Externally Funded Research Projects
- Money and Coinage before Alexander
- Roman Provincial Coinage in the Antonine Period
- Roman Provincial Coinage Online
- Medieval credit in England
- Prices in Medieval Scotland
- The excavation coins from the two early campaigns (1906-1910; 1924-1928) of the British School at Athens
- Monetary life in Later Medieval Constantinople
- Sir John Evans and the Development of Archaeology in Nineteenth-Century Europe
Prices in Medieval Scotland
Sponsor: Economic and Social Research Council.
Director: Professor Nicholas Mayhew.
Research Assistant: Dr Elizabeth Gemmill.
Commenced: 1987.
This is a full-scale study of prices in medieval Scotland, c. 1260-1542, which includes detailed discussions of coinage, and weights and measures. Nearly 6,000 prices are listed individually, average prices are calculated for each commodity, and for groups of commodities such as cereals and livestock. Scots prices are compared with English, and the significance of the data for the economic history of medieval Scotland is analysed fully.
Publication:
- Elizabeth Gemmill and Nicholas Mayhew, Changing values in medieval Scotland: a study of prices, money, and weights and measures, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
The excavation coins from the two early campaigns (1906-1910; 1924-1928) of the British School at Athens
Sponsor: British Academy.
Director: Dr Julian Baker.
Commenced: 2005.
In excess of 4000 coins and related objects, spanning the entire spectrum from classical to modern Greek times, were unearthed at Sparta during the indicated campaigns. The aim of this project is the complete study and publication of this material.
Monetary life in Later Medieval Constantinople
Sponsor: British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara.
Director: Dr Julian Baker.
Commenced: 2004.
This project is designed around the rich holdings of the Numismatic Collection of the Archaeological Museum, Istanbul and in collaboration with its curator T. Göky?ld?r?m. The primary focus is on the hoarded and stray material from within the city itself which dates to the Palaiologan period (1261-1453). It comprises Byzantine, western-style medieval, and Ottoman issues.
Publication:
- ‘Later medieval monetary life in Constantinople’, Anatolian Archaeology, 9, 2003, p. 35-36.
Sir John Evans and the Development of Archaeology in Nineteenth-Century Europe
Sponsor: Leverhulme Trust 2005- (for three years)
Directors: Dr Arthur MacGregor and Professor Nicholas Mayhew
Researchers: Dr Susanne Bangert, Dr Cathy King, and Alison Roberts.
The Ashmolean houses both the artefact collection and documentary archives of Sir John Evans (1823-1908), a pioneer figure in the fields of both prehistoric archaeology and of numismatics in Britain. From the numismatic point of view the project will focus on John Evans as a collector, and on his contribution to Iron Age, Roman, and English Medieval numismatics. John Evans provided the only authoritative works then available on Iron Age coins, or Ancient British coins as they were known. He also devised a classification for English Short Cross Coinage (1180-1247), which survived virtually unchallenged for half a century.