As long as there have been coins, there have been counterfeiters. Tribes to the north of Greece imitated Greek bronze and silver coins as early as 450 BC. "Counterfeits" is a strong word to describe some of the coinage imitating official mint products. "Imita-tions" is perhaps a better word to describe most bar-barous coins. Imitation is the highest form of flattery and this coinage not only allowed for economic flex-ibility (as opposed to a barter economy) but were also a symbol of a cultured existence. Although there is some evidence that these Greek imitations were used in trade with the Greek city states. it is not likely that this was a prevalent practice. Early imitative silver coins are rarely found with hordes of official Greek coins and the bronze coins are generally cast and are quite inferior to "real" Greek coins. These imitation coins served as local currency to the tribes to the north and trade with the Greeks would still have been a bartered exchange.

The height of the imitative coins were in the 3rd and 4th centuries AD. The 3rd and 4th Centuries were a chaotic time in western Europe. and almost forced the issue of unofficial coins. The order that the Ro-man Empire had provided for the past five centuries was quickly eroding. At the same time the "Barbar-ic" tribes to the north and west of the Roman Empire were becoming more organized and technologically advanced. The true counterfeit coins of this period were produced within the confines of the empire. These rogues (often imperial mint employees or suppliers to mint facilities) created very nice (if they didn't actually obtain official dies) renditions of imperial coins. The silver coins were extremely debased or washed with silver and bronze coins were seldom worth the effort to counterfeit. (Later that century the imperial mints started using debased silver and silver washed coins and they should not be confused with earlier copies.) These coins were minted with the intent to defraud. The imitative coins of the northern tribes were rarely made for this purpose. Certainly there were a few instances where the Celtic or Germanic tribes probably tried to pass off their coins as imperial issues, but in most instances if you were a marauding band of barbarians you could take goods by force and needn't bother with a medium of exchange.

The name "Barbarous Radiates" came about because in the 3rd and 4th centuries the Roman Empire's basic unit (and perhaps most prolific unit) of currency was the Antoninianus or double denarius. These coins depicted the emperor's portrait on the obverse with the spiked crown of the sun god. This crown was known as a radiate crown and this crown was the indicator that the coin was worth double other coins of the same size (hence the term double denarius). These "barbarous radiates" just like the early Greek imitation served as local currency and rarely were used in trade with the Romans. Initially these coins were very close in scale and artistic style with official imperial issues, but at time progressed they became very distinctive.

Barbarous radiates circulated for an extended period of time, often for hundreds of years and the tribes developed fairly distinctive styles over the years. For instance Celtic issues have distinctive lettering ("B"s and "S"s in particular) and very fluid method of die engraving (arms and legs that are S shaped without distinctive elbows or knees). Germanic and some later tribes in Britain had a less fluid style and emperors portraits have very angular features, additionally they rarely had legends on their coins. Although these radiates circulated for hundreds of years they generally (almost without exception) imitate the portraits of late 3rd century emperors (Postumus 259-268 AD, Victorinus 265-270 AD, Tetricus I 270-273 A.D, Tetricus II 270-273 AD, Claudius II "Gothicus" 268-270 AD, Tacitus 275-276 AD, and Probus 276-282 AD).

Since they were imitations of 3rd century issues into the 6th century, the later issues were probably a copy of a copy or potentially a copy of a copy with a long ancestry of imitative coins. This occurred because imperial issues generally did not circulate for hun-dreds of years and this was especially true for the western half of the empire when it was abandoned in the late 5th century. When the Roman Empire disin-tegrated in the west, the citizenry (well. at these the ones wealthy enough to do so) fled to the east and the protection of whatever legions remained. They took with them their knowledge of mining and refining ore and minting procedures. Both were very impor-tant in the manufacture of quality coins. The western and northern tribes were forced to make due with what metals they had on hand at the end of the western Roman era.

To paraphrase an old economic adage "If the size of the pie is fixed, and the number of participants that vie for the pie increases, each individual slice is re-duced." Nowhere is this better illustrated than the far western reaches of the old Roman empire where in-digenous metals are scarce… they simply quartered imperial issues or older barbarous radiates and struck over whatever facade still existed on each wedge. These coins were very crudely done, and no attempt was made to dull the angular edges. Some tribes (generally ones in the 6th century) had developed the technology to recycle existing copper and bronze alloys and cast new planchets to be struck. These new planchets were considerably smaller than the original coins. Whereas, an original imperial antoninianus might be 19-24 mm in diameter, the new radiates (called minimi for their size) could be as small as 5 mm in diameter. Nonetheless, the barbaric celators still tried to make a recognizable obverse and re-verse. No matter how hard they tried there was very little "canvas" to ply their artistic trade. Generally speaking these minimi do not have legends and they have sticklike figures rather than more corpulent vis-ages. The lack of artistic style was of very little con-sequence, the coins of the day were really based on a bullion system and currency valuations were based on the actual weight of the coin. During these uncer-tain times, many barbarous radiates were invariably melted down into a more useable form such as an arrowhead or a blade.

Barbarous radiates are often overlooked in the nu-mismatic world. Certainly they are not generally aesthetically pleasing, and finding an excellent ex-ample is actually quite difficult. Additionally, since they were minted over such a long period of time and typically they are very crude, it difficult to ascertain the emperor they were meaning to imitate or some-times even the coins region or origin. This difficulty does intimidate some collectors. but to someone will-ing to do a bit of research it does afford the opportu-nity to find overlooked treasures. Barbarous radiates are relatively inexpensive and price is almost entirely dependent upon condition...a decent specimen can be found for less than $20 and a crude example for as lit-tle as $1. They will not win any beauty contests. but they are a wonderful lesson in early numismatics and one of the few examples of a historical record from the time following the Roman occupation of western Europe.

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