Legend help - Visigoths, Leovigild, in the name of Justin I or II

[Prieure de Sion]

 

Leovigild (died 21 April 586 AD in Toledo) was king of the Visigoths on the Iberian Peninsula from 568 to 586 AD, and from 571/572 AD also in the kingdom of Septimania (in south-west France). He is regarded as an important ruler, as he consolidated the power of the kingdom and reorganised it along Roman lines, subjugating the Suebi and asserting himself against the Eastern Romans. However, his religious policy remained unsuccessful overall, as he was unable to unite the empire religiously on the basis of Arianism. After the death of King Athanagild, the kingdom remained without a ruler for months until the nobleman Liuva I was finally elevated to king in Septimania in 568/569 AD. Liuva made his younger brother Leovigild co-ruler, leaving Spain to him and keeping only Septimania for himself. Leovigild, whose first wife, the mother of his two sons, had died, married Athanagild's widow Goswintha. After Liuva's death, Leovigild was able to unite both parts of the empire under his rule in 571/572 AD. Leovigild's first goal was to reduce the Eastern Roman province of Spania, created by Emperor Justinian I, in the south of the Iberian Peninsula. On his first campaign in 570 AD, he was only able to wreak havoc, but was unable to conquer fortified cities. The following year, however, he succeeded in capturing Medina-Sidonia through treachery, whereupon he had the Eastern Roman garrison executed. The Eastern Romans were unable to send reinforcements and had to resign themselves to the loss of territory. In 572 AD, Leovigild was also able to conquer Córdoba and its surroundings, an area that had previously been under the control of unknown local forces. After this success in the south, Leovigild turned to northern Spain to subjugate independent tribal territories and a local ruler. In 574 AD, he defeated the Cantabrians and captured their capital Amaya (today's province of Burgos) and Monte Cildá. They had previously formed a noble republic under the control of a council ("senate"). Here, too, Leovigild ordered numerous executions after the victory and annexed the territory. He concluded a truce with Miro, the king of the Suebi. In 578 AD, he founded Reccopolis. Three years later (581 AD), Leovigild marched against the Basques and conquered part of their territory.

Leovigild strove to lend his kingship imperial splendour by orientating himself on the Roman tradition. In doing so, he modelled himself not only on the contemporary Eastern Roman empire, but also on older (Western) Roman customs. This "imperialisation" of Visigothic kingship included the following measures: 1) Leovigild was the first Visigothic king to wear a special ruler's robe and sit on a throne "among his own" - i.e. also outside of diplomatic occasions. He is depicted on coins in royal regalia. 2) Before Leovigild, the Visigoths had minted gold coins with the image and name of the respective emperor, thereby respecting the emperor's prerogative. Leovigild began to add his own image and name to his coins. On the occasion of military successes (the conquest of Seville, Córdoba and Braga), coins were struck with corresponding inscriptions in accordance with Roman custom. The model for this was not the contemporary Eastern Roman coinage, but the old Western Roman coinage. 3) Leovigild also continued the imperial Roman tradition by founding cities. This was also expressed in the naming of the new cities: one was called Reccopolis (in honour of Reccared), another, founded on the occasion of the victory over the Basques, was named Victoriacum ("city of victory") by the king. This policy also included the elevation of Toledo to the new capital of the empire. Toledo appears in this function as the ruler's permanent residence from 580 AD.

Leovigild arranged for a record to be made of all applicable law, i.e. the older laws and his own. One aim of his legislative activity was the legal harmonisation of Romans and Goths, thereby strengthening the unity of the inhabitants of the empire. The ethnic units (gentes) were to become one imperial people (populus). Until then, the Goths had had their own tribal law (Codex Euricianus), while the Romans had their own code of law (Lex Romana Visigothorum) based on Roman tradition. Leovigild at least partially ended this legal separation with his code; this was only finalised under Rekkeswinth. Leovigild lifted the ban on marriages between Goths and Romans, which had often been disregarded anyway, and introduced the Roman right of inheritance for daughters to the Goths as well. As in the legal system, Leovigild also strove for standardisation in the religious sphere. His goal was a common state religion for all inhabitants of the empire. He was convinced that this should be the traditional Arianism of the Goths. In 580 AD, a council of Arian bishops convened in Toledo, the only one we know of in Visigothic history. At the king's request, it passed resolutions on dogmatics and worship that were favourable to the Catholics in order to facilitate their conversion; Catholic baptism was recognised as valid. The king's intervention, even in dogmatic matters, was in line with Eastern Roman custom; it was not customary in the Arian churches of the Germanic kingdoms. The successes of Leovigild's religious policy remained sporadic; overall it failed, as Catholicism was already too strong.

 

 

And now to my coin. I have received this Visigothic tremissis and would like to identify it more precisely - which is very difficult with these specimens from the migration period. I have already tried acsearch to find what I am looking for. Every tribe from every village has tried to imitate coins of the Western and Eastern Empire. So many different styles have emerged that it's hard to really tell where they came from.

I have found similar examples - you have to pay attention to the style of the portrait and the Victory. This style is quite similar - pay particular attention to the head / forehead / nose of the portrait.

https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=8267192

Which is very likely:
- Visigoths
- Leovigild
- Narbonne style

However, in order to verify and compare this with similar examples, the legend would be an important piece of the puzzle. Unfortunately, I have to admit that I find it difficult to read poorly preserved legends. It's a kind of reading error I have - I find it difficult to visualise letters when they are not clearly visible. I would therefore appreciate your help.

What I can recognise.

Obverse:  I   V   N   I   V   N   ?   ?   I   I   V   ?

Reverse: I   V   I   I  I  A   I   I   V   ??   ???

But I don't see the point here.

 

Thank you for your help.

 

Edited March 1 by Prieure de Sion

[Tejas]

Very nice. This is probably Tomasini Group JII 4 (no. 482). The legend is often completely garbled on these coins, before attempts to spell LIVVIGILD were made. However, the attribution is correct I think. This coin belongs to the period 565-585, which pretty much overlaps with the reign of Liuvigild.

Edited March 7 by Tejas

[Tejas]

On 3/1/2024 at 5:10 PM, Prieure de Sion said:

And now to my coin. I have received this Visigothic tremissis and would like to identify it more precisely - which is very difficult with these specimens from the migration period. I have already tried acsearch to find what I am looking for. Every tribe from every village has tried to imitate coins of the Western and Eastern Empire. So many different styles have emerged that it's hard to really tell where they came from.

Yes, there are many different styles, but these coins were minted by royal mints in various cities of the large Visigothic kingdom, not by tribes or villages. The number of identifiable royal mints in the 7th century is quite astonishing. Also, this coin post-dates the migration period. When this coin was struck, the Visigoths had settled in Spain for some 70 years or so. 

[Prieure de Sion]

14 hours ago, Tejas said:

Very nice. This is probably Tomasini Group JII 4 (no. 482). The legend is often completely garbled on these coins, before attempts to spell LIVVIGILD were made. However, the attribution is correct I think. This coin belongs to the period 565-585, which pretty much overlaps with the reign of Liuvigild.

First of all, thank you for your assessment!

I happened to get Tomasini's book and have already read a lot here.

It's like you write, the legends don't always have to make sense. Or to put it another way, always looking for meaning makes no sense.

The engravers were often not educated in Latin and typographical errors were commonplace. Some apparently didn't even know what they were engraving. They just copied without knowing what they were copying.

 

In Tomasini's reference book there are examples with legends that read: "IVIVIVIVIVIVIVIVIV" - completely meaningless. Therefore, my legend can be anything - perhaps a mixture of partially correct and completely incorrect legend.

But one thing remains - I think - this time of chaos and ruin (the ancient world) is a very fascinating time. Of course, it also entails a lot of suffering and misery, no question about it. What we find fascinating was, for people back then, the end of the world as people knew it back then.

But still, this time has become very interesting for me. I previously paid little attention to the late Roman period, but I find this time of chaos and decline - from which something new grows - very fascinating. And we must not forget that an end is often needed for something new, stronger to emerge.

 

Thank you also for your reference - I also thought of Tomassini Group JII4 - I will look up your reference again in the book later.

[Prieure de Sion]

On 3/7/2024 at 7:34 PM, Tejas said:

Very nice. This is probably Tomasini Group JII 4 (no. 482). The legend is often completely garbled on these coins, before attempts to spell LIVVIGILD were made. However, the attribution is correct I think. This coin belongs to the period 565-585, which pretty much overlaps with the reign of Liuvigild.

I find two similar coins for the style.

First No. 482 - as you said: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=567090 

And No. 485 from the British Museum: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/C_B-12549 

 

[Tejas]

I also find this time from late antiquity to the early medieval period particularly fascinating. Most people in advanced countries only know progress in living standards and wealth. This is basically the only experience that most of us have. But how did it feel to see civilization crumbling before your own eyes. Boethius (480-524) was probably the last secular person in the west who knew both Latin and Greek. Realizing that classical knowledge was disappearing, Boethius embarked on a programme to preserve classical works, by translating it from Greek to Latin. Cassiodorus (490-585) was the other figure, who preserved classical knowledge by linking it to monasticism. In 550 to 750 the corpus of knowledge was reduced to 264 books, only 26 of which dealt with non-religious matters. If this decline in knowledge had not been stopped, Europe and European culture would have fallen into obscurity. 

Of course, the decline was stopped and reversed by Karl the Great,  who revived classical knowledge with a deliberate programme of learning and multiplication of books. The monastry of Reichenau (southern Germany), which was one of the most important monastries of the time, had 50 books in its library in the year 800. By 846 it had more than 1000 books. This Carolingian renaissance is basically the reason why the world today is not Asian, African, American or middle Eastern, but European.

Edited March 13 by Tejas

[John Conduitt]

6 hours ago, Tejas said:

I also find this time from late antiquity to the early medieval period particularly fascinating. Most people in advanced countries only know progress in living standards and wealth. This is basically the only experience that most of us have. But how did it feel to see civilization crumbling before your own eyes. Boethius (480-524) was probably the last secular person in the west who knew both Latin and Greek. Realizing that classical knowledge was disappearing, Boethius embarked on a programme to preserve classical works, by translating it from Greek to Latin. Cassiodorus (490-585) was the other figure, who preserved classical knowledge by linking it to monasticism. In 550 to 750 the corpus of knowledge was reduced to 264 books, only 26 of which dealt with non-religious matters. If this decline in knowledge had not been stopped, Europe and European culture would have fallen into obscurity. 

Of course, the decline was stopped and reversed by Karl the Great,  who revived classical knowledge with a deliberate programme of learning and multiplication of books. The monastry of Reichenau (southern Germany), which was one of the most important monastries of the time, had 50 books in its library in the year 800. By 846 it had more than 1000 books. This Carolingian renaissance is basically the reason why the world today is not Asian, African, American or middle Eastern, but European.

Much of Europe's intellectual revival can be put down to the Islamic world. The study of classical science continued there, preserving and developing ancient knowledge, until Europe was able to rediscover it.

[Tejas]

Islamic scholarship has certainly helped in the revival of western classical learning, but the influence is in my view exaggerated. The Carolingian Renaissance did not rely on the Islamic world. The towering figures, were men like Alkuin the Anglo-Saxon, Paulus Diaconus (Langobard), Theodulf of Orleans (probably a Visigoth), Arn of Salzburg (a Bavarian) and many more. The basis of this revival were mostly classical text, that had been preserved and copied by Benedictine monks. The contribution of the Irish monks is also often underestimated. Clearly, the Islamic scholars also preserved classical knowledge, but the Islamic world did not utilize this knowledge to the extend the Christians did. In AD 1000 Europe was weak not least because of Moslem, Viking and Magyar invasions and raids. However, under the surface 1000s of monasteries had emerged as centers of learning, the multiplication of knowledge and importantly as economic power houses, which tried and implemented new forms of agriculture, which in turn allowed for an explosion in the European population, culture and military might. By the end of that centuries, Europeans had repulsed Vikings and Magyars and crusader armies had taken Jerusalem. I think the influence of Karl the Great on world history can hardly be overestimated.

Back to coins: I think the OP coin with its crude design and blundered legends is a nice example of this time in between, when classical culture was disappearing fast and was actually hanging by a thread. In the 580s when the coin was made, things could have gone in any direction. The rapid ascent of European culture was anything but a done deal. In fact, an outside observer would probably have expected, China or the middle East to become the dominant culture, rather than Europe.

 

Edited March 14 by Tejas