Conference Oltre "Roma medio repubblicana": il Lazio fra i Galli e Zama

Report on funds received from the Classical Numismatic Group Roman and Byzantine Fund

by Marleen Termeer

A Royal Numismatic Society grant enabled me to give a lecture on coinage production in Latium and the Latin colonies in the Middle Republic at the conference Oltre “Roma medio repubblicana”: il Lazio fra i Galli e Zama in Rome (Rome, 7-9 June 2017).

This important conference was organized, together with its counterpart on Mid-Republican Rome (5-7 April 2017), with the aim of bringing together a variety of sources and perspectives on the city of Rome and the Latin world from the beginning of the fourth to the end of the third centuries BC (more information available here). My lecture was one of two to focus on the numismatic material. I discussed the significance and the potential of the coinages of Latin colonies in Latium and beyond as a source for understanding the relation between Rome and the colonies. In addition, I was able to introduce the topic of a postdoctoral research project that I am currently preparing. This project will investigate the first (pre-denarius) Roman coins and contemporary Italic and Greek productions in relation to Roman state formation. It challenges the assumption of a strict relation between coin production and state authority in the Mid Republic, and instead develops and investigates the hypothesis that different actors produced coinages that were functional to, and sometimes even representative of, the Roman state.

My participation in this conference allowed me to make new contacts and get some important feedback, both on the general purposes of my research project and on specific source material and publications that are important in this context. In addition, it allowed me to develop a broader perspective on the coinages that I study, as many other contributors to the conference addressed similar themes, but based on other textual and material sources. Finally, I hope to have been able to communicate the importance of the numismatic material to address the broad theme of the developing relations between Rome and Italy in the Mid Republican period to an audience of ancient historians and archaeologists.

Key references

Burnett, A.M. 2012, Early Roman coinage and its Italian context. In The Oxford Handbook of Greek and Roman Coinage. Oxford U.P.

Burnett, A.M. & M.H. Crawford 2014, Coinage, Money and Mid-Republican Rome: Reflections on a recent book by Filippo Coarelli. Annali. Istituto italiano di numismatica 60, 231-265

Burnett, A.M. & M.C. Molinari 2015, The Capitoline Hoard and the Circulation of Silver Coins in Central and Northern Italy in the Third Century BC. In P.G. van Alfen, G. Bransbourg and M. Amandry (eds.) FIDES: Contributions to Numismatics in Honor of Richard B. Witschonke. New York: the American Numismatic Society, 21-119.

Cantilena, R. 2000, Nomen Latinum: la monetazione. Appunti per una discussione. In Gentes fortissimae Italiae. I Convegno sui Popoli dell’Italia antica. Atina: Centro di studi storici Saturnia, 41-56.

Coarelli, F. 2013, Argentum signatum. Le origini della moneta d’argento a Roma. Rome: Istituto italiano di numismatica

Rutter, N. K. (ed.), 2001, Historia numorum. Italy. London: British Museum Press.

Termeer, M.K. 2016, Roman colonial coinages beyond the city-state: a view from the Samnite world. Journal of Ancient History 4(2), 159-190