Notă despre o monedă romană „reparată”
Note on a “repaired” Roman coin

Summary/Abstract: The study presents a remarkable Roman issue kept in the collection of the Institute of Archaeology in Iași. It is a denarius serratus of Q. Antonius Balbus (83-82 BC), which belongs to a hoard discovered in the vicinity of the Drobeta site. This coin was originally sloppily pierced to be worn as a pendant. Subsequently, at a time we cannot estimate, the hole was plugged with a metal piece. It has drawn our attention that the „repair” was carried out very carefully. The Roman craftsman tried to integrate the added material as well as possible, taking into account the metal (silver with a 97-98% fineness), colour, relief, and design of the coin. The aim was to reproduce the original appearance of the denarius as accurately as possible to reinsert it into monetary circulation in Dacia. The only analogies we have found in scholarly literature refer to perforated Roman coins, mostly of gold (aurei, solidi) and, rarely, of silver (denarii), discovered in territories outside the Empire (India and the eastcentral and north European Barbaricum), which have been „repaired” in a similar manner in order to restore their original monetary function.

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