EARLY BYZANTINE COPPER COINS

CATALOGUE OF AN ENGLISH COLLECTION

This site aims to inform collectors and students of Byzantine base metal coins issued in the period between the monetary reform of Anastasius I (491-518) and that of Alexius I Comnenus (1081-1118).

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About the Book

Byzantine Copper Coins

“Early Byzantine Copper Coins” comprises a number of sections.

The Foreword(s) describe the circumstances of the formation of the collection and the fascination of this series.  There is a lengthy Introduction to the catalogue itself which includes some observations on collecting and studying Byzantine copper, a guide to understanding the catalogue entries, and a short bibliography.

There are 38 chapters which, in a largely conventional way, attribute the coins either by reign (there are two chapters each on the coinage of Justinian I and that of Maurice, and three on that of Heraclius) or by issuing authority. Much of the latter is necessarily speculative, encompassing military issues and emergency and necessity issues from the attempted recovery of parts of Western Europe under Justinian I and his immediate successors, the 20 year conflict with Persia (610-630), and the conquest of large parts of the Eastern Empire by the Arabs.

Two short chapters describe coins in the collection struck by the Germanic Kingdoms and by the Umayyad rulers of Bilad al-Sham and North Africa.

Chapters 39 to 42 inclusive incorporate a number of both published and unpublished papers.

Scroll down to view the catalogues of the collection of Early Byzantine Copper Coins.

Contents

Early Byzantine Copper Coins (EBCC): The Online Catalogues

Two different online versions of the catalogue are available.

Click on the “2016” button below to see the whole text of the book “Early Byzantine Copper Coins” as it was published in 2016. The errors contained in the book have been corrected.

Click on the “2025” button to see an updated digital (online only) version of the collection catalogue.

This 2025 digital catalogue describes about 2800 coins the majority of which (about 2500 coins) were given to the Dumbarton Oaks Museum in Washington DC between 2020 and 2022.

The arrangement of the 2025 digital catalogue is quite different to that of the 2016 published version. The number of chapters has been expanded to 41. The chapters of this edition have been recast in a more austere version of the modified sylloge. The information on each coin incorporates: a single font, minimal punctuation; and the descriptive section set out in a more economical format that still enable the reasonably experienced numismatist to research a particular coin in more detail. (That is, the major catalogue references; the weight, the EBCC number if appropriate; and the unique accession number.) The structure of the chapters has also been simplified – mint followed by date or period of issue being the most obvious and uniform attribute.

Select Edition:

2025 Edition
1 Anastasius I
2 Justin I
3 Justin I and Justinian I
4a Justinian I: Constantinople
4b Justinian I: Propontine mints
4c Justinian I: Antioch and the minor eastern mints
5a Justinian I: Western mints
5b Justinian I: Carthage and Constantina
5c Sbeitla Hoard Listing
6 Emergency coinage at Antioch
7 Three Coin Groups
8 Justin II
9 Anomalous coinage of Justin II
10 Tiberius II
11 Maurice – Constantinople
12 Maurice – Nicomedia and Cyzicus
13 Maurice – Antioch, Alexandria and Cherson
14 Maurice – Thessalonica and the Imperial mints in the West
14a Military issues 580-600
15 Phocas
16 The Revolt of Heraclius
17 Heraclius Constantinople
18 Heraclius The Propontine and Eastern mints
19 Heraclius Thessalonica and the Western mints
20a The Syrian Mint Classes I to IV
20b The Syrian Mint Classes V & VI
21 Constans II
22 Year 20 mint
23 Pseudo-Byzantine coins
24 The Umayyad Imperial Image coinage
25 The Early Islamic Coinage
26 Constantine IV
27 Justinian II (first reign)
28 Leontius to Theodosius III
29 Leo III and Constantine V
30 Leo IV to Irene
31 Nicephorus I to Michael III
32 Basil I to Constantine VII and the Anonymous folles
33 Comneni and Angeli
34 Historical Counterfeits
35 Germanic Kingdoms

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