COIN

Merovingian tremisses are extremely rare finds in the Midlands.

Comments made by Dr Arent Pol (2021 pers. comm.) on the identification of this coin are as follows:

Designs and legends of this tremissis are essentially more or less standard, but in exactly this combination not seen before, nor are there any stylistically close parallels available that could help us further. The obverse clearly reads BRIODERO VIC. As such a place name (here with qualification) on one side usually goes with the name of a moneyer on the other, I seem to decipher fairly easily most of the reverse as …AOGVLFO M (for …augulfus monetarius). Between the small cross at 6h and the -A- at 9h, however, there are some (two? three?) letters that undoubtedly belong to the name of the moneyer. I'm unable to make a suggestion as to what the beginning could be, alas.

With regard to identifying the mint I find myself in trouble too. Earlier I indeed suggested to bring this new coin together with two others with the same legend BRIODRO (Belfort 903+943 and 942). These are attributed to Briare (département Loiret) and I have no reason to disregard that identification since the type of these coins is very common in the Orléans region. The present BRIODERO coin, however, does not comply typologically with them. There is another tremissis (Belfort 990-991) where the place name is spelled in exactly the same way, this time without qualification (and another moneyer). That item, however, I prefer to see as not from the Orléans region since the reverse complies better with what we sometimes see appear in Normandy/Picardy (Avranches, Bayeux, Amiens). The problem is that BRIODRO and BRIODERO (accusative) are different spellings of an original Brivodurum – a generic name that indicates a 'bridge at a (fortified) riverine settlement'.