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Description: | Two French feudal base-silver deniers from Ponthieu and Vermandois (both NE France Picardy) found with the use of a metal detector in proximity to each other and therefore likely to have been lost or deposited at the same time. (Besly, Ed, 2012)The find comprises two base silver French feudal deniers (pence):1. Comtes de Vermandois, Eléonore (1183-1214); cf. Poey d'Avant Vol. III, no.6690;2. Comtes de Ponthieu, Guillaume III (1191-1221); cf. P. D'A. Vol. III, 6707/6708 (obv/rev).These were two feudal principalities in present-day Picardy, northern France: Ponthieu centred on Abbeville (Somme), Vermandois on Péronne (Somme) and Saint-Quentin (Aisne).Metal contentAs delivered to Amgueddfa Cymru, the two coins are of bright silver appearance and seem to have been cleaned; apparent wear on the coins may result from this. Elemental analysis was undertaken by Mary Davis (Department of Archaeology & Numismatics, Amgueddfa Cymru) using a Bruker TRACER III-V Light Element Analyzer hand-held XRF, with a rhodium target, a voltage of 40kV and a beam current of 9.6μA. The readings were for 100 live seconds. These indicated surface fineness of the order of 50% Ag (Vermandois) and 40% Ag (Ponthieu).Although there is some degree of penetration through the surface layer using a relatively high kV, surface analysis is susceptible to distortions due to the asymmetry of unpolished samples, surface corrosion layers and the surface enrichment and depletion of elements. This particularly affects the surface analysis of silver objects, as the values will also be depleted in copper. The silver items all qualify as 'Treasure', but the percentage proportions will not reflect the original composition of the objects before burial.Published analyses of the contemporary deniers parisis of Philippe Auguste (Philip II, 1180-1223), on which these issues were modelled, suggest silver contents of the order of 30-40% Ag (Dumas and Barrandon, 1982); the relatively high silver figures here probably result from differential corrosion followed by the cleaning of the coins.
Original Image | Publisher: | http://finds.org.uk | Source: | Portable Antiquities | Identifier: | http://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/r... | Go to resource |
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