History of the English penny (c. 600 – 1066)
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The Earliest Gold Coinage: Thrymsas
The earliest known English coins are gold pieces, modelled on contemporary Merovingian Frankish coinage, and consisting largely of tremisses: one third of a gold solidus, originally weighing 4.5g, but in the Anglo-Saxon context apparently based on a revised standard of 3.9g implemented in Gaul from around the 580s. Indeed, the earliest Anglo-Saxon gold tremisses (sometimes referred to by numismatists as thrymsas) circulated alongside Frankish issues: all of the forty gold tremisses found in the burial at ‘mound one’ at Sutton Hoo were Frankish. The first coins which were probably struck in England are thus closely linked with contemporary Frankish coinage, and can be roughly dated to around the year 600: they include one gold tremissis struck by a moneyer named Eusebius working at Canterbury (Dorovernia), and a gold medallion (though in fabric very like a coin) found in Canterbury and bearing the name of a bishop Liudhard, almost certainly the same bishop of that name whom Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica described coming to England with Bertha, the Frankish bride of Æthelberht I of Kent.
The only substantial hoard of English coins from this period was found at Crondall, and included 69 English tremisses as well as a number of Frankish tremisses, probably deposited around 630. These and other finds reflect a range of types that rarely name a mint or issuing authority, though some rare types bear the name of London, and others are struck in the name of King Eadbald of Kent (616–40). In terms of design, they are modelled on Roman and Merovingian prototypes.
Widespread use of metal detectors in the last thirty years has substantially increased the number of coins known from this and indeed all periods. For all that the coins are still relatively rare and minting was primarily confined to the south-east, some were probably struck in Northumbria and both English and Frankish gold coins circulated widely. Though the early Anglo-Saxon law-codes must be used with caution for this period, they describe a wide range of compensatory payments in scillingas and scættas from c. 600 onwards; these terms reflect translations of continental legal usage, and may well describe measures of value rather than coins as such, yet nonetheless it is probable that the gold tremisses produced in seventh-century England were referred to as scillingas.
The Silver Boom of c. 675–c. 750: the Sceattas
Over the course of the seventh century, the gold content of Anglo-Saxon and Frankish tremisses deteriorated until, in the 660s, they were often only 10-20% pure. Around this point, there was a major shift from debased gold to silver, and within a few years of c. 675 very large silver coinages were being struck and circulated in southeastern England. A few issues, such as those inscribed with the runic name Pada, exist in both debased gold and silver, presumably spanning the changeover. The new silver coins are similar to the later tremisses in terms of size and weight: small (typically 10-12mm in diameter), thick and typically weighing 1–1.3g. Because of the references in the law-codes mentioned above, these new silver pieces are known to numismatists as sceattas. Contemporary terminology is uncertain, though it is likely that these coins were known as peningas (pennies). Silver pennies of roughly this weight (1–1.6g) were to remain the sole unit of English currency until the thirteenth century, with the exception of rare silver halfpennies and even rarer gold coins.
The first (‘primary’) sceattas were largely confined to Kent and the Thames Estuary, though the emergence of the ‘secondary’ sceattas introduced a breathtaking array of new designs and saw minting expand to many new areas: by the middle of the ‘secondary’ phase coins were being struck in Kent, the Thames Estuary, East Anglia, eastern Mercia, Northumbria and Wessex. Unfortunately, because very few coins bear any form of legend and there was extensive imitation and copying, it is extremely difficult to assign dates and minting-places to the various series identified by modern scholars. These are arranged into lettered series according to the scheme of Stuart Rigold, and sometimes by the numbers applied to types in the British Museum catalogues of the 1880s.
There remains much uncertainty about the organisation behind the sceattas and exactly what authorities organised minting. Some issues are so large that only major rulers could have been behind them, whilst others are so small that they could well have been the work of an individual moneyer. Others display prominent religious motifs, suggesting that they may have been produced by monasteries or bishops. An exception to the general obscurity of the sceattas comes in Northumbria, where from a very early date the king and (arch)bishop of York had a strong role in coinage production: King Aldfrith was the first English king named on silver coinage anywhere, and his successors retained a relatively tight hold on coinage production throughout the eighth century.
The early eighth century saw coinage production and circulation on a very impressive scale; greater indeed than at any point after the fourth and before the thirteenth century. Sceattas are found all over eastern England in large numbers, and also circulated in the Netherlands and Jutland. Sceattas from these areas also reached England at a time when trade and other links across the North Sea were particularly strong.
The Introduction of the Broad Penny: Offa and his Contemporaries
By the middle of the eighth century, production of sceattas had, like the thrymsas before them, declined considerably: the last coins of the secondary period are scarce and often debased, and a dearth of coinage is indicated in the record of several archaeological and metal-detecting sites that had been productive for the previous period. Similar problems afflicted the Frankish kingdom too, and in 755 King Pippin III (751 – 68) took the initiative and reformed the Frankish coinage, introducing a new, thinner, broader format (at least 15mm in diameter) struck in much finer silver. Importantly, these new coins all bore the king’s name and the name of the issuing mint. English rulers followed suit around the same time, and the earliest signs of reform outside Northumbria (where a substantial and relatively high quality silver coinage remained in production, albeit sporadically, over the eighth century) came in East Anglia, where the obscure ruler Beonna reformed the local coinage sometime after he came to the throne in 749. His coins bear the royal name and that of the moneyer, and in fabric are midway between the sceattas and the new Frankish pennies. Initially struck from fine silver, Beonna’s coinage later declined in standard, though one of his moneyers survived to strike some of the earliest coins known of Offa of Mercia.
It was Offa who introduced the broad penny to southumbrian England on a substantial scale, and made the employment of king’s and moneyer’s names standard at at least three mints at Canterbury, London and somewhere in East Anglia. His earliest coins bear an abbreviated version of the royal title influenced by that on the coinage of Pippin III and the moneyer’s name, and early in the course of his coinage there were also issues at Canterbury in the names of two local Kentish kings, Heaberht (of whom only one coin survives) and Ecgberht II, probably in the 770s. A small coinage was also struck in the name of King Æthelberht II of East Anglia, who was executed by Offa in 794: only three specimens survive today, and they were probably produced in the 780s or 90s.
Offa’s coinage represents one of the high-points of Anglo-Saxon art, and indeed were probably the most accomplished coins produced anywhere in Europe at that time, in contrast with the coins of contemporary Frankia. Portraits were introduced at an early stage, and were executed in a number of different styles betraying a range of artistic influences. Reverse designs included intricate crosses of various types, and were sometimes even more diverse: intertwining serpents, eels, the wolf and twins and other devices can be found. Uniquely in Anglo-Saxon England, coins were also struck at Canterbury in the name of the queen, Cynethryth, from dies produced by the same talented individual responsible for the best of Offa’s portrait dies. This practice could have been inspired by encounters with Roman coins in the names of empresses, and it has been suggested that the appearance of Irene on Byzantine coinage led Offa’s queen to place her image on coins as well. Certainly Cynethryth appears as a formidable individual, who regularly witnessed contemporary charters immediately after her husband and survived him to become a powerful abbess. However, it is also possible that the pennies of Offa’s reign merely reflect the vestiges of the complex sceattas, with the diverse designs often varying from moneyer to moneyer. Other authorities exerted minting rights in his reign that may have been held for some time: the bishop of London (Eadberht) is named on some coins, the only pieces struck by any Anglo-Saxon bishop of London; and in Canterbury the archbishops Iænberht (765–92) and Æthelheard (793–805) struck both independently and with Offa.
Dating the reforms that brought this new penny coinage into being is contentious. It appears likely that production started at roughly the same time at London, Canterbury and East Anglia, perhaps c. 765–70, and the bulk of the coinage – including the portrait coinage – was probably produced in the 770s and 80s. Later in Offa’s reign there was a second reform in which the weight was raised, the size of the flan increased and a common non-portrait design introduced at all three mints. This ‘heavy coinage’ can be closely dated, for no examples of it are known in the name of Archbishop Iænberht, whilst there are no ‘light’ (i.e., pre-reform) pennies of Archbishop Æthelheard, indicating that the reform took place in 792 or 3.
The coins of Offa are valuable evidence for a new dimension of royal authority and action, and have received much attention from historians because of their impressive artistry and range of royal titulature: Offa is variously entitled REX, REX M(erciorum), REX MERCIORU(m) and probably REX A(nglorum).
The Ninth Century
After Offa’s death in 796, usurpers in Kent and East Anglia – Eadbearht Præn and Eadwald – took power and issued coins in their own name, following the design of Offa’ heavy coinage. After a small issue at London based on the same type, the mew Mercian ruler Coenwulf instituted another reform of the coinage leading to the new tribrach type. This was adopted by Eadbearht and Eadwald and even by Beorhtric of Wessex, who struck a very rare coinage around this time.
By 798 Coenwulf had regained Kent and East Anglia also came back under his power by the 800s. He appointed a sub-ruler for Kent – his brother Cuthred – in whose name coins were struck at Canterbury. Cuthred and his brother may have minted simultaneously in the cross-and-wedges portrait type current from around 805, but it is equally likely that they had sole control of the mint one after the other. Around the same time, the archiepiscopal coinage at Canterbury also changed: the new archbishop, Wulfred, was very eager to assert his ecclesiastical rights, even at the expense of the king, and instituted an archiepiscopal portrait coinage bearing no reference at all to Coenwulf. This attractive coinage was modelled on the silver denarii produced by Pope Hadrian I (772–95).
Coenwulf continued a portrait coinage throughout his reign at Canterbury, London, East Anglia and, from c. 810, at a new mint at Rochester in Kent. Canterbury came to dominate silver coin production, and whilst East Anglia and Rochester remained relatively stable, pennies from London become very rare indeed and despite the recent discovery of a gold coin of Coenwulf with the legend DE VICO LVNDONIAE it is clear that the mint of London was in decline by around 800.
The years after Coenwulf died in 821 saw Egbert of Wessex seize control of the main coin-producing kingdom of Kent in 825 or 6. Just prior to this, the mint at Canterbury had weathered a turbulent period that is better reflected in the coins than any written source: Coenwulf’s brother and successor Ceolwulf I held Kent, but coins in his name from Canterbury are very rare and struck by only a few of the full complement of moneyers. Rochester, on the other hand, became far more productive under Ceolwulf, perhaps to compensate for lower royal production at Canterbury, whereas the greater part of Canterbury’s production from this time consists of ‘anonymous’ pennies bearing a royal- or archiepiscopal-style portrait surrounded by the moneyer’s name and the mint name (Dorobernia civitas) on the reverse. No reference is made to any king or archbishop. This fascinating coinage seems to reflect a time when the moneyers were uncertain of whose authority to recognise, probably around Ceolwulf’s deposition in 823 by Beornwulf. No Kentish coins are known in his name, but there are many in the name of one Baldred, who was probably another Mercian sub-ruler of Kent, though this is difficult to tell for certain from the very scanty written records of this period. However, it is known that when Egbert of Wessex and his son Æthelwulf invaded Kent in 825 they put Baldred to flight and imposed their own rule.
Egbert’s campaign of conquest took him far beyond Kent and even through Mercia to the borders of Northumbria in 829-30. Unusually, this dramatic military success was reflected in an issue of coinage from London, with Egbert named REX M(erciorum). Yet Egbert retreated and consolidated his position in the south-east, leaving Mercia to Wiglaf. His coinage from Kent at first continued the pattern of Baldred’s, but was reformed c. 828 to introduce a new reverse monogram type, retaining a portrait of the king on the obverse. Archiepiscopal minting was interrupted immediately after the West Saxon takeover, but resumed shortly before the end of Egbert’s reign.
The ninth century saw the spread of minting outside the traditionally south-eastern centre. The West Saxon mint initiated by Beorhtric was reopened under Egbert in the 820s but remained very sporadic in operation between then and Alfred’s reign later in the ninth century. In East Anglia, coinage gradually became more substantial under the last Mercian rulers and, from c. 825, under a series of independent rulers: Æthelstan, Æthelweard and (St) Edmund. These kings mainly issued non-portrait pennies bearing a large central A. When first adopted under Coenwulf, this probably represented part of an Alpha-Omega pair, but in East Anglia more likely signified Angli or (rex) Anglorum.
Under Æthelwulf, minting remained buoyant at Canterbury and Rochester and continued in the name of Archbishop Ceolnoth throughout the period. A succession of four phases can be distinguished: a non-portrait type bearing the legend REX SAXONIORUM, inspired by Egbert’s West Saxon coinage; a new portrait coinage bearing a wide range of reverse designs; a standardised non-portrait coinage with the ambiguous mint legend DORIBI (which could refer to either Canterbury, Dorobernia; or Rochester, Dorobrebia) and a monogram for CANT(ia); and finally a new portrait type of very different style. This ‘inscribed cross’ type may have only come into production after a few years without coinage at Canterbury: only two moneyers from there and from Rochester survived from earlier types, possibly because of the Viking raid on Kent recorded in 851. This new coinage survived into the reign of Æthelwulf’s son Æthelberht (no genuine coins are known of Æthelbald, who ruled 858–60) under whom it became very substantial: about 40 moneyers are known to have produced it. Another new portrait type, the short-lived ‘floreate cross’ type, also appeared at the end of his reign but survives in very small numbers today.
In the reign of Berhtwulf of Mercia (c. 840–52) minting at London, Mercia’s only remaining mint, began again in earnest, around the time of Æthelwulf’s second and third phases of coinage. A mixture of portrait and non-portrait types was struck. Because of its long abeyance, considerable support came from West Saxon Rochester in the form of dies and even moneyers, and it is even possible that some coins in Berhtwulf’s name were actually produced in Rochester. It was once thought that this monetary co-operation was reflected in a unique penny bearing the name of Æthelwulf on one face and that of Berhtwulf on the other. However, this coin more likely represents an unofficial production without any particular political significance.
The recovery of Mercian minting was made most manifest by the adoption in Wessex of the ‘lunettes’ type first struck at London by Berhtwulf’s successor Burgred. This coinage survives in very large numbers thanks to a great increase in minting (about 20 moneyers are known for Alfred and 35–40 for Burgred) and the discovery of a large number of hoards, presumably associated with Viking raids, and the coinage is very difficult to organise or categorise in any meaningful way. However, the lunettes type had become very debased by the early 870s when production was probably at its highest, and another reform was initiated in the mid 870s by Alfred of Wessex. This introduced the heavier, finer ‘cross-and-lozenge’ type after a number of very rare and often highly interesting experimental issues were struck in the years around the reform. At London, which lay within the Mercian kingdom, Alfred was initially recognised as king of Mercia as well as Wessex after the deposition of Burgred in 873/4, and was even called REX ANG(lorum) on the one known example of the ‘two emperors’ portrait penny type, one other specimen of which was struck in the name of Ceolwulf II, the new Mercian king installed by the Vikings. Ceolwulf also struck pennies of the ‘cross and lozenge’ type, and the earliest known round English halfpenny belongs to this phase of coinage.
Further reforms were initiated by Alfred later in his reign. Around 880, London struck an innovative series of portrait pennies bearing Alfred’s portrait and, on the reverse, a monogram of Lundonia; later one moneyer, Tilewine, placed his name on the reverse as well, but the coinage was for the most part without moneyers names. The main type struck in the latter part of Alfred’s reign was the non-portrait ‘two line’ type, though again rarer, perhaps experimental types have survived in small numbers. These include a portrait coin – probably from around the same time as the London monogram pennies – with the mint-name ÆT GLEAPA (‘from Gloucester’), which had become an important centre of ‘English’ Mercia under Alfred’s ealdorman Æthelred; a small number of ‘four-line’ non-portrait pennies with reverse mint names assigning their production to Winchester and Exeter; another non-portrait series probably struck at Oxford (OHSNAFORDA); and large silver ‘offering pieces’ inscribed ELIMOSINA (‘alms’).
Northumbria’s numismatic history was quite distinct from that of the south. Coinage never petered out as completely as it did elsewhere, and until close to the end of its history it remained closely linked to the king and archbishop. However, debasement became a serious issue around the end of the eighth century, when numismatists begin to apply the term stycas to Northumbrian coinage (based on a tenth-century gloss in the Lindisfarne Gospels; contemporary terminology is unknown). By the middle of the ninth century Northumbrian coinage contained almost no silver and was being produced on a massive scale: many tens of thousands of coins are known today, and several very large hoards have been known, such as one from the churchyard in Hexham which contained some 8000 stycas. After a final phase of considerable disorganisation, the stycas were phased out by the Scandinavian rulers who took over Northumbria in 867, and replaced with a new penny coinage on the model of the Carolingian empire and southumbrian England.
Viking Coinages
The first coins that can be associated with the Vikings in England are imitations of Alfred’s coinage, particularly the ‘London monogram’ and ‘two-line’ types. These are very numerous today, and for a long time caused great difficulty for numismatists working on Alfred’s coinage, who could not always tell them from the genuine issues. However, before the end of the ninth century new silver coinages had begun in East Anglia and at York. In East Anglia, a very large coinage naming the martyred Saint Edmund on the obverse was struck by at least 60 moneyers (the bulk of them bearing names indicating continental origins) until the conquest of East Anglia by Edward the Elder in 917/18. In Northumbria, the highly debased styca coinage came to an end and was replaced with a fine silver coinage, which is very well known thanks to the huge (8,000 coin) Cuerdale hoard deposited in the first decade of the tenth century. At various times this coinage named local Viking rulers (the identification of whom with figures from written sources is often impossible or contentious) and, at the start of the tenth century, the name of the mint and that of Saint Peter replaced references to king and moneyer. From the 910s resumed naming the ruler and also began to display a range of interesting devices connected to the Scandinavian presence in York: swords, hammers, banners and a bird variously interpreted as a raven or dove. The York pennies of Anlaf/Olaf Guthfrithson (939–41) present the first known use of Old Norse in the Latin alphabet anywhere in the legend ANLAF CVNVNGIR (‘King Anlaf’).
Although Northumbria and East Anglia were the main bastions of Viking coinage, at various times there was also production in the East Midlands, for instance of coins naming Saint Martin at Lincoln.
The Tenth Century
The coinage of Edward the Elder in some ways continued the types of his father Alfred, but with the expansion of West Saxon control into the Midlands and East Anglia the currency system became more complex as new regions were incorporated into Edward’s kingdom. For the most part the coins are non-portrait and simple in design, though some mints in English Mercia struck an interesting series of pictorial reverse types. Since mint names are again very rare, attributions must largely be made by working backwards from Æthelstan’s reign when mint names were often found on coins of the ‘circumscription cross’ and ‘bust crowned’ types. These coinages, struck at about thirty named mints after the conquest of the kingdom of York in 927, reflect a renewed effort on the king’s part to have a single, centrally controlled coinage spanning the kingdom: types were standardised, the royal title was expanded from the usual REX to REX SAXONUM or even REX TO(tius) BRIT(anniae), as one finds in contemporary charters. It was also under Æthelstan that coinage was first mentioned in any detail in legal documentation: a law-code issued by him at Grateley, probably around 934 though incorporating numismatic data from somewhat earlier, details the acceptance of a single currency, penalties for forgery and goes on to list a series of minting places and the number of moneyers attached to each.
Towards the end of Æthelstan’s reign and in the time of his successors Edmund, Eadred, Eadwig and the first part of Edgar’s reign, the coinage was of a regionalised character, with up to seven regions of monetary circulation. Coins normally stayed within their area of production, and different types were current in each region. Mints are not normally named, but it is usually possible to attribute coins to their region of origin. However, despite the regionalised types and circulation of coinage, they remained of relatively stable size, weight and fineness, and most importantly were always struck in the name of the West Saxon king. Even when the kingdom was divided between Eadwig and Edgar in 957, coinage remained the preserve of Eadwig, the senior partner in rule, even in the mint towns ruled by Edgar.
The last phase of this regionalised coinage, struck in the first decade of Edgar’s sole reign, contained a number of innovations. Mint names became more common, and there were a number of conscious antiquarian features, such as a resurrection of Alfred’s London monogram on halfpennies and Æthelstan’s royal title REX TO(tius) BRIT(anniae). This revival of interest in the coinage foreshadowed an even greater reform at the end of Edgar’s reign.
Edgar’s Reform, c. 973 and the Late Anglo-Saxon Coinage
Exactly when Edgar reformed the coinage is not certain: that it was towards the end of his reign is clear from the coins, and the only help provided by written sources is a lone reference in Roger of Wendover’s thirteenth-century chronicle, which implies the reform may have taken place in or after 973. Its impact, however, cannot be underestimated. Old coins disappeared from circulation and a single standardised type was introduced at all forty mints across the country, bearing the royal portrait and title on the obverse and the moneyer’s name and mint around a small central cross on the reverse. Initially, too, all new dies were distributed from a single die-cutting centre, located at Winchester. Such centralisation was unusual, and occurred in only a few types: more commonly, a number of regional die-cutting centres existed and distributed dies to nearby, smaller mints. Around seventy places in England (and in Wales in the Normans) were active as mints during this period, ranging hugely in size and productivity: the largest was London, though York and Lincoln remained important throughout the period, and other major mints included Winchester, Norwich and Stamford. At the other end of the scale are places that were never important mints in the Anglo-Saxon period and are little more than villages, hillforts and market towns today, including Melton Mowbray, Milborne Port, Castle Gotha, Cadbury Castle and Dunwich. Mints of this kind were often only active during short periods, such as a number of 'emergency' mints set up during the reign of Æthelred II because of Viking depredations.
The designs chosen for the coinage were relatively uniform, following the pattern of Edgar’s reformed pennies: the obverse carried some form of royal portrait as well as the royal name and title, whilst the reverse gave the name of the moneyer and the mint around some form of cross. Within this format, however, there was much variation. Portraits could face either way and reflect a wide range of influences. Under Æthelred II, for instance, one type was based upon early fourth-century Roman coins showing the emperor in military garb, with helmet and armour. Under Edward the Confessor there was strong German influence in the portraits, perhaps as a result of Edward’s employment of German goldsmiths named Theoderic and Otto, and show the king bearded, helmeted and crowned, and in some cases even facing straight forward or seated on a throne. The existence of moneyer and mint names on each and every coin provide valuable evidence for the study of not only mint structure (in terms of how productive certain moneyers were, or how many shared dies) but also of contemporary naming patterns and – to some extent – the makeup of the population. Mints located in the old Danelaw, like York and Lincoln, contained a preponderance of moneyers with Scandinavian names, whilst one sometimes comes across moneyers all over the country with continental names, or even more exotic names in Old Irish.
This first type, usually known as the ‘First small cross’ or ‘Reform’ type, remained in currency for Edgar’s last years, the whole of Edward the Martyr’s short reign and even into the first years of Æthelred II, who came to the throne in 978/9. At some point early in his reign, however, another of the features that was to characterise the late Anglo-Saxon currency system came into play: the first of many changes of type. More than fifty such changes occurred during the existence of the coinage as reformed by Edgar, which persisted until the 1150s. Within the reign of Æthelred, for instance, six such changes can be seen, manifested in progression of the following types: First Small cross; First hand; Second hand; Crux; Long Cross; Helmet; Last Small cross. After the death of Cnut, under whom another three types (Quatrefoil, Helmet and Short cross) were struck, types become more numerous and changes presumably more frequent: fourteen types were struck in the years between 1035 and the Norman Conquest of 1066. It is presumed that each change of type required coins of old money to be exchanged for new, with the king and the moneyer taking a cut either as a portion of the value of the new coins or from the minting process. The weight of the coinage varied considerably in the late Anglo-Saxon coinage, even within types, suggesting that there may have been some profit taken in minting by extracting silver from the coinage, though within the kingdom of England it would have been possible to enforce that all coins be accepted at face value regardless of weight. Hoard evidence, at least from before the 1030s, suggests that reminting of the whole coinage was stipulated at each change of type, for a number of hoards survive consisting of only one type. Alongside these, however, are ‘savings’ hoards, which contain a mixture of two or more types; and a mixture of types becomes much more common in hoards from after the 1030s.
Remarkably little written evidence survives to help numismatists and historians understand how the coinage and its system of changes of type actually functioned. Domesday Book does record that moneyers at certain mints had to go to London to purchase new dies for twenty shillings quando moneta vertebatur (‘when the coinage was changed’), and that certain towns paid annual sums to the king for the privilege of running a mint. One probable explanation for this change in the pattern of production and hoarding is that it came to be the rule, after the 1030s, that only payments to the crown had to be in the current type, whereas other types of English coinage were viable for other purposes.
Numismatists have sometimes tried to discern a very rigid system of organisation in the late Anglo-Saxon coinage: one, Michael Dolley, believed that until the death of Cnut in 1035, each type lasted six years, with a few exceptions – such as the Last Small Cross type at the end of Æthelred’s reign – lasting longer under very unusual conditions. Some features seem to support this belief, at least for the earlier period. Certain changes of type apparently coincided with datable historic events: no coins of the Helmet type survive from the mint of Wilton, for instance, whereas no coins of the preceding Long Cross type are known from Salisbury, but moneyers with the same names as those from Wilton started to operate there in the Helmet type. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that in 1003 Wilton was sacked by Vikings and the inhabitants retreated to Salisbury, and it is likely that the change of type coincided with this event. However, there are a number of difficulties with reconstructing such a fixed framework. Not all types are as well represented in the surviving material, and it is clear that this is not always simply a result of a few large hoards distorting our view. There are a number of very small and rare types which were certainly never meant to become fully fledged issues, though some bear a clear relationship to them. Examples from the reign of Æthelred II include the Benediction Hand type and the Intermediate Small Cross type, as well as the famous Agnus Dei type: a unique and fascinating issue on which the king’s portrait and the reverse cross are replaced with, respectively, the Lamb of God and the Holy Dove. The exact context for the production of this very rare coinage (sixteen specimens survive) is unclear: it was only struck at smaller mints, mostly in the midlands, either as an abortive main issue or as a special religious coinage for some specific purpose or occasion. Although the dating is unclear, it may be associated with the Eynsham gathering and the Penitential Edict of 1009. But the difficulties with the sexennial theory are not restricted to smaller, rarer types. The Second Hand type of Æthelred, for example, was not much different in appearance from its predecessor, raising the question of how easily people would have told it and the old coinage apart. More importantly, only minuscule numbers of the type survive from more northerly mints such as Lincoln and York which, in the rest of the period, were some of the most productive in the kingdom. It is possible that the Second Hand type represents a continuation of the First Hand type, which may have run on rather longer than six years as part of a mechanism that did envisage changes of type, but not necessarily on a strict sexennial basis.
The late Anglo-Saxon coinage is best understood for the period c. 990–c. 1030 thanks to the discovery of many tens of thousands of coins in hoards from Scandinavia. Connections between England and Scandinavia were very close at this time, with raiders, traders, mercenaries and, ultimately, kings regularly crossing the North Sea. English coins in Scandinavian hoards probably include at least some profit from raiding and the tributary payments referred to as Danegeld. Payments to Danish troops employed by the English kings continued until 1051, when Edward the Confessor dismissed the last of them; English coins finds in Scandinavia become even fewer at this time. However, since even larger numbers of Arabic and, later, German coins have been found in Scandinavia, it is more probable that the bulk of the English imports came via trade rather than military action.
Bibliography
General
Dolley, R. H. M., Anglo-Saxon Pennies (London, 1964)
P. Grierson and M. A. S. Blackburn, Medieval European Coinage, I: the Early Middle Ages (5th – 10th Centuries) (Cambridge, 1986)
P. Grierson, Numismatics (Oxford, 1975)
Stewart, B. H. I. H., ‘The English and Norman Mints, c. 600–1158’, in A New History of the Royal Mint, ed. C. E. Challis (Cambridge, 1992), pp. 1–82
Thrymsas
Abdy, R., and G. Williams, ‘A Catalogue of Hoards and Single-Finds from the British Isles, c. AD 410–675’, in Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. 500 – 1250. Essays in Honour of Marion Archibald, ed. B. Cook and G. Williams (Leiden, 2006), pp. 11–73
Grierson, P., ‘La fonction sociale de la monnaie en Angleterre aux VIIe – VIIIe siècles’, in Moneta e scambi nell’alto medioevo (Spoleto, 1961), pp. 341–85; repr. in his Dark Age Numismatics (London, 1979), no. XI
Metcalf, D. M., Thrymsas and Sceattas in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 3 vols. (London, 1993–4), vol. 1
Sutherland, C. H. V., Anglo-Saxon Gold Coinage in the Light of the Crondall Hoard (Oxford, 1948)
Williams, G., ‘The Circulation and Function of Coinage in Conversion-Period England, c. AD 580–675’, in Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. 500 – 1250. Essays in Honour of Marion Archibald, ed. B. Cook and G. Williams (Leiden, 2006), pp. 145–92
Sceattas
Abramson, T., Sceattas: an Illustrated Guide (Great Dunham, 2006)
Gannon, A., The Iconography of Early Anglo-Saxon Coinage (Sixth–Eighth Centuries) (Oxford, 2003)
Hill, D., and D. M. Metcalf, ed., Sceattas in England and on the Continent: the Seventh Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History (Oxford, 1984)
Metcalf, D. M., Thrymsas and Sceattas in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, 3 vols. (London, 1993–4)
Metcalf, D. M., ‘Monetary Expansion and Recession: Interpreting the Distribution Patterns of Seventh- and Eighth-Century Coins’, in Coins and the Archaeologist, ed. J. Casey and R. Reece, 2nd ed. (London, 1988), pp. 230–53
Rigold, S., ‘The Principal Series of English Sceattas’, British Numismatic Journal 47 (1977), 21–30
The Age of Offa
Archibald, M., ‘The Coinage of Beonna in the Light of the Middle Harling Hoard’, British Numismatic Journal 55 (1986), 10–54
Archibald, M., ‘A Sceat of Ethelbert I of East Anglia and Recent Finds of Coins of Beonna’, British Numismatic Journal 65 (1995), 1–19
Blunt, C. E., ‘The Coinage of Offa’, in Anglo-Saxon Coins: Studies Presented to F. M. Stenton on the Occasion of His 80th Birthday, 17 May 1960, ed. R. H. M. Dolley (London, 1961), pp. 39–62
Chick, D., ‘Towards a Chronology for Offa’s Coinage: an Interim Study’, Yorkshire Numismatist 3 (1997), 47–64
Chick, D., The Coinage of Offa and His Contemporaries (London, 2007)
Pirie, E. J. E., Coins of the Kingdom of Northumbria, c. 700–867, in the Yorkshire Collections (Llanfyllin, 1996)
Stewart, B. H. I. H., ‘The London Mint and the Coinage of Offa’, in Anglo-Saxon Monetary History: Essays in Memory of Michael Dolley, ed. M. A. S. Blackburn (Leicester, 1986), pp. 27–43
The Ninth Century
Blackburn, M. A. S., ‘Alfred’s Coinage Reforms in Context’, in Alfred the Great: Papers from the Eleventh-Centenary Conferences, ed. T. Reuter (Aldershot, 2003), pp. 199–217
Blackburn, M. A. S., and D. N. Dumville, ed., Kings, Currency and Alliances: History and Coinage in Southern England in the Ninth Century (Woodbridge, 1998)
Blunt, C. E., ‘The Coinage of Ecgbeorht, King of Wessex, 802–39’, British Numismatic Journal 28 (1955–7), 467–76
Blunt, C. E., C. S. S. Lyon and B. H. I. H. Stewart, ‘The Coinage of Southern England, 796–840’, British Numismatic Journal 32 (1963), 1–74
Pagan, H. E., ‘Coinage in the Age of Burgred’, British Numismatic Journal 34 (1965), 11–27
Pagan, H. E., ‘The Coinage of the East Anglian Kingdom from 825 to 870’, British Numismatic Journal 52 (1982), 41–83
Pagan, H. E., ‘Coinage in Southern England, 796–874’, in Anglo-Saxon Monetary History: Essays in Memory of Michael Dolley, ed. M. A. S. Blackburn (Leicester, 1986), pp. 45–65
Metcalf, D. M., ed., Coinage in Ninth-Century Northumbria (Oxford, 1987)
Dolley, R. H. M., ‘The Chronology of the Coins of Alfred the Great’, in Anglo-Saxon Coins: Studies Presented to F. M. Stenton on the Occasion of His 80th Birthday, 17 May 1960, ed. R. H. M. Dolley (London, 1961), pp. 77–95
Dolley, R. H. M., and K. Skaare, ‘The Coinage of Æthelwulf, King of the West Saxons’, in Anglo-Saxon Coins: Studies Presented to F. M. Stenton on the Occasion of His 80th Birthday, 17 May 1960, ed. R. H. M. Dolley (London, 1961), pp. 63–76
Viking Coinages
Blackburn, M. A. S., ‘The Ashdon (Essex) Hoard and the Currency of the Southern Danelaw in the Late Ninth Century’, British Numismatic Journal 59 (1990), 13–38
Blackburn, M. A. S., ‘Expansion and Control: Aspects of Anglo-Scandinavian Minting South of the Humber’, in Vikings and the Danelaw: Selected Papers from the Proceedings of the Thirteenth Viking Congress, Nottingham and York, 21–30 August 1997, ed. J. Graham Campbell (Oxford, 2001), pp. 125–42
Blackburn, M. A. S., ‘The Coinage of Scandinavian York’, in Aspects of Anglo-Scandinavian York, ed. R. Hall et al. (York, 2004), pp. 325–49
Blunt, C. E., ‘The St Edmund Memorial Coinage’, Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology 31 (1969), 234–53
P. Grierson and M. A. S. Blackburn, Medieval European Coinage, I: the Early Middle Ages (5th – 10th Centuries) (Cambridge, 1986), pp. 316–25
The Tenth Century
Blunt, C. E., ‘The Coinage of Æthelstan, King of England 924–39’, British Numismatic Journal 42 (1974), 35–160
Blunt, C. E., B. H. I. H. Stewart and C. S. S. Lyon, Coinage in Tenth-Century England from Edward the Elder to Edgar’s Reform (London, 1989)
Jonsson, K., ‘The Pre-Reform Coinage of Edgar – the Legacy of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms’, in Coinage and History in the North Sea World, c. 500 – 1250. Essays in Honour of Marion Archibald, ed. B. Cook and G. Williams (Leiden, 2006), pp. 325–46
Lyon, C. S. S., ‘The Coinage of Edward the Elder’, in Edward the Elder, 899–924, ed. N. J. Higham and D. H. Hill (London, 2001), pp. 67–78
Edgar's Reform and the Late Anglo-Saxon Coinage
Blackburn, M. A. S., and K. Jonsson, ‘The Anglo-Saxon and Anglo-Norman Element of North European Coin Finds’, in Viking-Age Coinage in the Northern Lands. The Sixth Oxford Symposium on Coinage and Monetary History, ed. M. A. S. Blackburn and D. M. Metcalf (Oxford, 1981), pp. 147–255
Dolley, R. H. M., ‘An Introduction to the Coinage of Æthelred II’, in Ethelred the Unready: Papers from the Millenary Conference, ed. D. Hill (Oxford, 1978), pp. 115–33
Dolley, R. H. M., and D. M. Metcalf, ‘The Reform of the English Coinage under Edgar’, in Anglo-Saxon Coins: Studies Presented to F. M. Stenton on the Occasion of His 80th Birthday, 17 May 1960, ed. R. H. M. Dolley (London, 1961), pp. 136–68
Freeman, A., The Moneyer and the Mint in the Reign of Edward the Confessor 1042–66, 2 vols. (Oxford, 1985)
Jonsson, K., The New Era: the Reformation of the Late Anglo-Saxon Coinage (Stockholm, 1986)
Jonsson, K., Viking-Age Hoards and Late Anglo-Saxon Coins: a Study in Honour of Bror Emil Hildebrand’s Anglosachsiska mynt (Stockholm, 1987)
Metcalf, D. M., An Atlas of Anglo-Saxon and Norman Coin Finds, c. 973–1086 (London, 1998)
Petersson, H. B. A., Anglo-Saxon Currency: King Edgar’s Reform to the Norman Conquest (Lund, 1969)
Smart, V., ‘Scandinavians, Celts and Germans in Anglo-Saxon England: the Evidence of Moneyers’ Names’, in Anglo-Saxon Monetary History: Essays in Memory of Michael Dolley, ed. M. A. S. Blackburn (Leicester, 1986), pp.171–84
Stewart, B. H. I. H., ‘Coinage and Recoinage after Edgar’s Reform’, in Studies in Late Anglo-Saxon Coinage in Memory of Bror Emil Hildebrand, ed. K. Jonsson (Stockholm, 1990), pp. 455–85