Bonshaw Posted February 27 · Supporter Share Posted February 27 (edited) I am interested in understanding the nature of countermarks / banker's marks in some of the earliest electrum coins and protocoins. For reference, I include a photo of a countermarked Lydia lion (an early Weidauer XV trite). Does anyone have examples of early countermarked electrum coins and protocoins? I'm particularly interested in countermarks on Early typeless electrum protocoins (Ionia / Lydia) Striated electrum WALWET / KUKALIM inscribed electrum PHANES electrum But any early countermarked electrum is interesting - thanks for posting any that you know of (or have in your collection)! Edited February 27 by Bonshaw 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deinomenid Posted February 27 · Supporter Share Posted February 27 You probably know it, but there's a huge study, White Gold, that in a series of essays covers this a few times. The book -or vast tome - has no index though so it might be easier to look through the different subessays online. No-one knows what they were or what they were for, and there are endless debates, even really just squabbles about it. Apparently the occasional early Lydian coins had as many as 18 countermarks, which to me makes most likely that they were owner marks. A.R. Bellinger has a good essay on them in the Robinson festschrift and he was fairly sure they were owners' marks though maybe I'm just suggesting work that matches my prejudice. The key seems to be that why would there be so many marks if they were from money changers to mark them as acceptable currency, but that's disputed... Why it would be disputed is beyond me though as fourrees can have a number of different marks too. Even Kraay vacillates, saying they were likely money changer marks but also saying similar marks on darics etc are possibly owner marks. Short answer is no-one knows and it's up to one's common sense to decide the likeliest reason. Here's a fairly early one of mine with a couple of marks... LYDIA. ALYATTES OR WALWET, ca. 610-546 BC. Electrum trite (1/3 stater), 4.71 g, 12 mm. Uninscribed issue of Sardes. Weidauer Group XVI, 89 11 1 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonshaw Posted February 27 · Supporter Author Share Posted February 27 Excellent, thanks for that reference, I actually have that volume but haven't read the sections on counter marks. I'll look through it this weekend. The marks on your coin are spectacular! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deinomenid Posted February 28 · Supporter Share Posted February 28 15 minutes ago, Bonshaw said: read the sections on counter marks. Annoyingly, they are all mixed in with the other essays, and there's no way to find them short of reading the whole thing, but all the subessays are available online as pdfs at academia.edu and elsewhere so are more easily searchable. Good luck! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bonshaw Posted March 10 · Supporter Author Share Posted March 10 On 2/27/2024 at 4:02 PM, Deinomenid said: Annoyingly, they are all mixed in with the other essays, and there's no way to find them short of reading the whole thing, but all the subessays are available online as pdfs at academia.edu and elsewhere so are more easily searchable. Good luck! Thank you for this pointer! I found everything I was looking for in Velde's article in White Gold. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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