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Getting Started with Celtic Coins – Crude and Barbarous, or Just Different?

“I paint objects as I think them, not as I see them” Pablo Picasso People who are unfamiliar with Celtic coins sometimes describe them as crude or barbarous, suggesting that the Celts were unskilled artists. On the contrary, the archaeological record shows that they were very skilled artists, engravers and metal workers, so we need […]

Over time, the need or desire to look similar to the originals faded, and the Celts were able to make the imagery their own, which they did through a process of disintegration, abstraction and reintegration. A new feature, a hair bar, has appeared, which was inspired by Hera on the coins of Tarentum (“Gaulish and Early British Gold Coinage” by Dr. John Sills). However, the Celts produced the flans with very tightly controlled weights and alloy compositions, so the idea that they could do this but not get the dies the correct size is absurd.

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