Some problems in interpreting Anglo-Saxon coinage

Abstract

This discussion of Anglo-Saxon coinage attempts to look beyond the detail of numismatic classification in order to consider the relationship between the underlying variations and the economic life of the times. Those parts of it which deal with the classification of the coinage and analyse the observed metrology are intended to be a critical summary of the numismatic research carried out in the past thirty years. Other parts, in which I seek to relate the metrology to such documentary evidence as is known to me – and thus trespass across the vague dividing line between numismatics, of which I have some knowledge, and economic history, of which I have little – are aimed at stimulating awareness and discussion of the problems involved. Finally, a section is devoted to numismatic methods because it is important that their use and limitations be generally understood.