Experiencing the Republican Empire: a numismatic perspective

his article takes three case studies of ‘Republican provincial coinage’ in the eastern Mediterranean as a starting point to examine what provincial coinage in the Roman Republic can reveal about Roman hegemony in this period. he case studies demonstrate the divergent experience of Roman power before the rule of Augustus; while in Boeotia Roman contact appears to have brought about a decline in minting, within Achaea production continued as the Romans used local coinage for their own (likely military) purposes. Finally an examination of the currency of Crete and Cyrenaica reveals how numismatic iconography from this period can relect Roman conceptions of power, and the Roman perception of the regions they had conquered. hese three case studies reveal the potential of this type of evidence, traditionally the prerogative of ‘Greek’ numismatists, in aiding our understanding of Roman expansion and Roman ideologies.