Britain’s First Coins takes a fresh look at British iron age coins. It contains 300 coin photos, most greatly enlarged to aid identification.
For about 150 years, Britons minted their own tribal coins until the Romans stopped them in AD 43. During this brief period, about 100 rulers of a dozen different tribes issues no fewer than 1000 different coins.
2000 years later, the imaginative imagery of these ancient British coins remains unsurpassed. This was Britain's golden age of daring coin design.
The book is a crisp and colourful introduction to a fascinating series of ancient coins. Read it and you’ll want to start collecting them.
Topics included:
– explanation of why these coins are British, not Celtic
– colour map of 13 coin issuing tribes
– where the largest hoards have been found and how many coins were in each
– illustrations of the differences between the nine denominations in gold, silver, bronze and potin
– how coins were minted and how forgers made gold-plated staters
– the 20 rarest types
– illustrations of how symbols on coins relate to symbols on other artefacts the first to hint at links with druidism
– seven ways to collect and the safest way to buy your first coins