Egypt Exploration Society

The Beni Hasan Coin-Hoard

Author(s): J. Grafton Milne
Source: The Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, Vol. 19, No. 3/4 (Nov., 1933), pp. 119-121
Published by: Egypt Exploration Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3854598
Accessed: 01-02-2016 16:17 UTC

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 THE BENI HASAN COIN-HOARD
BY J. GRAFTON MILNE

IN the Revue Archeologique,1905, 257-61, I described a hoard found at Beni Hasan by

Professor John Garstang which in some respects is unlike any other Egyptian coin-hoard
that has been published. Apart from this one, fourteen hoards have been described, in more
or less detail, which appear to have been deposited before the conquest of Egypt by Alexander
the Great: in two cases the information is too scanty for any conclusion to be drawn, but
the rest all appear to belong to the class of what may be called bullion-hoards-that is,
hoards made up of coins of various states and different standards, which were evidently
taken simply as metal. Most of them contain a substantial proportion of pieces which have
been cut to test their quality, and some an admixture of rough silver. In the Beni Hasan
hoard, on the other hand, together with an assortment of coins or pieces of coins similar to
those in the hoards mentioned, there were 54 tetradrachms of Athenian type in perfect
preservation and apparently uncirculated, such as would be found in a currency-hoard of
coins which the holder designed to use at their face value. An explanation of this difference
seems to be worth seeking.
The two largest of the fourteen hoards in question have ben fully described by H. Dressel
and K. Regling in Zeit. f. Num., xxxvII; and, though it is not certain that these hoards
came intact into the hands of the writers, it is probable that the coins seen by them were
representative ofo thewhole, and their lists may be taken as giving a typical survey of the
composition of bullion-hoards from Egypt. One of these two is reported to have been found
at Damanhur, and the total number of coins examined was 165, of which 22 could not be
definitely ascribed and 3 were illegible: the remaining 140 were issues of places in various
parts of the Greek world, the area most extensively represented being Northern Greece:
there were 34 Thraco-Macedonian, 12 of Thasos, 4 of Neapolis, 3 of Dikaia, and 1 each of
Akanthos and Skione; 16 were of Aegina and 6 of Corinth; 7 came from the Cyclades, 4
being of Paros, 2 of Naxos, and 1 of Delos; in the Asiatic area, 19 were of Miletos, 1 of Teos,
5 of Chios, 3 of Samos, 1 each of Cos, Ialysos, Lydia, and Phaselis, 8 other Lycian, 1 of
Selge (?); there were 4 of Salamis and 9 other Cypriote; and 1 each of Barke and Cyrenaica.
The second hoard came from Zakazik, and consisted of 84 coins, from an even wider range
of origin; Northern Greece was well represented, as in the other hoard, with 3 Thraco-
Macedonian, 1 of Thasos, 5 of Akanthos, 2 of the Derrones, 1 of Dikaiopolis, 4 of Mende,
4 of Potidaea, and 3 of Terone; there were 9 of Aegina and 1 of Corinth, and also 1 of Delphi
and 34 of Athens, which did not occur at Damanhur: the farthest travelled piece was 1 of
Sinope; the remainder were from the same areas as at Damanhuir,1 of Paros, 2 each of Teos,
Chios, and Samos, 1 each of Poseidion, Kamiros, and Phaselis, 3 Lycian, 1 of Salamis, and
1 of Cyrenaica. All the coins, in each hoard, are such as might have been found in circulation
at one time, and have received similar treatment; there is nothing to suggest that they were
specially selected, or that the holders of the hoards had any preference for coins of a particu-
lar standard. It would have been a most complicated task to value either of these hoards in
terms of any Greek currency, even if that would have had any meaning in Egypt; and it is
hardly imaginable that they can have been regarded as anything more than metal and have

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120 J. GRAFTON MILNE
been traded otherwise than by weight. This conclusion is supported by the evidence of the
only one of these fourteenhoardsobtained under scientificconditions-the "Silversmith's
hoard"fromNaukratis,describedby B. V. Headin Num. Chron.,1886,1-18: in this coinsof
Syracuse, Athens, Aegina, Samos, Chios, Lycia, and Mallos were associated with a number
of lumps of rough silver. Similar lumps or "ingots" of silver are noted as occurring in two
or three otherhoards,and it is possiblethat they may have been presentin most cases, and
have been thrown out by the dealers into whose hands the hoards passed; but, even if this
were not so, there is no reason for supposing that the coins which were not mixed up with
uncoined metal were regarded differently from those that were so mixed.
The Beni Hasan hoard was found farther up the country than any of those previously
mentioned, which are chiefly from the Delta, with two from Memphis; and it is later in date,
having probably been deposited about 360 B.C., while the others seem to range from late
sixth century to about 440. This naturally explains the difference in composition of that
part of the hoard which otherwise resembles the Delta hoards: the coins, or pieces of coins,
24 in number, which from their condition appear to have been taken from circulation and
treated as bullion, are of Tyre, Sidon, and Gaza, not of Greek cities: in the early part of the
fourth century Egypt would derive its silver supply from Persian territories, most readily
from Phoenicia. The singularity of this hoard is in the other part of it, the Athenian tetra-
drachms: while the Phoenician coins all show traces of wear, in addition to the gashes which
were made to test their quality, the Athenian, although of types earlier than the majority
of the Phoenician, are absolutely fresh.
When the hoard was exhibited in London with the rest of the finds from Beni Hasan,
Sir Arthur Evans suggested to me that the Athenian tetradrachms might have been struck
in Egypt; and certain facts which have been published since then support his suggestion. In
Corolla Numismatica, 285-95, J. N. Svoronos described a die of an Athenian tetradrachm
found in Egypt, which was also the subject of an article by G. Dattari in Journ. Int. Arch.
Num., vII (1905), 103; and in Num. Chron., 1922, 14, G. F. Hill recorded a pair of similar
dies which had been shown at the British Museum in 1910. These discoveries presumably
mean that the dies had been sent over for use in Egypt; and an occasion for their use is
indicated by the gold stater, of Athenian types but with the name of Tachos, the Egyptian
rebel leader of 361 B.C., which was published by Hill in Num. Chron., 1926, 130-2. As Hill
remarks, this stater must be a relic of the money coined by Tachos to pay his mercenary
army; and, if he was striking gold with Athenian types to satisfy the wishes of his Greek
auxiliaries, it is quite reasonable to suppose that he would also strike silver of the same
character. He could probably obtain old tetradrachm dies from Athens through Chabrias,
and so save himself the trouble of making fresh ones: Athenian dies for gold would hardly be
available, which explains why he produced his own.
The dates of the Phoenician coins in the Beni Hasan hoard agree with the idea that it was
collected in the time of Tachos: they belong to various issues, but the latest date assigned to any
of these by J. Rouvier in his study of Phoenician coinage is 370 B.C. All of them are of types
which might have been passed into Egypt in the course of trade by 361; and they may con-
ceivably represent part of the proceeds of the levy which Tachos, accordingto the Aristotelian
Oeconomica(i, 26), made on the gold and silver of the Egyptians. It is consistent with this
that the hoard included two rings and a bead of silver, which evidently were destined to the
same fate as the Phoenician coins; and what that was is indicated by several lumps of
roughly
cast metal, two at least of which were clearly coins which had only been partially melted.
It seems reasonable to conclude that the Phoenician coins and miscellaneous silver were
being melted down to be turned into new coins of the types of the Athenian tetradrachms;

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 THE BENI HASAN COIN-HOARD 121

and this explains at once the remarkable difference between the condition of the tetradrachms
and that of the other coins in the hoard. The former are not only free from the gashes and
rubbing which are shown in a greater or lesser degree by the latter; this might be explained
by the supposition that they were coins which had actually been struck at Athens in the
fifth century and brought out of a reserve store; but, moreover, they do not bear any of the
scratches which are generally found on coins that have been stored or packed in bulk, and
which would almost certainly have been made on these if they had been shipped from Athens
to Egypt. In all probability they represent the products of a local workshop at Beni Hasan,
which was charged with the duty of minting the silver collected in the levy of Tachos.
It was suggested by Dattari, in the article cited above, that the Athenian die described
by him had been used to strike a number of tetradrachms found with it at Athribis. The
objection to this idea is that the Athribis coins are not in mint condition, like the Beni
Hasan tetradrachms, but are mostly worn and freely stamped with the small punch-marks
which are common on coins of the latter half of the fourth century in Egypt, and which served
to denote that the pieces on which they occur were demonetized and treated as bullion. It
may well be the case that the tetradrachms found at Athribis were intended to be restruck
with the die that was with them, but they cannot be regarded as products of that die or of
a shop in which it was used.
The fact that the Beni Hasan hoard was unearthed in surroundings which did not suggest
a regular mint, but rather the workroom of a village silversmith, is not against the explana-
tion of it suggested above. Objection has, it is true, been taken to the description of pre-
Alexandrine hoards of coins found in Egypt as silversmiths' hoards, on the ground that they
should be regarded rather as currency, in the sense of silver passing by weight; but all that
this amounts to is that the term bullion-broker should be substituted for silversmith, and,
as the functions of the two were probably identical in Egypt at this time, it matters little
which word is used.' The first persons to whom any one who, like Tachos, wished for a
supply of coin would turn would naturally be the silversmiths; just as for instance, the gold-
smiths of England played a leading part in the work of coinage under the Norman kings:
they were the chief mercantile holders of stocks of metal, and were skilled in the operations
necessary for making the metal up in the form required. And the silversmiths of Egypt
probably, like their compeers in many parts of the East to-day, carried out their work with
a very slight apparatus in any convenient corner.
There does not seem to be any exact parallel to the Beni Hasan hoard recorded, but an
interesting comparison may be found in the Taranto hoard published by E. Babelon in
Rev. Num., 1912, 1-40. Unfortunately, this hoard was discovered and marketed under condi-
tions which make it difficult to estimate its real intention, but it seems to have consisted of
two groups of coins, together with a quantity of ingots and miscellaneous silver. There was
a heterogeneous collection of pieces from all parts of the Greek world, like those in the Delta
hoards of Egypt, and, as in those, many of the pieces were cut: this group might be regarded as a
bullion-hoard. But about three-quarters of the coins were from neighbouring towns of South
Italy-about 150 of Metapontum, over 100 of Sybaris, about 80 of Croton, and about 100 of
Velia; and these, which were in normal condition, could have been a currency-hoard. As there
were no coins of Tarentum itself, however, it can hardly be taken to be representative of the
ordinary circulation of the place, and more probably was the foreign section of the reserve of a
money-changer; but its dual character is worth comparing with that of the Beni Hasan hoard.
1 There is a serious difficulty in the way of the theory that these hoardsof silver were used for making

payments: silver was not an ordinarymeasureof exchangein Egypt, as gold and copperwere, beforethe time
of Alexander.
R

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