The numismatic chronicle and journal of the Royal Numismatic Society

476 SIR ARTHUR EVANS.
with occasional pieces issued at intervals during a con-
siderable period of years, but the whole series is
deserving of special investigation.
The natural question suggests itself Have we in the
series of small silver issues enumerated above under
types A-Gr examples of the " argentei minutuli " which
were current about the end of the fourth century? The
word itself implies a distinction between the ordinary
current silver coin, in which we must recognize the-
siliquae, and a more diminutive class.
minutuli " is indeed due
Our knowledge of the term c;
to that strange farrago known as the Scriptores Historiae
Augustae, 5G so largely pieced together, as recent criticism
has shown, from forged documents, and replete
with anachronisms. The work itself belongs to the
close of the fourth century, and the numismatic details
foisted into its materials have now been conclusively
demonstrated to be altogether foreign to the monetary
conditions of the third century, to which they are
applied. On the other hand, every element as far as
it can be traced illustrates the system and nomen-
clature of the Imperial coinage as it existed in the age
of Honorius. 57
In. this way there is a certain value in
the statement of Lampridius, in his Life of Severus
Alexander, 58 that the price of a pound of pork or veal
66 Fl. Vopisci, Vita Aureliani, 9. 7 and 12. 1. (The application
here of the term Philippeos to silver
marks the work of an ignorant forger.)
coins itself
sufficiently
Ael. Lampridii Vita Sev.
Alexander, 22. 8.
57
I need only refer to the convincing and exhaustive essay of
K. Menadier, "Die Miinzen und das Munzwesen bei den Scriptores
Historiae Augustae," Zeitschr.f. Numismatik, 1913, pp.1 seqq.
58
c. 22. 8
"
Tantumque intra biennium vel prope annum
porcinae carnis fuit et bubulae ut cum fuisset octo minutulis
libra ad duos ununique utriusque carnis libra redigeretur ". The