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Unearthing a Roman crime scene

22 January 2025

Murray Andrews (UCL Institute of Archaeology) has recently appeared on BBC’s Digging for Britain, discussing an important new find of Roman counterfeit coin moulds.

Digging for Britain Series 12 Trailer image with an image of Alice Roberts standing in the landscape with a gold DFB logo  (Courtesy of Rare TV/BBC)

The coin moulds were found during excavations at Castleford, West Yorkshire, which were directed by Archaeological Services WYAS.

Dating to the mid- to late third century AD, the moulds were made by impressing genuine coins into clay discs, which would have been filed with molten metal to produce debased counterfeit coins. Counterfeiting was a severe crime in the Roman Empire, punishable by exile and even crucifixion, and it is possible that the moulds were hidden in order to prevent their discovery by local officials.

According to Murray Andrews:

This important new find gives us a fresh glimpse of money and criminality in the countryside of Roman Yorkshire. The survival of the individual mould fragments is remarkable, and further study will help us to unpick the story behind why they were made – and, just as importantly, why and how they found their way into the ground."

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