The Mughals and their Contemporaries
Morning Session (chaired by Jan Lingen)
10.35. Najaf Haider: The technology of coin production in the Mughal Empire
11.00. Coffee
11.45. Nich Rhodes: Altered dies in North-East India
12.00. Discussion on Monetisatoin and the use of coinage during the Mughal Period, led by Sanjay Garg.
12.45. Lunch
Afternoon Session (chaired by Stan Goron)
2.00. Sanjay Garg: The 200 muhrs of Shah Jahan revisited
2.30. Jan Lingen: The dating of the reign of Muhammad Shah and Nadir Shah's invasion of India
3.15. Nurussaba Garg: A forgotten hoard of Mughal gold coins from Kasur
3.45. Ken Wiggins: Hollow Authority -- the use of the Emperor's name on coins of the new Princely States
4.15. Summing-up by Stan Goron.
4.30. Departure
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Interpreting Early Medieval Coin Finds of
Northern Europe
in Sacred Contexts
Third Cambridge Numismatic Symposium
Archaeologists and numismatists of the Early Medieval period (AD 600-1200) are invited to attend the Third Cambridge Numismatic Symposium, 12-13 March 1999, for an investigation of coins in sacred contexts. Single coins and hoards found in graves, within churches, and in other sacred contexts (eg: wells, foundations, hearths, boundaries, etc) form the main types of evidence to be explored and evaluated at this conference.
Social messages are embedded in such depositions, and the very material which numismatists may reject for analysing economy and coin circulation, and which archaeologists may see mainly as a dating tool, actually forms a unique category of 'archaeo-numismatic' evidence.
A sacred context is here defined as a location which has been specially chosen for a symbolic or ritual reason, and a coin deposit occurs in such a context as a result of thoughtful and deliberate placement, not by chance alone. Interpreting a coin find which is essentially a gift or offering involves more than identifying coin types, dates, mints and so forth, and its economic significance is not straightforward. It may not even be relevant. Instead, this premeditated deposition conveys a meaningful social statement. The message and the action behind it are in some ways more important than the material itself, providing insight into social customs, beliefs and behaviour.
Coins in sacred contexts are thus seen to have lost one aspect of their intended economic function while taking on a new symbolic role. Alternatively, it may be said that a layer of social meaning has been added to their utilitarian function. But how do we extract this kind of meaning from small metal disks?
It is the purpose of this symposium to shed light on the social practices reflected in depositions of this kind, while also appreciating alternative (non-economic) uses of coins. Awareness will be raised of the prejudices and potential of material which has been subjected to a 'social filter', and we aim to find better ways to access and utilise this kind of information in our work.
Chairman: Prof. Philip Grierson
10.00 Coffee and Registration
10.30 Welcome
10.40 Aleksander Bursche, Coins in
Sacred Contexts in
the Barbaricum of Later Antiquity
11.20 Arent Pol, Sacred finds in Early Medieval
Germany
12.00 Mark Blackburn, Coins in Anglo-Saxon graves
12.40 Lunch
Chairman: Dr Catherine Hills
2.00 Keld Grinder-Hansen, The ritual
use of coins in
graves in Viking-Age and Medieval Denmark
2.40 Tuukka Talvio, Grave finds in the Eastern
Baltic
3.20 Tea
3.40 Martin Biddle, Coins in
Anglo-Scandinavian burials
4.20 Lucia Travaini, Saints and sinners: Coins in
Italian graves
5.00 Discussion 1: To what extent are coins in
graves different
from other grave goods?
5.50 Break up
7.00 Dinner at Peterhouse (optional, tickets c.£20 in advance)
Chairman: Prof. James Graham-Campbell
9.30 Märit Gaimster, Coin
pendants and gold
bracteates: An amuletic perspective of Early Medieval coins
10.10 Torun Zachrisson, Divine gold and silver: In
search of a
division between hoards and sacrifices within the precious metal
deposits of Eastern Middle Sweden AD 800-1200
10.50 Coffee
11.20 Kristin Bornholdt, Consecrated
contexts: A new
perspective on coin finds from the Isle of Man
11.50 Discussion 2: How do we recognise a sacred
context?
12.40 Lunch
Chairman: Dr Peter Spufford
2.00 Hanne Wagnkilde, Coins in grave
and hoard
contexts in 11th-century Bornholm
2.40 Svein Gullbekk, Coin finds from churches in
Early Medieval
Scandinivia
3.20 Tea
3.40 Kenneth Jonsson, Late medieval
cumulative finds
in churches – increase or decrease?
4.20 Summing up and dispersal
Lectures will held in the Auditorium, Gonville & Caius College
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Italy and Europe 10th to 15th Centuries: Numismatic and Documentary Evidence
Lucia Travaina: Welcome and introduction to the symposium
Peter Spufford: Local coins, foreign coins in Europe: an overview
Andrea Saccocci: Billon and bullion: local and foreign coins in Northern Italy (11th-15th centuries)
Angelo Finetti: Boni e mali piczoli: local and foreign denari in central Italy (12th-15th centuries)
Alan Stahl: The Circulation of Medieval Venetian Coinages
Lucia Travaini: Papienses, provesini, turonenses,...: foreign coins in south Italy and Sicily (11th-15th centuries)
Marc Bompaire: Definition de la "monnaie étrangère", monnaie prohibée et monnaie tolerée, en France aux XIIIe-XVe siècles
Jens Christian Moesgaard: Foreign coins in Lancastrian France (1417-1450)
Barrie Cook: Local and foreign coins in medieval England
Ulrich Klein: Notes on the circulation of Italian coins in South-Western Germany during the Middle Ages
Jorgen Steen Jensen: Local and foreign coins in Denmark (11th-16th centuries)
Peter Spufford - Lucia Travaini: Conclusion
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Philip Grierson: Before the Normans: Byzantine and Lombard coinage
Lucia Travaini: The Normans and their coinage
Donald Matthew: Numismatic evidence and the historian
Jonathan Shepard: Byzantine diplomacy and money
Graham Loud: Wealth and coinage in the age of Robert Guiscard
Jeremy Johns: Populus trilinguis: coinage as a medium for royal policy