Instrument Representations on Coins

Iconography | IC000

Find Spot: France, Germany, Israel, Switzerland, UK

Current Location: France, Germany, Israel, Switzerland, UK

Description: Coin listings are grouped according to their utility in the research on brass instruments. For this reason, as those depicting the karnyx are by far the most prolific and invaluable in their representations, they are listed as a category. two categories are provided; karnyx coins and other-instrument coins.

Karnyx Coins

Two different types of coins depict the karnyx, those from the Native peoples of Europe showing their own instrument and the Roman coins which depict the instruments of the people they subjugated.

The references for individual type coins are as shown below. The coins are then listed under their individual IC numbers. In the case of the Native European coins, i.e. those from France, Switzerland and the UK, these are illustrated below as there are different varieties of these.

Native European Coins:

French Coins:

Coins of the Native tribes from France:

British Coins:

The coins of the Native tribes from Britain depict the five different instruments shown below with a number of different varieties of theseexisting, particularly the karnyces. Interstingly, the five instruments shown bear a striking similarity of type to those seen on the Cumae frieze (IC498):

Swiss Coins:

Coins of the Native tribes from Switzerland:

Non-Karnyx Coins

Coins from Israel

Only one group of coins from Israel shows a brass instrument, these being the Bar Kochbar coins which show the chatsotserah. The type coin for this group is IC033

Image: Coin illustrated: IC033b