Images of power
Byzantium and Nordic coinage, c. 995-1035
This study is devoted to a group of Scandinavian imitations of a type of miliaresia of Basil II and Constantine VIII struck between AD 977 and 989. The imitations were produced during the first half of eleventh century, i.e. later than the circulation of their Byzantine prototypes. Apart from Scandinavia, similar imitations were struck in the area of the Taman peninsula in southern Russia. What was the reason for imitating these Byzantine coins? Did the imitators and people of Scandinavia understand the effigies on these coins? Why were some Anglo-Saxon and Byzantine coins chosen as the prototypes for the oldest Scandinavian coinage? Is there any connection between the Scandinavian and Russian imitations of Basil II and Constantine VIII’s coins? This book addresses these questions and contains a catalogue with descriptions of all of the types of Scandinavian imitations of Byzantine coins, and details relating to dating and find circumstances, as well as plates with enlarged photographs of the coins studied by the author.
