YOU ABSOLUTELY GOT TO READ THIS !!!

[Ocatarinetabellatchitchix]

Techniques and tools for Roman die engraving and coin production ; evidence from the 4th century- Lars Ramskold

This is the most detailed and researched article I have ever read on this subject. Sit comfortably in your favorite chair and enjoy !

https://www.academia.edu/122223347/Techniques_and_tools_for_Roman_die_engraving_and_coin_production_evidence_from_the_4th_century_Ramskold_York

 

AND YOUR COMMENTS WILL BE WELCOME…

[ela126]

wow. this is incredibly well done and nicely presented. i've only been able to take in about 1/3rd of it so far because there is so much good information.

[Heliodromus]

I'll look forward to reading it later.

Lars is great at this sort of stuff - I guess that's what comes from spending your career looking down a binocular microscope!

 

[JayAg47]

Thank you for your post! It cleared up many of my questions about engraving. I've always been curious about the 'halo' around the letters and never realised that the letters were punched!

I particularly like the slides that show the 'step punching' technique, only a skilled engraver could make such beautiful patterns!

For the past few years, I've been experimenting with engraving my own coins, not on iron, but on wax using a simple toothpick and a set of tiny screwdrivers.

Here's my first-ever attempt on wax along with its impression on clay.

Another try at the Chola insignia copied form the tiny gold coin, I took an impression in clay and painted with silver acrylic. 

Here's my first attempt at a portrait that would make any barbarian engraver proud!

Next, I spent more time and attempted to create a more detailed engraving. I made, or at least tried to replicate, realistic portraits. See if you can guess which emperors they are. First, I drew my design or portrait and then simply gouged it in. For portraits, I broke it down into three parts: the forehead, cheek, neck, and ear; the eyes, nose, and lips; and finally, the hair and other details. For lettering, I scribed them in retrograde with a toothpick. I never knew until now that old engravers used to stamp the letters, it makes sense, as it would be incredibly difficult to scratch such tiny letters that deeply into hard iron without having your fingers sore or burn. 

Here are a couple more attempts at Greek imagery. One features a front-facing Medusa/Gorgon head, and the other is a Cilician stater with a bunch of grapes. I broke my first die trying to make an impression because I gouged too deeply while carving the grapes, so I had to make a new one, though I think the original die was better rendered.

More recently, I worked with lead, which, despite not being the safest metal, is the softest and easiest to manipulate with the tools I had. I engraved a simple design of twin fish and a scepter, the Pandyan symbol. Although I couldn't strike any metal on a lead die, I used it to stamp my letter for my Saturnalia giftee!

Edited July 24 by JayAg47

[Heliodromus]

Incidentally, there's an interesting end of conference statement on the Britannia 2024 web site (where Lars gave this presentation) from Rick Beleson who co-sponsored the conference as well, it transpires, as the BM finds curator position, which is now being assumed by Mathew Ball (who some may follow on Twitter).

Also, a cool pick of Rick, Sam Moorehead and a group of York's roman army re-enactors!

https://britannianummaria2024.blogspot.com/

 

 

Edited July 24 by Heliodromus

[TIF]

Thanks for the link!  Looking forward to reading this :).

[Deinomenid]

Thank you! A fantastic presentation. I've always enjoyed the esoteric debate  about whether minute engraving was done with rock crystals etc for  magnification,  or "myopic youths". Glad to see that unusual term used here!

[Salomons Cat]

29 minutes ago, JayAg47 said:

Next, I spent more time and attempted to create a more detailed engraving. I made, or at least tried to replicate, realistic portraits. See if you can guess which emperors they are.

I‘m impressed! If you say that is even difficult to do this in wax, then the ancient engravers must have been really skilled.

My guesses: Marcus Aurelius, Hadrian, Vespasian, Nerva

[Heliodromus]

38 minutes ago, JayAg47 said:

I particularly like the slides that show the 'step punching' technique, only a skilled engraver could make such beautiful patterns!

When you can count the 5-6 punch marks on each individual outer leaf of the wreath, you can appreciate the amount of work/craftsmanship that went into each of these dies, even something as commonplace as a votive or campgate.

 

Edited July 24 by Heliodromus

[JayAg47]

3 minutes ago, Salomons Cat said:

I‘m impressed! If you say that is even difficult to do this in wax, then the ancient engravers must have been really skilled.

My guesses: Marcus Aurelius, Hadrian, Vespasian, Nerva

I’m just an amateur dabbling in this art for fun without any formal training. I actually learned more about it just now from reading this article. For engravers who did this professionally for years, it would have been much easier because of all their muscle memory and experience. And your had right guesses, although I was going for Septimius Severus, I'll take Marcus Aurelius! 

[Salomons Cat]

7 minutes ago, JayAg47 said:

I’m just an amateur dabbling in this art for fun without any formal training. I actually learned more about it just now from reading this article. For engravers who did this professionally for years, it would have been much easier because of all their muscle memory and experience. And your had right guesses, although I was going for Septimius Severus, I'll take Marcus Aurelius! 

You’re right, it must be Septimius Severus. The beard of Marcus Aurelius goes in the other direction. Septimius Severus was actually my first thought; don’t know why I changed it.

Edited July 24 by Salomons Cat

[JayAg47]

4 minutes ago, Heliodromus said:

When you can count the 5-6 punch marks on each individual outer leaf of the wreath, you can appreciate the amount of work/craftsmanship that went into each of these dies, even something as commonplace as a votive or campgate.

 

It makes me wonder if it took two people to perform this, one with the master punching into the die while an apprentice held the magnifying loop next to the master's eye (If that was the case, I can easily picture many an apprentice getting scolded for not holding it properly). It seems almost impossible for someone to hold the loop in one hand and punch precise designs within millimeters of each other on the die with the other hand without really messing it up.

[Deinomenid]

Just on the article's  point about the different tools, there are some working engravers who are fascinating to learn from. I spent some  time this summer with Castro Smith at  his studio at Cockpit yards in London. He's arguably one of the finest engravers working today. The range of tools and techniques is staggering. Here's a photo of his at work, with some of  his tools on the wall to  his left.

[Heliodromus]

7 minutes ago, JayAg47 said:

It makes me wonder if it took two people to perform this, one with the master punching into the die while an apprentice held the magnifying loop next to the master's eye (If that was the case, I can easily picture many an apprentice getting scolded for not holding it properly). It seems almost impossible for someone to hold the loop in one hand and punch precise designs within millimeters of each other on the die with the other hand without really messing it up.

The greek rock-crystal magnifying lenses Lars shows are the first time I've seen any such thing. Together with things like the Antikythera mechanism, it really makes you wonder at the technology/techniques they were capable of.

This die engraving work is so fine, it's hard for me to imagine a second person being able to hold a magnifier still enough (for hours on end) for that to work. I suppose they could have built such lenses into a head mounted visor for hands-free use, or alternatively used a different type of magnifier such as a water filled spherical vessel, perhaps sitting on a tripod - a kind of desktop magnifier.

[Kaleun96]

Great share! Some interesting bits of info in that article which I was uncertain of but had suspected. In this hobby it's sometimes hard to know what is established fact versus something repeated as fact so it's great to now have something to point to when discussing this topic.

Speaking of the Antikythera mechanism and engraving in general, I can recommend checking out Clickspring's videos on YouTube about rebuilding the Antikythera mechanism (currently paused pending research he's working on related to the mechanism). Not only do you get an idea about the tools they may have used at the time and what they would've been capable of but you can also see some techniques for engraving that may have some parallels to die engraving:

 

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

Fascinating I'll read it later.

[Ryro]

Thanks @Ocatarinetabellatchitchix!

This is an incredibly detailed, well written and fun read! I'll certainly be reading it again. 

A few years back I picked up this forger's die. The ancients were so good at making sure nobody out of the mint got ahold of dies that they are extremely rare... and costly today:

Antoninus Pius. AD 138-161. Forger’s PB impression or die for a sestertius (35mm, 53.60 g, 12h). Copying a Rome mint issue of AD 161. CONSECRATIO, four-tiered funeral pyre topped by facing quadriga; S C in exergue; all in incuse and retrograde. Cf. RIC III 1266; cf. Banti 75 (for official strike). A few scratches on reverse, spot of roughness. VF.

 

From the WD Collection, purchased from David Vagi, January 2007. Ex New York Sale XI (11 January 2006), lot 374.

 

When a counterfeiter prepared his dies, he could either engrave them himself, in a style easily to be distinguished from official mint issues, or he could use a genuine, mint-issued host coin. He would then impress this design into a piece of piece of metal and affix it to the iron die-shaft. This object may represent a counterfeiter’s first attempt, a practice strike in lead, as lead is generally too soft a metal for striking coins.

[Heliodromus]

Just read it for the second time - absolutely fantastic research/article. Now I know what I'm looking at!

On the question of die clash damage - why it's the upper (reverse) die that invariably takes all the damage, there are two asymmetries that may account for it.

1) The lower die has the bust with it's large central area gouged out and therefore below the impact area. The reverse designs are much more varied, typically without such a large central gouged area.

2) The upper die, being the one struck, presumably gets a lot hotter than the lower die, so may be more malleable and prone to damage.

Still a bit surprising why the edge (legend area) of the lower die doesn't take much damage, unless 2) account for it.

[Heliodromus]

This article makes me want to go inspect all my coins under magnification to see what die creation artifacts can be seen!

Of course, most coins aren't in good enough condition, from fresh enough dies, to show the finest details. I did check one coin under 10x loupe and was able to see very fine die polishing scratches that were completely invisible to the naked eye.

 

[Roman Collector]

On 7/24/2024 at 6:01 AM, Ocatarinetabellatchitchix said:

Techniques and tools for Roman die engraving and coin production ; evidence from the 4th century- Lars Ramskold

This is the most detailed and researched article I have ever read on this subject. Sit comfortably in your favorite chair and enjoy !

https://www.academia.edu/122223347/Techniques_and_tools_for_Roman_die_engraving_and_coin_production_evidence_from_the_4th_century_Ramskold_York

 

AND YOUR COMMENTS WILL BE WELCOME…

Fascinating!! 

[Coinmaster]

This is indeed great, thanks for sharing, learned a lot! Fascinating about these 13 lines in just 1 mm...!

[Heliodromus]

The Romans were clearly skilled at rock/gem cutting and polishing, including polishing rock crystal to a high degree of optical clarity, so if they were NOT using magnifying glasses then it seems it would have to be by choice. Here's some examples from the British Museum.

The bottom one looks interesting! The BM describes it as a "bean shaped bead, maybe used as a game-counter". It measures 3.5cm long. It certainly looks as if it would be a serviceable magnifying glass. Maybe there are more hiding in plain sight?

Here's a nicely engraved coin from my collection, whose die would certainly seem to have required magnification ... The parallel lines providing the background to Medusa on Daia's cuirass are spaced at 4-5 per mm. The nicely engraved rightmost horse on his shield is 3mm from nose to tip of his tail. The coin's diameter is 25mm.

 

 

Edited July 27 by Heliodromus

[Coinmaster]

57 minutes ago, Heliodromus said:

The Romans were clearly skilled at rock/gem cutting and polishing, including polishing rock crystal to a high degree of optical clarity, so if they were NOT using magnifying glasses then it sees it would have to be by choice. Here's some examples from the British Museum.

The bottom one looks interesting! The BM describes it as a "bean shaped bead, maybe used as a game-counter". It measures 3.5cm long. It certainly looks as if it would be a serviceable magnifying glass. Maybe there are more hiding in plain sight?

Here's a nicely engraved coin from my collection, whose die would certainly seem to have required magnification ... The parallel lines providing the background to Medusa on Daia's cuirass are spaced at 4-5 per mm. The nicely engraved rightmost horse on his shield is 3mm from nose to tip of his tail. The coin's diameter is 25mm.

 

 

Wow, that Medusa head is incredibly made too! About 2mm I'd guess? 

[Heliodromus]

1 hour ago, Coinmaster said:

Wow, that Medusa head is incredibly made too! About 2mm I'd guess? 

Yes, must be around that. I bet the engraver would be pleased if he knew that 1700 years later people would still be admiring his work!

 

[Molag Bal]

Thanks for sharing the link, fascinating. In one of my other hobbies some people can paint really small miniatures without the use of magnification so maybe it wasn't necessary. This one is like 8mm tall: