​The study, published in the journal PLOS One just a day ago, and picked up by publications in the UK and later by many in Romania, begins with a story about a gold coin found in a hoard in Transylvania in the 19th century. 18th century and tells the story of a would-be Roman emperor, a usurper, who would temporarily take over the province of Dacia around 260 AD.

On this occasion, an emperor named Sponsian struck a series of gold coins bearing his image. British scholars say that scratches on the coins found in Scotland show that they have been in circulation for a long time, probably since ancient times, and this confirms their authenticity, despite the fact that to this day they are repeatedly cataloged as Renaissance forgeries. An opinion accepted by the press but vehemently denied by other researchers in the field.

In order to clarify this question, we asked for the opinion of some specialists both in the field of numismatics and in the study of the specified period, namely the period of the first centuries of our era. in Dacia. You can read their opinion below:

Dr. Emanuel Petach, Member of the Numismatic Cabinet of the Romanian Academy and President of the Romanian Numismatic Society

The gold piece, which comes from a so-called historical figure, the Emperor or, as some say, Sponsian, appeared sometime in the 18th century and was believed, according to information at the time, to come from a hoard found in Transylvania around 1713. Nobody says it won’t happen. The problem is different. This study, which recently appeared in a publication already familiar to us (No. PLOS One), is signed by a group of British researchers, none of whom are named. All of them are specialists in physical and chemical research.

Of course, investigations of this nature are very important, and we also practice them in collaboration with people who specialize in this type of investigation, but they must always be carried out as a team, together, and not by each one individually, because we do not know how to interpret the results of the respective investigations, and they are certainly not well versed in history and even more so in numismatics, according to the historical context. Well, the piece has been considered a forgery since the mid-19th century. Who said what? Henry Cohen, who was the curator of the famous numismatic collection of the equally famous “Cabinet des médailles” in the National Library of France. And Henry Cohen, with all due respect, was a world authority.

He declared it in a catalog devoted to Roman imperial coins to be, and I quote, “a ridiculous forgery in every respect.” In terms of style, historical information, context and images of the coin. As for the coin itself, for many reasons it has no chance of being a genuine Roman coin. Stylistically, the obverse looks terrible. The legend on the obverse does not correspond in any way to the imperial title.

It has nothing to do with anything in the Roman world

Some letters are incorrect, presented more than rudimentarily. Or something like that is impossible, it is not on any Roman imperial coin, especially gold. If it doesn’t happen with bronze coins, you know it’s unlikely to happen with gold coins. The emperor was the issuer of coins. The entire process of issuing gold coins was subordinated to him. Everything was extremely well controlled in terms of the gold title, in terms of distribution, iconography and implementation. On the other hand, the flip side, the flip side of the coin, is complete madness again. It is not even clear that there is no legend on the reverse, which is not found on any Roman coin. The chosen iconography has nothing to do with the Roman world.

We can’t even tell exactly what is depicted on this reverse. There are several attempts to render some elements. There are several ears of wheat, something that seems to be trying to represent a Roman war trophy, and some attempts to reproduce some symbols. This is an aberration. Stylistically and iconographically, it has no chance of qualifying as a real, gold, imperial Roman coin.

In addition, if we look at the obverse of the coin on which the face of the emperor is depicted, it shows a crown of rays. With a radiant crown, as it is technically called. Or the ray crown in the vast majority of cases, more precisely in 99.99% of cases, is absent on gold coins, for the good reason that it was a specific element of a certain category of silver coins, namely the antoninian.

The remaining 0.01% is represented by several extremely rare coins sold through various Western auctions, with a price of tens of thousands of euros, so extremely rare and in any case very controversial, not guaranteed by any discoveries or other such things. But they are considered coins worth two auras, not the basic unit of gold coin, which is the aureus. Or to make a gold coin with an unknown character, with a more than rudimentary style, with an iconography completely irrelevant and unacceptable for Roman gold coins of the time and not only, also to set a radiant crown, which is not a 2 aurea coin, but a one aureus, this is a complete aberration.

There was nothing unnatural in the invention of coins of the ancient type

The author of the coin was a person who had a certain idea, but was not the best expert. The same could not have been the case at the time in question, around 1700, or perhaps even earlier, when such things happened.

On the other hand, from the point of view of the physical and chemical research conducted by the relevant researchers, no one says that this coin has no traces of use. It is normal that it has signs of use, since it is still 300 years old, it has changed hands, passed through all kinds of collections, moreover, at least in theory it was part of a treasure that came out of the ground. It is normal for it to show signs of use and obviously for the same reason it also has some deposits. This is absolutely natural. It means nothing, but absolutely nothing. Finally, there is one more element to add. There was nothing unnatural about the minting of ancient coins of that time. Why am I saying this?

Everything is fiction from beginning to end

Well, because it happened as a result of the collective psychic impact of a great discovery that happened about half a century ago, around 1550 to be exact, when the famous treasure was discovered in the water of the river Stray, the treasure of Decebalus, as it was called at the time with good reason and not only. And it is very possible. At least part of it is a treasure from the time of Decebalus. The hoard contained, according to information at the time, about 40,000 gold coins of the Lysimachus type, probably also cosoni, and probably also a Dacian gold bracelet of the type we see today.

This discovery had a huge impact on the collective psyche. This gave rise to the production of ancient coin artifacts modeled after the Renaissance. In a way, it was about the rediscovery of antiquity, especially in the Transylvanian space. And this must also explain the appearance of this imitation Roman gold coin. The curator of the collection of Roman coins of the British Museum, Richard Abdi, claims the same thing, who says that everything from head to tail is a fabrication.

Florian-Matei Popescu, CS 2 at the Vasyl Parvan Institute of Archeology of the Romanian Academy

Historically, we have practically no information about this Sponsian. The name itself is very strange because it seems rather a work of art, and it is present in only two or three inscriptions, which is strange compared to the hundreds of thousands of inscriptions that we find in the Roman Empire. It appears in a slave context in Italy, in the 1st century AD, because the name comes from the expression “sponte sua” (Latin – of the will, on one’s own initiative). This name, given to a slave, denoted a person who is at the master’s disposal. Moreover, the name Sponsian was preserved in special works only with a question mark.

Importantly, if the coins were genuine, which is unlikely, they would be more likely to be dated to the reign of Philip the Arab, 244-249 AD, rather than 260 AD, as suggested by the study published in PLOS One. . Probably, the authors of the study had in mind the context of the problems that arose in the Lower Danube during the time of Philip of Arabia, who opened a mint in Dacia. We are talking about the so-called coins of the province of Dacia, which appear between 247/248 AD. and 255/257 AD.

Despite this, they were bronze coins of little value. You can call it pocket money. These were bronze issues intended to pay the Dacian army. From this point of view, it is difficult to admit that there was an emperor named Sponsianus who issued several gold coins. What to do with them? It was not possible to give to the army for accumulation. Their cost was very high and there was simply no one to change them.

In the journal PLOS One, the historical part is covered very poorly

Regarding dating after AD 260. we have no sources. All the sources we have agree on one conclusion, namely that Dacia was lost during the time of the emperor Gallienus (253-268 AD). Emperor Aurelian did nothing but pay attention to the situation after 270 AD. and to try to restore Romanian administration south of the Danube on a different basis. Roman usurpers attested by coins are in the vast majority, with very few exceptions, also attested in written sources. Especially in the Historia Augusta, which has a chapter devoted to about 30 usurping tyrants from the crisis period of the 3rd century, between 235 and 284 AD.

In practice, there would have to be many more than this tiny number of coins, some have survived in Scotland, and a sample is kept in the Bruckenthal Museum, to create a story about the so-called Sponsian and, above all, to place it at such a late age In the journal PLOS One, in which the study was published, you will find that this part of the story is very badly treated. Biography is not enough. There are many things that the respective authors have not taken into account when trying to paint or sketch a historical scenario, starting with rather weak and questionable records, that is, only based on analysis that does not really prove that they are ancient, but simply that they were common, they remained in the ground.

No one will be against a new discovery

Obviously, each of us is curious and we all want to bring something new, but they must have an extremely strong documentary basis in order to fundamentally change the image created during decades of research on the ancient period. That’s the problem with this article. It has no elements except these chemical analyses. Not even an analysis of the origin of the gold was carried out. Even from this point of view, the conducted analyzes were not completed.

You can’t speculate. This is impossible, because otherwise we would no longer talk about scientific discipline, methodology, a certain scientific rigor, but simply find ourselves in the zone of vulgarization of literature. It’s not, or we try not to be, because we try to do everything right, believing that it’s the work of whoever wrote this article.

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