Speaker
Description
Regardless of the exact dating of the battle fought at Kalkriese, this findspot is our best insight into Roman army pay of the early Imperial period. As there are no underlying layers of prior monetary usage in the region, and the coin supply came to a sudden halt after the Roman troops left, the insight gained into the legionaries’ purses is unique. Additionally, the composition of the coin finds is drastically different from other military findspots in Germany, with higher percentages of precious metal coins and countermarked Aes coinage. An ongoing research project aims to re-examine all the coins found at Kalkriese and to establish the findspot as a benchmark for further analysis of coin supply within the Roman army in the early Imperial period. This paper will present some of the possibilities the coins found at Kalkriese offer for our understanding of this matter.
