Seal (emblem)
A seal is a device for making an impression in wax, paper, or some other medium, including an embossment on paper, and is the impression thus made. The original purpose was to authenticate a document, a wrapper for one such as a modern envelope, the seal-making device is referred to as the seal matrix or die, the imprint it creates as the seal impression. In most traditional forms of dry seal the design on the matrix is in intaglio. The design on the impression will reverse that of the matrix and this will not be the case if paper is embossed from behind, where the matrix and impression read the same way, and both matrix and impression are in relief. However engraved gems were carved in relief, called cameo in this context. The process is essentially that of a mould and these pendent seal impressions dangled below the documents they authenticated, to which the attachment tag was sewn or otherwise attached. Some jurisdictions consider rubber stamps or specified signature-accompanying words such as seal or L. S. to be the equivalent of, i. e. an equally effective substitute for.
In Europe, although coats of arms and heraldic badges may well feature in such contexts as well as on seals, the study of seals is known as sigillography or sphragistics. Seals were used in the earliest civilizations and are of importance in archaeology. In ancient Mesopotamia carved or engraved cylinder seals in stone or other materials were used and these could be rolled along to create an impression on clay, and used as labels on consignments of trade goods, or for other purposes. They are normally hollow and it is presumed that they were worn on a string or chain round the neck, many have only images, often very finely carved, with no writing, while others have both. From Ancient Egypt seals in the form of signet-rings, including some with the names of kings, have been found, seals have come to light in South Arabia datable to the Himyarite age. One example shows a name written in Aramaic engraved in reverse so as to read correctly in the impression, from the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC until the Middle Ages, seals of various kinds were in production in the Aegean islands and mainland Greece.
In the Early Minoan age these were formed of stone and ivory. By the Middle Minoan age a new set for seal forms, hard stone requires new rotary carving techniques. The Late Bronze Age is the par excellence of the lens-shaped seal and the seal ring. These were a luxury art form and became keenly collected. His collection fell as booty to Pompey the Great, who deposited it in a temple in Rome, engraved gems continued to be produced and collected until the 19th century
Roman Republican currency
Coinage came late to the Roman Republic compared with the rest of the Mediterranean, especially Greece and Asia Minor where coins were invented in the 7th century BC. The currency of central Italy was influenced by its resources, with bronze being abundant. The coinage of the Roman Republic started with a few silver coins apparently devised for trade with the Greek colonies in Southern Italy, during the Second Punic war a flexible system of coins in bronze and gold was created. This system was dominated by the silver denarius, a denomination which remained in circulation for 450 years, the coins of the republic are of particular interest because they were produced by mint magistrates, junior officials who choose the designs and legends. This resulted in the production of advertising the officials families for political purposes. Toward the end of the 4th century BC bronze began to be cast in flat bars which are today, without any historical authority. These bars were heavily leaded, of varying weights although generally on the order of five Roman pounds, and usually had a design on one and both sides.
The actual function of aes signatum has been interpreted, although a form of currency they were not coins since they did not adhere to a weight standard. V. A. A. A. F. F. Julius Caesar briefly raised their number to four, according to Suidas, the mint was located in the temple of Juno Moneta on the Capitoline Hill. By this time Rome was familiar with coinage, as it had introduced to Italy in the Greek colonies of Metapontum, Croton. Rome had conquered a large portion of central Italy, giving it large quantities of bronze, a system of heavy cast leaded bronze coinage was introduced, these issues are known as aes grave by numismatists. Stylistically the coins were distinctly Roman and, due to both their size and their being cast rather than struck, crude compared to the coinage elsewhere around the Mediterranean at the time. The standard coin was the as, the word as referred to a coin and to a unit of weight – in fact, as could mean any unit – of length, the uncia was thus both a weight and a coin of the weight.
In addition to the as and its fractions, multiples of the as were produced, fractions were much more common than asses and their multiples during the period of aes grave. By the time of the standard, the smaller denominations such as the uncia and semuncia were struck rather than cast. A variety of common denominations were minted over time, those found in Crawford are listed here. Greek-style struck bronze coins were produced in quantity with the inscription ΡΩΜΑΙΩΝ around 300 BC. Rome entered into a war against Tarentum in 281 BC, the Tarentines enlisted the support of Pyrrhus of Epirus and this coinage may have predated the aes grave discussed above, but was minted and used largely in Magna Graecia and Campania
Coin
A coin is a small, round piece of metal or plastic used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in quantities at a mint in order to facilitate trade. They are most often issued by a government, Coins are usually metal or alloy, or sometimes made of synthetic materials. Coins made of metal are stored in large quantities as bullion coins. Other coins are used as money in transactions, circulating alongside banknotes. Usually the highest value coin in circulation is less than the lowest-value note. In the last hundred years, the value of circulation coins has occasionally been lower than the value of the metal they contain. Exceptions to the rule of face value being higher than content value occur for some bullion coins made of copper, silver, or gold, while the Eagle, Maple Leaf, and Sovereign coins have nominal face values, the Krugerrand does not. The first coins were developed independently in Iron Age Anatolia and Archaic Greece, Coins spread rapidly in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE, throughout Greece and Persia, and further to the Balkans.
Standardized Roman currency was used throughout the Roman Empire, important Roman gold and silver coins were continued into the Middle Ages. Fiat money first arose in medieval China, with the paper money. Early paper money was introduced in Europe in the Middle Ages, the penny was minted as a silver coin until the 17th century. The first circulating United States coins were cents, produced in 1793, Coins were an evolution of currency systems of the Late Bronze Age, where standard-sized ingots, and tokens such as knife money, were used to store and transfer value. In the late Chinese Bronze Age, standardized cast tokens were made and these were replicas in bronze of earlier Chinese currency, cowrie shells, so they were named Bronze Shell. According to Aristotle and Pollux, the first issuer of coins was Hermodike of Kyme The earliest coins are associated with Iron Age Anatolia. Early electrum coins were not standardized in weight, and in their earliest stage may have been ritual objects, such as badges or medals, issued by priests.
The first Lydian coins were made of electrum, a naturally occurring alloy of silver, most of the early Lydian coins include no writing, only an image of a symbolic animal. Anatolian Artemis was the Πὀτνια Θηρῶν, whose symbol was the stag, a small percentage of early Lydian/Greek coins have a legend
Macedonian denar
The denar is the currency of the Republic of Macedonia. It is subdivided into 100 deni, the first Macedonian denar was established on 26 April 1992. It replaced the 1990 version of the Yugoslav dinar at par, in May 1993, the currency was reformed. A new denar was introduced, with one new denar being equal to 100 old denari, the name denar comes from the name of the ancient Roman monetary unit, the denarius. The currency symbol is ден, the first three letters of its name, the first denar was a temporary currency introduced in April 1992 to establish the monetary independence of the Republic of Macedonia. It replaced the Yugoslav dinar at par, the Republic of Macedonia declared independence from Yugoslavia on 8 September 1991. At the time the country was using the Yugoslav dinar, secret preparations were started to introduce its own currency. In April 1992 the country was ready to acquire independence from Yugoslavia. On 26 April the national bank was established and the declared the currency of the country.
Notes entered circulation the next day and on 30 April the Yugoslav dinar ceased to be legal tender, the first denar was replaced at a rate of 100 to 1 by a new, denar consisting of notes and coins in May 1993. No coins were issued for the first denar, temporary notes were introduced on 27 April 1992, although preparations for producing them began much earlier. They remained in circulation until replaced by permanent notes of the second denar during 1993, the notes were printed by the printing firm “11 October” in Prilep. Printing started on 15 January 1992, the difficulties of creating a new currency in secret is reflected in the notes themselves. The paper, which was purchased from Slovenia, proved to be of poor quality, although denominated in denari, the name of the currency does not appear on the notes because they were printed prior to the adoption of the Law on the Monetary Unit. Likewise, the issuer appears as the National Bank of Republic of Macedonia, not its successor, the notes were designed by a young employee of the 11 October printer.
He had only one week to them and not a very large budget. That is why the six lowest denominations are identical with the exception of their colors. ”The denar was introduced with an exchange rate against the German Mark of 360 denars to the mark. In May 1993, coins for the second denar were introduced in denominations of 50 deni,1,2,10 and 50 denari coins were introduced in November 2008
Fals
The fals was a medieval copper coin first produced by the Umayyad caliphate beginning in the late 7th century. The name is a corruption of follis, a Roman and Byzantine copper coin, the fals usually featured ornate Arabic script on both sides. Various copper fals were produced until the 19th century and their weight varied, from one gram to ten grams or more. The term is used in modern spoken Arabic for money
Constantine VII
Constantine VII Porphyrogennetos or Porphyrogenitus, the Purple-born, was the fourth Emperor of the Macedonian dynasty of the Byzantine Empire, reigning from 913 to 959. He was the son of the emperor Leo VI and his wife, Zoe Karbonopsina, and the nephew of his predecessor. Constantine VII is best known for his four books, De Administrando Imperio, De Ceremoniis, De Thematibus and his nickname alludes to the Purple Room of the imperial palace, decorated with porphyry, where legitimate children of reigning emperors were normally born. Constantine was born in this room, although his mother Zoe had not been married to Leo at that time, the epithet allowed him to underline his position as the legitimized son, as opposed to all others who claimed the throne during his lifetime. Sons born to a reigning Emperor held precedence in the Eastern Roman line of succession over elder sons not born in the purple, Constantine was born at Constantinople, an illegitimate son born before an uncanonical fourth marriage.
To help legitimize him, his mother gave birth to him in the Purple Room of the palace, hence his nickname Porphyrogennetos. He was symbolically elevated to the throne as a child by his father. In June 913, as his uncle Alexander lay dying, he appointed a regency council for Constantine. Following Alexanders death, the new and shaky regime survived the attempted usurpation of Constantine Doukas, Patriarch Nicholas was presently forced to make peace with Tsar Simeon of Bulgaria, whom he reluctantly recognized as Bulgarian emperor. Because of this concession, Patriarch Nicholas was driven out of the regency by Constantines mother Zoe. She was no more successful with the Bulgarians, who defeated her main supporter, in 919 she was replaced as regent by the admiral Romanos Lekapenos, who married his daughter Helena Lekapene to Constantine. Romanos used his position to advance to the ranks of basileopatōr in May 919, to kaisar in September 920, just short of reaching nominal majority, Constantine was eclipsed by a senior emperor.
Nevertheless, he was an intelligent young man with a large range of interests. Romanos kept and maintained power until 944, when he was deposed by his sons, Romanos spent the last years of his life in exile on the Island of Prote as a monk and died on June 15,948. With the help of his wife, Constantine VII succeeded in removing his brothers-in-law, several months later, Constantine VII crowned his own son Romanos II co-emperor. In 949 Constantine launched a new fleet of 100 ships against the Arab corsairs hiding in Crete, but like his fathers attempt to retake the island in 911, on the Eastern frontier things went better, even if with alternate success. In 949 the Byzantines conquered Germanicea, repeatedly defeated the enemy armies, but in 953 the Hamdanid amir Sayf al-Daula retook Germanicea and entered the imperial territory. An Arab fleet was destroyed by Greek fire in 957
Edict on Maximum Prices
The Edict on Maximum Prices was issued in 301 by Roman Emperor Diocletian. The Edict was probably issued from Antioch or Alexandria and was set up in inscriptions in Greek and it now exists only in fragments found mainly in the eastern part of the empire, where Diocletian ruled. However, the fragments have been sufficient to estimate many prices for goods. The Edict on Maximum Prices is still the longest surviving piece of legislation from the period of the Tetrarchy, the Edict was criticized by Lactantius, a rhetorician from Nicomedia, who blamed the emperors for the inflation and told of fighting and bloodshed that erupted from price tampering. By the end of Diocletians reign in 305, the Edict was for all practical purposes ignored, the Roman economy as a whole was not substantively stabilized until Constantines coinage reforms in the 310s. Earlier in his reign, as well as in 301 around the time as the Edict on Prices, Diocletian issued Currency Decrees. It is difficult to exactly how the coinage was changed, as the values.
The Roman Empire was awash with other coins from outside of the Empire – especially in the Mediterranean, the implied coinage changeover time was at least a decade. Although the decree was successful for a short time after it was imposed. The full mechanics of the decree have been lost, no full decree has been found, as it exists only in fragments. However, enough of the text is known for the following to be understood to be true. All coins in the Decrees and the Edict were valued according to the denarius, the argenteus seems to have been set at 100 denarii, the silver-washed nummus at 25 denarii, and the bronze radiate at 4 or 5 denarii. The copper laureate was raised from 1 denarius to 2 denarii, the gold aureus, was revalued at at least 1,200 denarii. During the previous decades the amount of silver in the billon coins had fuelled inflation. This inflation is understood to be the reason the decree was issued, issues of economic system feedback were not well understood at the time. Merchants were forbidden to take their goods elsewhere and charge a higher price, the last third of the Edict, divided into 32 sections, imposed a price ceiling – a list of maxima – for well over a thousand products.
These products included various food items, freight charges for sea travel, the highest limit was on one pound of purple-dyed silk, which was set at 150,000 denarii. The Edict did not solve all of the problems in the economy, Diocletians mass minting of coins of low metallic value continued to increase inflation, and the maximum prices in the Edict were apparently too low
Sestertius
The sestertius, or sesterce, was an ancient Roman coin. During the Roman Republic it was a small, silver coin issued only on rare occasions, during the Roman Empire it was a large brass coin. The name is derived from semis and tertius, third, in which third refers to the third as, the sestertius was introduced c.211 BC as a small silver coin valued at one-quarter of a denarius. A silver denarius was supposed to weigh about 4.5 grams, valued at ten grams, in practice, the coins were usually underweight. When the denarius was retariffed to sixteen asses, the sestertius was accordingly revalued to four asses and it was produced sporadically, far less often than the denarius, through 44 BC. In or about 23 BC, with the reform of Augustus. Augustus tariffed the value of the sestertius as 1/100 Aureus, the sestertius was produced as the largest brass denomination until the late 3rd century AD. Most were struck in the mint of Rome but from AD64 during the reign of Nero and Vespasian, Lyon sestertii can be recognised by a small globe, or legend stop, beneath the bust.
The brass sestertius typically weighs in the region of 25 to 28 grammes, is around 32–34 mm in diameter, the distinction between bronze and brass was important to the Romans. Their name for brass was orichalcum, spelled aurichalcum, meaning gold-copper, because of its shiny, orichalcum was considered, by weight, to be about double the value of copper. This is why the half-sestertius, the dupondius, was around the size and weight as the bronze as. Sestertii continued to be struck until the late 3rd century, although there was a deterioration in the quality of the metal used. Later emperors increasingly relied on melting down older sestertii, a process led to the zinc component being gradually lost as it burned off in the high temperatures needed to melt copper. The shortfall was made up with bronze and even lead, sestertii tend to be darker in appearance as a result and are made from more crudely prepared blanks. The gradual impact of inflation caused by debasement of the currency meant that the purchasing power of the sestertius and smaller denominations like the dupondius.
In the 1st century AD, everyday small change was dominated by the dupondius and as, but in the 2nd century, as inflation bit, in the 3rd century silver coinage contained less and less silver, and more and more copper or bronze. By the 260s and 270s the main unit was the double-denarius, the Antoninianus, although these coins were theoretically worth eight sestertii, the average sestertius was worth far more in plain terms of the metal it contained. Some of the last sestertii were struck by Aurelian, the double sestertius was distinguished from the sestertius by the radiate crown worn by the emperor, a device used to distinguish the dupondius from the as and the Antoninianus from the denarius
Umayyad Caliphate
The Umayyad Caliphate, spelled Omayyad, was the second of the four major caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. This caliphate was centred on the Umayyad dynasty, hailing from Mecca, Syria remained the Umayyads main power base thereafter, and Damascus was their capital. The Umayyads continued the Muslim conquests, incorporating the Caucasus, Sindh, the Maghreb and the Iberian Peninsula into the Muslim world. At its greatest extent, the Umayyad Caliphate covered 11,100,000 km2 and 62 million people, the Umayyad Caliphate was secular by nature. At the time, the Umayyad taxation and administrative practice were perceived as unjust by some Muslims, Muhammad had stated explicitly during his lifetime that Abrahamic religious groups, should be allowed to practice their own religion, provided that they paid the jizya taxation. The welfare state of both the Muslim and the poor started by Umar ibn al Khattab had continued, financed by the zakat tax levied only on Muslims. Muawiyas wife Maysum was a Christian, the relations between the Muslims and the Christians in the state were stable in this time.
Prominent positions were held by Christians, some of whom belonged to families that had served in Byzantine governments, the employment of Christians was part of a broader policy of religious assimilation that was necessitated by the presence of large Christian populations in the conquered provinces, as in Syria. This policy boosted Muawiyas popularity and solidified Syria as his power base, the rivalries between the Arab tribes had caused unrest in the provinces outside Syria, most notably in the Second Muslim Civil War of AD 680–692 and the Berber Revolt of 740–743. During the Second Civil War, leadership of the Umayyad clan shifted from the Sufyanid branch of the family to the Marwanid branch. A branch of the family fled across North Africa to Al-Andalus, where they established the Caliphate of Córdoba, according to tradition, the Umayyad family and Muhammad both descended from a common ancestor, Abd Manaf ibn Qusai, and they originally came from the city of Mecca. Muhammad descended from Abd Manāf via his son Hashim, while the Umayyads descended from Abd Manaf via a different son, Abd-Shams, the two families are therefore considered to be different clans of the same tribe.
However Muslim Shia historians suspect that Umayya was a son of Abd Shams so he was not a blood relative of Abd Manaf ibn Qusai. Umayya was discarded from the noble family, Sunni historians disagree with this and view Shia claims as nothing more than outright polemics due to their hostility to the Umayyad family in general. While the Umayyads and the Hashimites may have had bitterness between the two clans before Muhammad, the rivalry turned into a case of tribal animosity after the Battle of Badr. The battle saw three top leaders of the Umayyad clan killed by Hashimites in a three-on-three melee and this fueled the opposition of Abu Sufyan ibn Harb, the grandson of Umayya, to Muhammad and to Islam. Abu Sufyan sought to exterminate the adherents of the new religion by waging another battle with Muslims based in Medina only a year after the Battle of Badr and he did this to avenge the defeat at Badr. The Battle of Uhud is generally believed by scholars to be the first defeat for the Muslims, as they had incurred greater losses than the Meccans
Metal leaf
Metal leaf, called composition leaf or schlagmetal, is a thin foil used for decoration. Metal leaf can come in different shades. Some metal leaf may look like gold leaf but does not contain any real gold and this metal leaf is often referred to as imitation leaf. Metal leaf is made of gold, copper, brass or palladium. Vark is a type of silver used for decoration in Indian cuisine. Goldbeating, the technique of producing metal leaf, has known for more than 5,000 years
Aes signatum
When exactly they were first made is uncertain. Popular tradition ascribes them to Servius Tullius, but due to the quality of art found on even the earliest specimens. A date in the midst of the 5th century BC is generally agreed on, designs featured are that of a bull, an eagle, and other religious symbols. The earliest asses signata were not cast in Rome proper, but in central Italy, Etruria and they bore the image of a branch with side branches radiating from it, and were called Ramos Seccos. They did not equate to a set standard, varying from about 600 to 2500 grams when complete. They were usually broken into subdivisions, and there are very few specimens surviving today. The surviving ramo secco bars are usually quarter, half or three bars, or minor smaller pieces which could be classified as asses rudes. The same fragmentation into smaller change applies to asses signata issued by the city of Rome and they weighed approximately 5 as when whole. They could technically be termed a quincussis, although they are not marked with any value, Ramos seccos were not issued by governing bodies, and could have been made at any foundry facility.
Italo Vecchi, Italian Cast Coinage, A descriptive catalogue of the cast coinage of Rome and Italy, London 2013
