New technique allows historians to more closely examine medieval money’s chemical composition.
Cambridge University historian Rory Naismith of holds Anglo Saxon coin made with Byzantine silver. Credit Adam PageTo determine trends in trade and cultural exchange, sometimes historians must follow the money. A team did just that by showing that Byzantine silver found its way into Anglo Saxon coins by A.D. 700, according to an article inHistorians had known for decades that, from around A.D. 660 to 750, Anglo-Saxon England saw a surge in silver coins, after the area had long relied on gold.
Naismath knew that there had been an “explosion” in trade and urbanization over that time period. Other researchers had focused on tracking silver from central and western France, so he followed his Byzantine hunch. “Surfaces can be contaminated,” Naismith says. They could literally send a researcher to look at the wrong mine for the silver’s origin.The laser method is minimally invasive, because it makes a minute mark on the coin where the laser “zaps” it.
The group could take multiple readings of 49 of the 51 coins available. About half the coins were similar in content — hinting that they probably came from the same region.
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