Durotriges c.58 BC-AD 43 Spread Tail Silver Stater 

Durotriges c.58 BC-AD 43 Spread Tail Silver Stater

ABC 2160

19mm, 4.05g

Obverse

Abstract head of Apollo right, wreath with inside end of leaves up. Hair curls hanging behind. Cloak below. Crescents in front.

Reverse

Disjointed horse left, rectangular head, body of crescents, four vertical legs, three diverging lines for tail, sometimes with pellets between lines. Pellet below. Twelve pellets above.

Comments

 

Provenance

This coin is from The London Collection of Ancient British Coins. For more information click here: The London Collection – Silbury Coins : Silbury Coins.

C Rudd (Liz’s List) 43, no 39 (Oct 2009). ex Brighstone hoard, Isle of Wight 2005

This coin comes with a previous label.

 

The Durotriges tribe occupied modern day Dorset with part of adjoining Hampshire, Somerset and Wiltshire. There is some mystery over the precise arrangement and correct attribution of coinage in the South-west, the Chute stater is probably struck by the Durotriges tribe but in recent years has been attributed to the Belgae.

The quick debasement of precious metal in the silver staters struck by the Durotriges would suggest an issue with the supply of silver to the area in the early first century AD, perhaps linked to the Roman conquest of West Gaul.