Dictionary of Greek and Roman antiquities. Ed. by William Smith. Illustrated by numerous engravings on wood.

NUIMMUS. NUMMUS. 811
which was adopted by the Ionian colonists, from older coinages, and the tetradrachm in the later.
whom it passed over into the Ionian States of Didrachms are the prevailing coin among the exGreece Proper, especially Athens, under the name tant specimens of Aeginetan money: tetradrachms
of the Euboic system; a name which it probably among the Attic. The didrachmn, from its prevaobtained from an early coinage in the island of lence in the early coinages, obtained the name of
Euboea, which was rich in copper and silver ores.* stater (ora'rap, i. e. standard), which was afterThe other tradition, in all probability, expresses wards used specifically as the name of the chief
an. historical fact, except as to the circumstance gold coins, because they were of the same weight
of Pheidon's executing his coinage in Aeginat, as the silver didrachm [STATEr]. There still
which is almost certainly an invention of the later exist numerous Aeginetan drachms, didrachms, and
writers, made for the purpose of explaining the tetradrachms of undoubted genuineness; many of
name Aeginetan, applied to the system which was the highest antiquity. The earliest of these coins
established by Pheidon and adopted by most of are very thick, and of rude wol'kmanship: they
the Dorian states. This system, as well as the are stamped with the figure of a turtle, the reverse
former, was derived from the East, and was iden- having no device, but only an indented marl, as if
tical with the Babyloniasn; and, moreover, both the coin, at the time of striking, had been laid
systems existed together in Asia Minor, where upon a puncheon, the impress of which has been
the larger (Babylonian) talent was used for silver, transferred to it by the weight of the blow. In.
and the smaller (Euboic) for gold. Thus it ap- the later coins of Aegina, the turtle is changed into
pears that these two systems of weight and money, a tortoise, and the other side bears a device. (See
both derived originally from the Chaldaeans, may the woodcut on p. 439.)
be distinguished as the layger Balbylonian or Asgice In calculating the weight of the Aeginetan coins,
or (genIerally, but less properly) Aeginetan, and we are at once met with one of the great sources
the sm2aller Batbylonians or Lydian or Iosnian or Eu- of uncertainty in numismatics, namely, the doubt
bo~ic or larger Attic. The last term is used to whether the existing coins of any system are of
distinguish the old Attic scale, which was iden- full weight, which doubt, in the great majority of
tical with the Eubo'i, from the scale which Solon cases, experience converts into the certainty that
introduced, and which was considerably less; the they are not. The chief exception to the general
latter alone was used for money, although the debasement of ancient money was the silver money
former continued in ase as a scale of weight under of Athens, which, at least until some time after
the name of the comzwmercial standard. The talents the Peloponnesian WVar, was proverbial for its full
of the three systems of money, which have been weight and purity. One method, therefore, is to
mentioned, are known respectively as the A eginetan, take the best Attic coins as the standard of coInthe Euboie, and the Attic or Solonian. Their nu- putation, not only for the Attic system, but also
taerical ratios to one another were as follows: - for any other system which bore a known deternlined ratio to the Attic. Now, taking Hussey's
Aeginetan: EuSoltn:: 6: 3
Aeginetan: Solonian:: 5: 3 Cvalue for the Attic drachma, 66 5 grains (which,
Eubogic: Solonian:: 1385: 100 if there be any error, is a little below the mark),
i. e.:: 100: 72 the Aeginetan drachma ought to weigh between:: 25: 13 110 and 111 grains.+ Its actual average weight,
or nearly:: 4: 3 however, as obtained by Mr. Hussey from the
coins of Aegina and Boeotia, is only 96 grains.
(Respecting the details of these matters comp. There is, of course, the alternative of using this disPONDERA). crepancy as an argument against the ratio of 5: 3 for
(1.) Morney of the Aegainetan Standacd. —A1 the systeums of Aegina and Athens; and this course
though, according to the tradition, Pheidon coined Mr. Hussey has adopted. But Bdckh has shown
copper as well as silver, and although we have in- most conclusively that this explanation is totally
dications of a copper currency among the Greek inadmissible. We have not space to discuss the
states of Sicily and Magna Graecia, which fol- question at length. It must suffice to observe
lowed the Aeginetan standard, yet in Greece that, if any one fact in ancient metrology is to be
Proper copper money was altogether exceptional. accepted as established by testimony, it is the
[CHALCUS.] The ordinary currency in all the fact of this ratio of 5: 3; — that the fact of the
states was silver, the principal coins being the prevailing debasement of ancient coinages, by
drachezst,and its double (iaspaXuAov), and quadruple which the discrepancy above noticed may be ex(re:pdalpaXlAov), the didrachm prevailing in the plained, is also one of the most certain facts in the
whole subject;-that coins are actually found of
* Mr. Grote's derivation of the names Euboic the Aeginetanl system, which come very nearly up
and Aeginetan, "from the people whose commercial to the full theoretical weight, those, namely, of
activity tended to make the scales most generally Melos and Byzantium, both Dorian settlements,
known - in the one case, the Aeginetans in the and those of the Macedonian kings before Alexanother case, the inhabitants of Chalcis and Eretria" der the Great.~ To these positive arguments it
(vol. ii. p. 432)- is at least as probable as that may be added, that Mr. Hussey's attempt to exsuggested in the text. plain away the statement of Pollux, that the Aegi~1 The. statement (Etym. uIag. s. v. EbgociKhv
vy6/Lcr/a) that Pheidon's coinage was struck in a + Biickh, from a rather higher value of the Attic
place of Argos called ETuboea, obviously arose from drachma, gives the following theoretical weights
a conlfusion, in the head of the compiler, between for the Aeginetan coins: the didrachm 224'59
the Aeginetan and Euboic standards; and then, grains, the drachm 112'295 grains, the obolus
after the frequent fashion of the grammarians, at- 18-716 grains (p. 77).
tempting to set right a blunder by a wilful mis- ~ These Mr. Hussey is compelled by his theory
statellment, he invented the Argolic Euboea. to erect into a distinct standard.