ha t extremit mainland.e th f yo 3 The coin, in poor condition, seems not to have been deemed of any great significance at the time of its discovery, and passed with other unidentified material to the National Museum of Antiquitie Scotlandf so onls ywa vert I , y recently tha Stevensor tM n cam contexe e th upo n i nt ti of quite another investigation immediateld an , y realise s potentiadit l importance. Becausf eo certain intriguing affinities to more than one of the later pieces in the Hiberno-Norse series, plaster-casts were sent to the present writer who hazarded the opinion that the coin was in fact Norwegian. This identificatio subsequentls nwa y endorse basie th f photograph o sn do e th f o s plaster-casts by both the Swedish and the Norwegian authorities on the series cited in the first paragraph of this note. coie nTh (PIsilvea s .i 23b) rc penn, y wit hmeaa n, thoug diamete possibls mm i 7 t hi 1 f ro e tha originae tth l diamete slightl s ther, rwa emm excesn y 8 i appearin 1 f so havgo t e bee ndegrea e of loss by chipping or flaking around the circumference. It gives the impression, too, of being more than a little base, and certainly one should not attach too much importance to the recorded weight of 0-36 g (5-5 gr.). The obverse type consists of a highly formalised right-facing bust with a small cross befor browe eth , whil reverse eth e typ essentialls ei voideya d short cross practicar Fo . l purposes the coin is anepigraphic, a few strokes with an hourglass-shaped punch being employed giv o semblanct e eth legenda f eo . Ultimatel showe typeb e yn th derivo nst ca e from e thosth f eo Long Cross coinage of ^Ethelrsd II of , of all the English issues that most extensively copied alik Irelan n eScandinavii n i d dan accounn ao comparativs it f to e simplicity, relatively high weigh verd an ty distinctive appearance doubto n . e Therb , n thougheca , that this particular class of imitation belongs well over half a century after ./Ethelraed's death, while the inclination of the present writer would be to place the Jarlshof specimen as late as possible within any bracket which is thought acceptabl Norwegiae th r efo n claswholea s sa . Ther , howevereis vere on ,y useful indication of a terminus ante quern. What seems to be a die-duplicate - the obverse die is certainly the same - in fact occurred, so Mr Skaare informs me, in the celebrated Gresli find of 1878 from central Norway. Both pieces belon consequencgn i clase th coif so o e t n know Stenerses na 14.nY 4 Coins of this class were originally dated by Schive, one of the giants of Nordic numismatics, to the early part of the reign of Olav Kyrre 'Peace-King' (1067-93), but the meticulous Stenersen's subsequent acceptance of Herbst's erroneous reattribution, in which Schive acquiesced, of certain 1 B. Malmer, 'A Contribution to the Numismatic hoara d from Yorkshir. eE (cf. . DolleH M . d yan History of Norway during the Eleventh Century', Pagan, 'An Early Nineteenth-Century Discoverf yo Commentationes de Nummis Saeculorum IX-XI in Edward Pennies at Knaresborough Priory', British Suecia Repertis (Stockholm, 1961), 225-376, and for Numismatic Journal, xxxn (1963), 117-26). this topic especially 229-33. Jarlshoe th r Fo 3f sit eHamilton. generallC . R . J . y,cf 2 Known to the writer, however, are at least two Excavations at Jarlshof, (, 1956), eleventh-century Danish coins occurring in hoards anseriee d th interif so m report excavatione th n so s froe soutmth f Englano h d . (cfDolleyM . , 'En by A. O. Curie in PSAS, LXVI-LXX (1931-6). penning fra Magnus den Gode fundet i England', Stenersen. B . L ' , Myntfundet fra Graeslid Thydaleni Nordisk Numismatisk Unions Medlemsblad (1957), etc., Oslo (Christiania). 1881. 253-6), and one fourteenth-century Swedish coin in SHORTER5 NOTE19 | S coins of Magnus 'Barefoot' (1093-1103) to Magnus Haraldsson (1066-9) resulted in a fairly general tendency to date the Gresli hoard c. 1068 in order to take account of their absence from the find.1 There can be little doubt, though, that Mrs Malmer is right when she dates the conceal- ment of this all-critical find c. 1080. A coin such as that from Jarlshof, therefore, cannot well be dated later than c. 1080, but equally a date much before that would seem precluded by such factors generae th s a l degenerac coin'e th f yso fabric, type metald san .dealine Thaar e w tg wit hNora - wegian penny from the middle part of the reign of Olav Kyrre cannot well be disputed, and in- evitably one is reminded of the fact that Olav was the immediate precursor of the celebrated Magnus 'Barefoot thoughs i o wh hav'o t e visited Shetland presumabld an , y Jarlshof itself, more thao Irelant ny onc wa d certainl s eonlan hi montha yvern w o yfe y s befor s deathhi e t I . seems very unlikely, though, that the coin under discussion was brought from Norway on that occasion f onli , y becaus earle eth y Norwan 1080i w ssa ymajoa r refore currencth f mo y which would have made it unacceptable for continued circulation. There is the further consideration that the Jarlshof specimen does not appear to evidence any real degree of wear as opposed to corrosion. Rather we should look to the normal intercourse that must have flourished when Olav was King of Norway and Paul and Erlend, the sons of Thorfinn, ruled an area broadly corresponding to the modern Shetland, , Caithnes d Sutherlandan s o wel d o remembe t le W . r that Olav's mother Thora had been the first cousin of Paul and Erlend's mother Ingibjorg.