Ancient fakes and imitations

Contents of this page:

• Introduction
• Types
• An obvious fake
• From the hardly noticeable to the bizarre
• A die-linked chain of hybrid imitations

Introduction

Counterfeiting is as old as coinage itself. There is an almost continuous series from the hardly detectable forgeries to the very crude "barbarous" imitations, from the full-weight and "good silver" pieces to the undersized and copper fakes. There are also many fourrees (silver plated pieces with a bronze core). One can hypothesize that some of these pieces came from the legal mints but the majority of the counterfeit coins must have been produced in various places, theoretically everywhere where these coins were respected.
All kinds of unofficial issues of the Apolloniate and Dyrrhachian coins will be dealt with in this page. Call again from time to time to see new additions.

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Types

The exact terminology and legal aspects of counterfeiting can be studied from other web sites but some terms are described here as I use them.

• Fake . Colloquial term of a counterfeit piece. Any unofficial issue belongs to this category. Does not necessarily mean lower weight or debased metal.
• Contemporary fake . Sometimes this term is misunderstood. A contemporary fake is contemporary with the original coin. An Illyrian contemporary fake is an ancient forgery. They were produced for use with or instead of the original coins and many of them took part in circulation. Almost all hoards of Illyrian coins contain some of them.
• Modern fake . Opposite of contemporary fake. A product of modern times to mislead collectors.
• Imitation . Can also be contemporary or modern. A slight distinction between a fake and an imitation is that contemporary imitations were produced in or for territories where there was no coin production.
  Imitations could enter the area of the original coin production where these were regarded as fakes if detected. In territories of no coin production imitations could play the role of legal currency. Sometimes the production and circulation of imitations continued in such regions even after the end of the production of their original prototypes.
  This is a very exciting issue in the research of the Illyrian drachms. Almost all Illyrian hoards contain some contemporary imitations. There are several hoards, mainly from the Dacian region, which consist of crude imitations only. These are probably local products after the termination of the drachm production in Apollonia and Dyrrhachium.
• Barbarous . Counterfeit coin with style degradation and/or faulty, corrupt legends. A misleading term. Greeks and Romans called any other people Barbarian. Imitations were not necessarily produced in foreign territories or by foreign people.
  The imitator often needed to take several pieces to see the full image of off-center coins and copied parts of the image or legend from different emissions. Inexperience and illiteracy resulted in style degradation and faulty legends. Mixing up the obverse and reverse from different issues created hybrids (see there). Copying of copies led to further dissolution of the original images and the emergence of bizarre, abstract devices.
• Fourree (plated coin) . A thin layer of precious metal covers the base metal core. Usually its weight is significantly lower than that of the original. Technical imperfections reveal the nature of the coin sooner of later, the surface layer peels off or wears off on the edges or on high relief points and the base metal core (bronze, copper) shows. Production of plated coins is an obvious sign of cheating (lower precious metal content = less intrinsic value) but sometimes these coins could come from the official mints, too.
• Hybrid (mule) . The images for the two sides of the coin are taken from different emissions. In theory, hybrid pieces could leave the official mints: pairing the dies of different emissions are found in many coinages. In the Illyrian drachms, however, this seems to be unlikely. The symbols on the obverse belong to the eponymous magistrate whose name is on the reverse therefore a new pair of dies had to be produced each year for the incoming eponymous magistrate. So far all Illyrian hybrid drachms have proved to be contemporary fake by closer examination. There are also hybrids where the obverse imitates an Apolloniate coin and the reverse a Dyrrhachian one or vice versa.
  All publications including Ceka's list of emissions contain hybrids taken as originals. A work on correcting these is still pending.

An obvious fake

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From the hardly noticeable to the bizarre

Let's see examples for the gradual style degradation. The most common examples come from the late, increased drachm production phase. The following table shows the main features of the most frequently copied Dyrrhachian emissions for easier detection of the decline from these on the imitations. 'Year' in the table is the year of issue of the particular coin type calculated backwards from the end of production (last emission = year -1).

Frequently imitated Dyrrhachian drachms from the last phase

Year	Obv. name	Rev. name	Ceka #	Symbol above name	Left / Right	Exergue	Reverse legend
-13	Ktetos	Damenos	276	-	- / ear of corn	grapes	DYR DA ME NOS
	Xenon		357
-12	Xenon	Pyrba-club	360	Eagle	- / -	-	DYR PYR BA club
-11	Xenon	Haropinou	363	Eagle on sceptre	- / quiver	-	DYR HARO PI NOU
-10	Xenon	Filodamou	362	Eagle	- / -	hound	DYR FILO DA MOU
-9	Xenon	Fillia	361	Caps of Dioscuri	ear of corn / torch	-	DYR FIL LI A
-8	Xenon	Agathionos	353	Eagle with flapping wings	- / -	rudder	DYR AGA THIO NOS
	Meniskos		316
-7	Meniskos	Arhippou	318	-	- / -	rudder	DYR AR HIP POU
-6	Meniskos	Filota	331	-	- / torch	hound	DYR FI LO TA
-5	Meniskos	Kallonos	322	Flying Nike with wreath	- / -	thunderbolt	DYR KAL LO NOS
-4	Meniskos	Dionysiou	320	Bird	- / -	-	DYR DIO NY SIOU
-3	Meniskos	Lykiskou	325	-	- / female statue	-	DYR LY KIS KOU

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A die-linked chain of hybrid imitations

This series of die-linked hybrid imitations of Dyrrhachian drachms reflects the counterfeiting activity of a prosperous workshop of so far unknown location during the final period of drachm minting. The coins surfaced in different hoards; can be found in many museums, and turn up in trade from time to time.
The picture below shows the specimens of this series from my collection. The two coins in the upper part are the prototype issues. The copy of the Xenon-Pyrba-club (XPA-A) shows style degradation on the obverse and the name on the reverse became nonsense, PYO-DTA. Only the obverse was copied of the Ktetos-Damenos coin on the right; the reverse of this imitation came from the same die that was used for the Xenon-Pyodta-club (TA-A). The obverse was copied again with further style degradation but the reverse was still produced with the same die (TB-A).

The whole series includes a further issue (Xenon-Haropinou, Ceka 363) and contains more die varieties. The prototypes were from consecutive years:

Emission	Ceka #	Class	Year
Ktetos-Damenos	276	Dyr-4	-13
Xenon-Pyrba	360	Dyr-5	-12
Xenon-Haropinou	363	Dyr-5	-11

The next table shows the details of twelve imitation pieces of the series. Some of the coins have not been available for closer examination. Three different obverse varieties were found in this material: XP is the imitation of the obverse of Xenon-Pyrba, XH of Xenon-Haropinou, and T of Ktetos-Damenos; this is an error legend. Tetos was copied instead of the original Ktetos: either the first letter was off-flan as on my piece or the prototype was already an imitation, Tetos-Damenos, BMC 58. I could identify altogether four different obverse dies: XPA, XHA, TA, and TB.
There is only one reverse type : DYR-PYO-DTA-club. Two different dies were distinguishable: A and B.
There are several die-links among these pieces: either the obverse or the reverse is die equivalent with another piece. The follow-up of style degradation helps identify the chronological sequence of the dies. Coins marked with the asterisk (#1, 4, 6) are illustrated in the picture above.

Details of recorded pieces

No.	Obv. die	Rev. die	Origin	Disposition	Weight	Reference
1*	XPA	A	? Baldwin's Auct.17 #19, 1998	GP collection	3.66	-
2	XHA	A	Zaklopaca hoard 1928	National Museum Belgrade	?	4, Pl. VI #1
3	XH?	B	Bobaia hoard 1962	Museum of Transylvania Cluj	3.65	5, #181
4*	TA	A	? Spink 1988	GP collection	3.28	1
5	TB	A	?	HNM Coin Cabinet Budapest	3.18	2, #29
6*	TB	A	? CNG 2001	GP collection	3.38	-
7	TB	A	Dolj hoard, 19th c.	Museum of History Bucharest	3.38	3, #161
8	TB	A	Zaklopaca hoard 1928	National Museum Belgrade	?	4, Pl. VI #2
9	TB	B	Bobaia hoard 1962	Museum of Transylvania Cluj	3.72	5, #183
10	Tnon-A	?	?	Archaeological Museum Istanbul	3.07	-
11	T?	?	?	Private collection Budapest	?	-
12	T?	?	?	eBay auction March, 2002	?	-

Further observations
The metal composition of the imitations is not known but they look 'alright'; some coins (#1, 3, 9) have even higher weight than the average of the official issues. An interesting feature here is the multiple appearance of the same reverse die with several obverses; and the number of obverse dies exceeds the number of reverse dies. Usually the opposite is found. The reverse of coins was produced by the hand-held upper (punch) die that wore off quickly, the more elaborate and therefore more precious obverse die lasted longer for it was fixed in the anvil. Maybe this workshop used different practices or the dies of the obverses were softer and had to be replaced more frequently. A small line at the ear of corn on coin #3 may suggest a die crack of obverse die TA that broke soon and was replaced by TB?

Summary
The growing number of recorded coins in this die-linked hybrid imitation series and the occurrence of such pieces in three different hoards far from each other (Zaklopaca is in Serbia; Bobaia is in the Transylvanian, Dolj in the Wallachian region of Rumania) suggest a well equipped and active mint, which produced deceiving imitations. The exact place of this workshop cannot be located yet in the wide area where these coins were popular in the first decades of the 1st century BC.

References

1. Petrányi G. Dyrrhachiumi borját szoptató tehén típusú drachma egykorú hibrid utánzatának több példánya. Numizmatikai Közlöny 92-93, 109-111, 1993-4.
2. Gohl Ö. Adalékok Illyria érmészetéhez. Numizmatikai Közlöny 21, 23-6, 1922.
3. Conovici N. Date noi despre un tezaur de monede antice descoperit in judetul Dolj. Thraco-Dacica 6, 59-74, 1985.
4. Petrovic J. Grcko blago iz sela Zaklopace kraj Beograda. Starinar 7, 40-65, 1932.
5. Chirila E, Iaroslavschi E. Tezaurul monetar de la Bobaia, sec. II-I. i.e.n. Acta Musei Napocensis 24-5, 69-96, 1987-8.