The premier form of Roman money since the time of the Second Punic War (218-201 BC), coins were vital to the success of Roman state finances, taxation, markets and commerce beyond the frontiers. This volume provides a history of how Roman coins were minted and used. Drawing on literary and documentary sources as well as on current methods of metallurgical study and statistical analysis of coins from archaelogical sites, Harl presents an overview of a system of coinage in use for more than a millenium. Challenging more recent scholarship, he emphasizes the important role played by coins in the overseas expansion of the Roman Republic during the second century BC, in imperial inflationary policies during the 3rd and 4th centuries AD, and in the dissolution of the Roman Mediterranean order in the 7th century AD. He also offers a region-by-region analysis of prices and wages throughout Roman history with reference to the changing buying power of the major circulating denominations. He shows how the provincial, civic and imitative coinages were in fact important components of Roman currency.
Illustrated with photographic reproductions of nearly 300 specimens, this volume should be of interest to scholars and students of classical antiquity and the Middle Ages, as well as to professional and amateur numismatists.