Studies in Early Medieval Coinage 1: Two Decades of Discovery

Recent years have seen increasing interest being taken by both scholars and enthusiasts in the remarkable iconography of early Anglo-Saxon coinage. During this period there was a remarkable diversity of intentionally ambiguous imagery conflating the various traditions then extant in England, and indeed the sheer quantity of types produced in post-Roman Britain prior to the establishment of a clear political hierarchy has often been regarded as a daunting hurdle for scholarly research. Although this wealth of material has long been available, recent advances in both discovery techniques and classification systems have seen a renewal of interest in these largely neglected artefacts.This volume draws upon these advances to establish a new benchmark for the study of coin typologies. Going beyond the traditional studies of moneyers, mint marks and monarchs, these essays draw upon the imagery present upon the coins themselves to offer new insights into Anglo-Saxon art and society.