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The Monetary Reform of Solon: a Correction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2013

J. G. Milne
Affiliation:
Oxford

Extract

When discussing the monetary reform of Solon, I adopted the view that he obtained his supplies of silver for his new coinage from Corinth: it was obviously necessary for the success of his scheme that he should get silver from some market other than Aegina, and Corinth appeared to be the only place that would ‘ fill the bill’: she had a coinage on a standard independent of Aegina, with the same unit of weight for the stater as that adopted by Solon, and it seemed probable that the stations established by Periander on the Illyrian coast would enable her to procure silver from the mines in the interior. But recent research by Mr. John May has shown that these mines were situated much further from the Adriatic than had been inferred from Strabo's account : the centre of the mining region was Damastium, and the site of Damastium, on the evidence of coin-finds, was clearly near Scupi (Skoplje) and the upper valley of the Axius.

Type
Notes
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies 1938

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References

1 JHS 1. (1930), 179Google Scholar.

2 Mr. May's account is now in the press.

3 Basel sale 22/3/1937, lot 302.