Etruscan coins

Like the Egyptians, Phoenicians and Carthaginians, the Etruscans were rather slow to adopt the invention of coinage. The brief period of Etruscan coinage, with the predominance of marks of value, seems to be an amalgam that reconciles two very different monetary systems: the ‘primitive’ bronze-weighing and aes grave economy of central Italy with that of struck silver and gold issues of southern Italian Greek type not familiar in Etruria.

Setting aside the early 5th century BC Auriol-type silver fractions of the Volterra hoard of 1868, which are probably not of Etruscan production, the earliest struck silver coinage seems to be that of Vulci and Populonia. An attribution to the 5th century for these first issues of tridrachms, didrachms, or staters and drachms is plausible since they seem to be struck on the ‘Chalcidian’ silver drachm standard of theoretically about 5.8 grams, which were present at Etruria’s nearest Greek neighbour, i.e. Cumae, dated to about 475-470 BC and at other Greek cities important to Etruscan sea-borne commerce in the early 5th century, such as Himera, Naxos and Zancle. The coins are of Greek style, but with an Etruscan flavour and have a predilection for ‘apotropaic’ images of exotic animals and monsters that drive away evil demons. The wheels with curved struts of Vulci are also reminiscent of some 5th century Macedonian tribal coins. These early issues are rare and seem not to have been exported; they have no mark of value and must have had a limited circulation.

An issue of silver didrachms with a crudely engraved male head issued on a similar ‘Chalcidian’ weight standard to the undenominated coins of Vulci and Populonia, but bearing the mark of value 5, has been tentatively attributed to Luca during the last quarter of the 4th century or later. They correspond to a single silver unit of about 2.25 grams, probably representing the silver equivalent of a bronze as or libra, derived from the Greek litra. These male heads were probably followed by a more finely produced octopus/amphora silver series, also struck on the ‘Chalcidian’ standard, but with exactly double the unit of value of the former. The marks of value 20, 10 and 5, give a silver unit or as of about 1.13 grams, approximately one Roman scruple, and probably represent a devaluation of the bronze unit in relation to silver.

Populonia may have been the first Etruscan city to place a mark of value on its coinage, following a practice already established by the mid-5th century at Syracuse and other Sicilian mints for silver uncial fractions of the litra, and at Akragas, the silver 5-litrae denominated ΠΕΝ for pentalitron and I for litra. The first Metus series has been dated to the second half of the 5th century by recent excavations at Prestino, via Isonzo, a chronology confirmed by the subsequent find of a rare 5-unit piece of the same series in the excavation of the early 4th century Etruscan sanctuary at Golasecca, from the phase III A 2 stratum. The weight standard employed seems to be the Corinthian stater (or Attic didrachm) with a theoretical weight of about 8.6 grams, subdivided into 10, 5 and 2½ units that seem to be on the Sicilian silver litrae standard of 0.86 grams. An issue of staters on the ‘Corinthian’ standard attested at Cumae, Etruria’s nearest Greek neighbour, dated to about 470-455 BC, may have provided the metrological model for this issue, which was denominated with Etruscan numeral X (=10); associated fractions are, V (= 5) and II< (=2½).

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