Greek coins began circulating in our region as early as the 3rd century BC: gold staters of Philip of Macedon (359-336) that continued to be minted under Alexander the Great (336-323) and Philip III Arrhidaeus (323-317). How did these Macedonian staters get to Gaul?

Beginning around 320 BC, Celtic mercenaries were hired by the Carthaginians to fight in Sicily during the conflicts between Carthage and Rome. They were paid in gold, mostly with Philip staters, as these were the most widely used gold coins in the Mediterranean region at the time.

By the early second century, the supply of original coins had dried up: with the coins in circulation no longer meeting demand, imitations began to appear. The Gauls thus started minting their own coins out of necessity, initially doing little more than producing copies of the originals. Philip staters were pure gold and weighed 8.60 g; the imitations were lighter (8.40-8.20 g) and their alloy was not as pure. This meant that production could be increased by 10% only by melting down existing coins.

The staters copied by the Treveri, the northernmost group to issue imitations, were struck in the Lampsacus mint during the reign of Philip III Arrhidaeus, with the head of Helios as a mintmark. Only six examples of this Gallic type are extant, including this particular coin, discovered fortuitously by children in the bed of a stream near Hesperange in 1984. Its free interpretation of the head of Helios sets it apart from other stater imitations: what we see here is a chopped-off head, evoking the custom of decapitating enemies that was practiced in Gaul at this time.

Text | CC BY-NC | François Reinert and Cécile Arnould