Long dismissed as forgeries, a handful of ancient Roman coins uncovered in Transylvania more than three centuries ago have been authenticated by a new analysis.
The name Sponsian is also very peculiar, with the only other known instance of it being from a Roman funerary inscription"Nicodemus Sponsian" dated to the first century. What's more, this sole other instance of the name wasn't even known at the time of the coins' discovery.
The Sponsian coin, in particular, has a distinct mix of gold, silver, and copper that's unlike the ratios measured in any of the other coins. While this might suggest the coins are modern fakes, Pearson and colleagues ."We suggest he was most likely an army commander in the isolated Roman Province of Dacia during the military crisis of the 260s CE."
"We suggest that Dacia became cut off from the imperial center around 260 [CE] and effectively seceded under its own military regime, which initially coined precious metal bullion using old Republican-era designs, then using the names of the most recent previous emperors who had achieved some success in the area, and finally under the name of a local commander-in-chief," the teamSponsian's"crudely manufactured coins supported a functioning monetary economy that persisted...
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