Item 1978/1 - Letter from John Brand to Jeffrey North and copied to Peter Woodhead

1 item, paper

Copy of letter from John Brand to Jeffrey North and copied to Peter Woodhead, typescript, two pages on two folios (recto only), dated 22 February 1978, regarding the 3/4 facing sterlings of Aquitaine. JDB writes that he has heard from PW about JJN's abandoned note on these coins, observing that whereas JJN was seeking to date the coins to about 1305, he has been trying to put them late, after 1330, but not on the basis of any evidence. Most of the remainder of the letter is turned over to JDB's comments on JJN's arguments. The hoard evidence (from Cockburnspath and Carsphairn), according to JDB, suggests that the coins "need not be before 1330". He thinks that JJN has gotten "tangled up in the mutations of the coinage of Philippe le faux-monnoyeur" and suggests that "French regal issues of 1307" cannot be compared "with documents of 1305". He discusses the reading of the unusual combination of legend on Edwardian obols and suggests dating the coins in the 1340s or 1350s rather than the 1320s. He describes the 1325 Tower issues as the maille blanche and "black" double burdelais. The English groat, he says, was always tariffed at four pence while the gros tournois was initially tariffed at twelve deniers tournois under Louis IX but soon lost that relationship. He notes the relative wealth of the documentary evidence for Aquitaine but also highlights discrepancies between the written sources and the numismatic evidence, for example in the "known issues of coin for which no specimens survive". Finally, he says that he has no record of the 3/4 facing sterlings of Aquitaine having been found in France and therefore wonders whether the mint and are of circulation lay elsewhere.

For later related correspondence from Jeffrey North to Ian Stewart, see JCPP/Stewartby/1/1/NORTH/2000/1