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A survey of the principal numismatic scholarship
From the onset of the rediscovery of ancient Etruria in the Renaissance, Etruscan coins have been misunderstood, misdescribed and misattributed. The founder of modern classical numismatics, the Jesuit Joseph Hilarius Eckhel, identified the coinage of Populonia and Volterra but added to the general confusion by attributing the Koson gold stater to Cosa and the coinage of Elis (with F-A in the field) to Falisci.

Millingan identified Etruria’s aes grave issues as parallel to those of Umbria and Rome but saw Populonia’s early struck issues as archaic on grounds of style and types, and believed them to be influenced by coins from Phocaea in Ionia.

Francesco Carelli correctly catalogued Populonia but attributed the bronze coinage of Vetulonia to Talamone.

In his monumental work, Theodor Mommsen gave a metrological analysis of the subject, and dated Populonia’s inception of coinage to the mid-6th century following the example of Solon at Athens.

Gian Francesco Gamurrini wrote an excellent study of the material available; he followed Mommsen’s dating but noted the parallels between Populonian and Syracusan litrae for silver and those between the Etruscan and Roman marks of the value for gold and bronze issues. He was the first to publish the hoard of type coins from Volterra IGCH 1875 and other finds.

Corssen validly interpreted most of the Etruscan legends in their generally accepted attributions. Deecke catalogued the various Etruscan issues, mostly with material from Florence, London and Paris, with traditional dates, adding a list of finds. Friedrich Hultsch identified the scruple standard of the early silver of 11.38 g. and followed Mommsen for its Babylonian origin, dating it to the 5th century BC. A parallel was made between Pliny’s denarius of 269 BC and the Attic standard 20 litrae silver stater, which he called a ‘double denarius’.

Garrucci was the first to compile a scientifically modern catalogue of the Etruscan, Roman and Greek coins of Italy with find spots and hoard information. His chronology followed Mommsen’s and Hultsch’s, but the Roman parallels were not taken up. Falchi provided a good catalogue of the Vetulonian coinage but misattributed some of Populonia’s silver; he adopted Mommsen’s chronology and his parallels with Rome.

Sambon’s work was more complete than Garrucci’s and attempted both to include all known types and mints and to discuss the beginning of Etruscan coinage from the mid-5th century on the basis of style and its standard, which he considered Persian.

Head in Historia Numorum fixed the beginning of the gold coinage to the 5th century and the gold issue of Volsinii to c. 300-265. According to him, an early Euboeic-Syracusan litrae standard before 350 BC was followed first by a l/2-litrae standard, then in the 3rd century by a 2-scruple standard, and finally later by a 1-scruple standard and its bronze equivalents, a very tidy arrangement.

In the same year Kovacs also neatly divided the coinage on metrological grounds into six periods from 500 to 200 BC, relying heavily on Mommsen, Hultsch and Sambon, and drawing on Asiatic origins for the weight standard. Secondina Cesano arranged and dated the series by historical probabilities to the wars against the Gauls and the Romans from the 5th to the 3rd century.

In the same year Sydenham noted that it would have been most ‘natural’ for the Etruscans to have imitated Rome. He went on to date Etruscan silver to before 271 and aes grave to between 275 and 268. Giesecke attributed the early silver coinage of scruple standard to the 5th century in southern Etruria. He dated the lion-head gold issues to after 450, linking them to the Syracusan litrae standard, and gave the Populonian 10-litrae Attic weight staters to the 4th century and the 20-litrae Attic weight staters to the 3rd century under Roman influence.

Mattingly noted that the Populonia 20-unit stater was struck on the standard of the denarius. His second edition, after the ‘revolution’ in which the date of the denarius was lowered, omitted the reference to Populonia. He later assigned the light Etruscan silver to the Second Punic War (218-201), considerably earlier than his date for the introduction of the denarius, which he calculated to be in 187.

Massimo Pallottino published all known Etruscan inscriptions, including those on coins, and dated them from the 5th and early 3rd centuries on grounds of style. Thomsen (II), in his fundamental study placed Etruscan coins in a logical chronological context, parallel to the coinage of Rome, and placed the introduction of the denarius to c. 211 BC on the evidence of the Morgantina finds. Jenkins published two carefully thought-out articles on the subject. He stated that ‘the dating of Etruscan coins is notoriously difficult ... yet there appears to be no hoard evidence of value for chronology’ and indicated that the Populonian X and XX value didrachm series probably reflected the central Italian bronze devaluations. The Etruscan bronze he found ‘tolerably datable ... they suffer a reduction from triental to sextantal’, but found it hardly possible that silver and bronze ran parallel as the style was so different. Later, he confirmed the early dating of the X-value didrachms, but rejecting Laura Breglia’s Asiatic weight standard and Walther Giesecke’s ‘Chalcidian’ litrae, opting for a ‘scruple’ and ‘double-scruple’ standard for inland Etruria.

During the 1960s and 70s the so-called ‘Plinian’ school was championed by Francesco Panvini Rosati, who stressed the traditionalist dating and attributions in several articles (e,g, Panvivi Rosati 1970). In 1969 there appeared the first volume of the Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum of the American Numismatic Society, which included its fine Etruscan holding and became the standard reference work for Etruscan coins. 1976 saw the publication of the Contributi Introduttivi allo Studio della Monetazione Etrusca (CISME), with numerous articles by eminent scholars and numismatists which included: Kraay, Pallottino, Colonna, Panvini Rosati, Sorda, Breglia, Critofani, Petrillo Serafin, Catalli, Baglione, Camilli, Hackens, Marchetii, Heurgon, Krauskopf, and Sutton, who perhaps wrote the most interesting article. This article was not well received by traditionalists as it upheld Thomsen’s theory of the parallel between the introduction of the Roman denarius and the 20-as Metus issue of Populonia. Patrich Marchetti took Thomsen’s theory to its logical conclusion by demonstrating the metrological linkage between Etruria’s four main coinages with marks of value and Roman aes grave.

Finally, Patrizia Petrillo Serafin produced the first systemic die-study in Etruscan numismatics and republished the celebrated Populonia Hoard of 1939. Marchetti published an all-embracing study of the period in which he repeated the theories already expounded in his CISME paper on Etruscan metrology. He was, however, rebuked by Thomsen for some of his interpretations of the weight standards used during Rome’s bronze revaluations. Thomsen goes on to refine and confirm the dating of the various stages of bronze revaluation from literal aes grave to uncial aes within the 3rd century.

With Fiorenzo Catalli the line-drawn plates of Garrucci were used to illustrate a well-researched catalogue of types with traditional dating. A year later the Italian Ministry of Culture declared 1985 the year of ‘Progetto Etruschi’ and a great deal was written on Etruscan coins by well-known scholars such as Mauro Cristofani and Luigi Tondo. Mostly based on material from the Museo Archeologico of Florence, incomplete catalogues were compiled as examples of Etruscan coin issues. The same year also saw the publication of Emilio Peruzzi’s study of central Italy’s pre-coinage bronze currency economy which clearly showed how the Etruscan economy was integrated into that of Rome and central Italy from a very early date, but did not take into consideration the anachronistic tendencies of the classical authors. Crawford demonstrated the widespread use of pre-currency bronze in central Italy, and confirmed the revaluations of bronze from the liberal to the sextantal standard at the time of the Second Punic War. He dated the inception of Etruscan struck silver to the 5th century at Vulci and 4th century at Populonia and stated that ‘for all practical purposes [coinage] was not adopted in Etruria for three centuries after its adoption by the Greek poleis in the west’.

Also in the same year, Parise linked the coins of Attic weight standard with those of Syracuse in the 5th and 4th century and resuscitated the archaic Asiatic origin for the earlier scruple silver standard.

In the exhibition catalogue of Greek coins in the Antikenmuseum und Sammlung Ludwig in Basel by Russo, many hitherto unpublished examples were described and dated according to Roman metrological parallels. In the same year, Panvini Rosati, drawing on 80 years of research by numerous scholars on the circulation of Greek coins in Etruria and taking this material in association with the Pristina find came to the conclusion that coinage began in Etruria in the course of the 5th century. Cristofani alleged that little of substance in new work had followed from the CISME Congress in Naples on Etruria, a complaint without foundation at a time of lively debate among Italian numismatists. He located the origins of Etrurian coinage in the 5th century, while attributing the later large Gorgoneion 20-as issue to the latter part of the 4th century.

Fiorenzo Catalli’s well illustrated catalogue usefully summarises numismatic research from Petrarch to the present day, interestingly informing us that the first description of Etruscan coins was made by Pier Francesco Giambullari in "Il Gello". He lists 97 Etruscan types dating from the 5th century.

Stefano Bruni, in an article on coin finds in association with objects concluded a date for Populonia’s bronze coinage to the late 4th century. Claudia Tesei, compiled a very useful list of Etruscan coin finds. Vicari is a general compilation of Etruscan coins publishing 251 types without illustrations, by copying from previous works with no regard to die identity, errors or duplications. However, useful graphs confirm the weight standards employed, and there are maps indicating find spots. Amisano, a general publication, included Etruscan coinage as commencing in c. 550, a chronology would cast aside the innovative Hellenes of Magna Graecia and credit the Etruscans with the introduction of coined money into Italy. He relies heavily on classical references, especially on the Etruscans’ Lydian origins of Herodotus and their invention of coinage.

Between 1988 and 1993 appered four papers of Italo Vecchi, with the common title "The coinage of the Rasna : a study in Etruscan numismatics."

In 2001 the first volume of the new Historia Numorum (HNItaly) was published, a superb general survey compiled by a team under the principal editor N.K. Rutter, which included eminent numismatists such as Burnett, Crawford, Johnston and Jessop Price. It lists and dates the general types with summaries of the latest research in Italy’s Greek coinages including struck and cast issues of Etruria, Umbria, north-east and central Italy. Sandra Della Giovampaola and Margherita Bergamini, usefully published, with die identies, the collection Emilio Bonci Casuccini of Siena. Melillo published a wide ranging account on the Etruscan monetary system of Populonia. The 2003 publication of SNG Paris 6, 1 by Rita Parente is one of the most accomplished works to date on Etruscan coins and has become a standard reference.