Contextualising Counterfeits: Roman Coin Moulds in Britain and the Channel Islands

Abstract

Abstract This paper addresses the archaeological contexts of the clay moulds used to produce copies of Roman coins in third-century Britain. Previous research has focused primarily upon the technology and chronology of the use of moulds to produce coins with the discarded remains of the used moulds considered as ‘waste’ items from an industrial process. This paper focuses attention on the deposition of the moulds. Using the best-recorded finds, it builds upon earlier suggestions that disused moulds were regularly discarded in boundary locations (settlement boundaries, field boundaries, drainage features, shafts/wells, coastal locations and disused structures). It proposes that the magical and ritual associations of production meant that the clay moulds, in addition to the coins that were produced, required careful handling.