Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Bronze Unit Hengistbury Trident
| Issuer | Durotriges tribe (Celtic Britain) |
|---|---|
| Year | 10-45 |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | A stylised three-pronged trident motif dominates the field, rendered in the abstract Celtic idiom characteristic of Durotrigan coinage. The central spike is flanked on each side by a crescent device and a grouping of five raised pellets, distributed across the flan in an asymmetric yet deliberate arrangement. The design is executed in low relief with the broad, unrefined casting typical of late Iron Age British bronze issues. No legend or inscription is present. The flan is irregular and slightly convex, with natural casting seams visible at the edges. |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Plain |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
The Durotriges occupied the territory of modern Dorset and parts of Somerset and Wiltshire, and their bronze coinage represents a late, localised response to the near-total collapse of their silver currency — coins that had progressively debased from good silver staters into pieces so degraded they were barely distinguishable from tin. This bronze unit emerged in the final decades before the Claudian invasion of 43 AD, a period when the tribe's political autonomy was shrinking under pressure from the pro-Roman Atrebates to the north.
Hengistbury Head, the probable mint site, had been one of the most significant cross-Channel trading ports in southern Britain a generation earlier, though that traffic had largely dried up by the time these bronzes were struck.