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Artykuły/Articles
DOI Artikel:Petac, Emanuel; Vîlcu, Aurel: About the Diobols Hoard of Apollonia Pontica and Mesembria Discovered in 1911 in Constanţa (Ancient Tomis)
DOI Seite / Zitierlink:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.57341#0048
EMANUEL PETAC, AUREL VILCU
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in the area), without understanding it as a funerary hoard. We also have a better
understanding of why only a few coins were recovered in the 1930 ’s: because they
were the remnants of the hoard discovered 25 years previously, in 1911. It should
also be recalled that the initial discovery was made just a few years before World
War I, an event which affected the Romanian Dobruja region in a dramatic way.
With all of this new data in our possession, we found a new and relevant notice
in an old personal numismatic Inventory containing the collection of M.C. Soutzu
(the chief-keeper of the Numismatic Department of the Romanian Academy from
1914 until 1933), which mentioned a significant number of diobols from Apollonia
Pontica (12 coins) that had been offered by M.C. Soutzu in 1921 (July 4th, nos.
1-13 / 902-913, today Reg. 68 PV 10334-10346) to the Numismatic Department
of the Romanian Academy. They belonged to his private collection, and had not
necessarily been found in the same year. Considering the fact that the Dobruja region
had been occupied by the Bulgarian army from the end of 1916 until September 30th
1918, and that the first part of Soutzu collection had been sent to Moscow in 1917
where it was subsequently lost during the Bolshevik revolution, only remerging in
the middle of the 20th century,10 we can easily suppose that it might have been part
of the hoard discovered in 1911 and then acquired by M.C. Soutzu after the end of
World War I. We must add that almost all of the coins from the Soutzu collection
were discovered or acquired in Romania with only a few exceptions (some small
silver objects from Egypt found around 190011 and several hundred Greek coins
from the Northern Black Sea area and Asia Minor, obtained from the collection
of Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovitch in Paris in 1930).12 A similar scenario
may be envisaged for the Alexander St. Georges Museum collection. The coins
represent a homogenous ensemble, exclusively containing diobols signed by several
magistrates which are unique to the other diobol hoards from Apollonia. Today,
based on the available information, we can estimate that around half of the initial
hoard was recovered in this way.
10 MOISIL 1933: 719; VILCU, ISVORANU and NICOLAE 2006: 4.
11 Inventory of the M.C. Soutzu Collection (1933): 155 (Numismatic Department of the Library of
the Romanian Academy).
12 Ibidem: 189.
46
in the area), without understanding it as a funerary hoard. We also have a better
understanding of why only a few coins were recovered in the 1930 ’s: because they
were the remnants of the hoard discovered 25 years previously, in 1911. It should
also be recalled that the initial discovery was made just a few years before World
War I, an event which affected the Romanian Dobruja region in a dramatic way.
With all of this new data in our possession, we found a new and relevant notice
in an old personal numismatic Inventory containing the collection of M.C. Soutzu
(the chief-keeper of the Numismatic Department of the Romanian Academy from
1914 until 1933), which mentioned a significant number of diobols from Apollonia
Pontica (12 coins) that had been offered by M.C. Soutzu in 1921 (July 4th, nos.
1-13 / 902-913, today Reg. 68 PV 10334-10346) to the Numismatic Department
of the Romanian Academy. They belonged to his private collection, and had not
necessarily been found in the same year. Considering the fact that the Dobruja region
had been occupied by the Bulgarian army from the end of 1916 until September 30th
1918, and that the first part of Soutzu collection had been sent to Moscow in 1917
where it was subsequently lost during the Bolshevik revolution, only remerging in
the middle of the 20th century,10 we can easily suppose that it might have been part
of the hoard discovered in 1911 and then acquired by M.C. Soutzu after the end of
World War I. We must add that almost all of the coins from the Soutzu collection
were discovered or acquired in Romania with only a few exceptions (some small
silver objects from Egypt found around 190011 and several hundred Greek coins
from the Northern Black Sea area and Asia Minor, obtained from the collection
of Grand Duke Alexander Mikhailovitch in Paris in 1930).12 A similar scenario
may be envisaged for the Alexander St. Georges Museum collection. The coins
represent a homogenous ensemble, exclusively containing diobols signed by several
magistrates which are unique to the other diobol hoards from Apollonia. Today,
based on the available information, we can estimate that around half of the initial
hoard was recovered in this way.
10 MOISIL 1933: 719; VILCU, ISVORANU and NICOLAE 2006: 4.
11 Inventory of the M.C. Soutzu Collection (1933): 155 (Numismatic Department of the Library of
the Romanian Academy).
12 Ibidem: 189.