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The bold design of this
Addedomaros Crescent Cross gold
stater - unfussy, uncluttered -
has much to commend it as a
piece of ancient British art,
quickly copied by a ruler of the
Iceni. Rainer Kretz says:
“Until
recently Addedomaros had been
considered a ruler of the
Trinovantes. However, it has now
become apparent that his issues
are largely concentrated on
Catuvellaunian territory,
although the more easterly
distribution of some of his
types may suggest that he also
controlled at least some, if not
all, of the Trinovantian domain
at some stage. This coin is a
good illustration of how the
Middle Whaddon Chase obverse
design impacted on subsequent
North Thames stater coinages.
Here the crescents have acquired
curious ‘eyelashes’, also found
on the subsequent ‘spiral’
stater. In addition, the die
cutter has stripped the original
wreath design of all of its
supplementary iconography, in
the process producing a
beautifully simple, yet
strikingly effective new obverse
design. Interestingly, the horse
too shows a close stylistic
affinity to the animal depicted
on the Middle Whaddon Chase
stater, perhaps an indication
that the time span between the
two issues was fairly short. As
is usual with this type, much of
the fascinating legend, which is
in the Gaulish script, is
missing.
This is known to range from AŠŠEDOMAROS
to
AŠŠIIDOMAROS
and
AӨӨIIDOMAROS.
For a discussion of this, and
other British coin legends see
Dr. Oliver Simkin’s article ‘Gaulish
letters on British Coins’ in CR
list 108.”
Chris Rudd May list.
10.5.10 |
