Catalog
12 Nummi
| Issuer | Carthage, Vandal City of |
|---|---|
| Year | 523-533 |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Diameter | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Horse's head facing right, rendered in a bold but schematic style, occupying the upper portion of the flan. A horizontal line divides the field, below which the value mark XII appears in large Roman numerals in the exergue. The horse motif is a direct reference to the ancient Carthaginian iconographic tradition. The overall execution is coarse, consistent with the debased municipal bronze coinage struck at Carthage under late Vandal administration. |
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| Edge | Plain |
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| Additional information |
These bronze fractions were struck under the last Vandal kings — almost certainly Hilderic and Gelimer — during the decade preceding Belisarius's swift North African campaign of 533, which collapsed the kingdom in under a year. Carthage had held the denomination system inherited from the late Roman West, and the 12 nummi piece occupied a practical middle register in daily transactions across a city that remained one of the Mediterranean's busiest ports despite a century of Vandal rule.
The attribution spread across Hilderic and Gelimer reflects genuine scholarly uncertainty; the coinage of this final phase was neither systematically dated nor consistently mint-marked.