Practice question · Multiple choice
A worn coin of 60 CE is found in a layer. What does it establish?
Hints
- Terminus post quem: a date after which.
- What does the wear tell you about how long it circulated?
Show the answer
B. Not earlier than 60 CE, but possibly later
Why
It gives a terminus post quem and nothing more. Wear is the clock: nearly-new narrows the interval to a few years, worn smooth may mean fifty years of pockets before it was dropped. The gap between strike and deposition is the whole art.
Practise Numismatics and Epigraphy
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