The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

COINAGE AND CUKRENCY IN ROMAN BRITAIN. 467
the weight itself has little relation to the original
intention of the moneyer. From a number of tests
made in the case of the present hoard it appears that
no more than about 10 per cent, of the siliquae were
under 1-8 grammes (c. 28 gr.) in weight. On the
other hand, out of two hundred well-preserved coins
from this find of various Emperors twenty, or again
exactly 10 per cent,, weighed over 2-2 grammes. It
thus appears that, of the siliquae in good condition
from Constantius to Arcadius inclusive, some 80 per
cent, ranged in weight between 1-8 and 2-2 grammes.
We shall not be far wrong in saying that the original
average weight attained by the siliquae of this period
was approximately 2 grammes.
This of course is below the theoretical value of the
siliqua. For we know that 24 siliquae (or Kepdria)
went to the gold solidus, and that the legal value of
a pound of silver was 5 solidi; 40 120 siliquae there-
fore went to the pound of silver or according to the
standard Eoman weight 327-5 grammes, so that by
this reckoning the siliqua should have weighed about
2-72 grammes. It is true that the silver ingots, evi-
dently intended to represent a pound weight, issued
officially by the Treves mint weighed, as we know
from the examples contained in the Dierstorf find,
only about 310 grammes. But even supposing that
provincial standards of this class were kept in view,
the difference between the net and the theoretical
average weight of the siliqua is too great
to be
explained by any such hypothesis.
We must infer that the siliqua was largely a money
40 Cod. Theocl, xiii. 2. 1.