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MEDIEVAL COIN HOARD FOUND IN ISRAELMost coin hoard found in present-day Israel date to ancient times. Here's a medieval coin hoard find. It was discovered in 2018, but not reported until recently. -Editor 
Archaeologists have discovered a hoard of gold and silver coins by the remains of a centuries-old synagogue in Israel, near the Sea of Galilee. The hoard of 364 coins, which was unearthed at the archaeological site of Huqoq (also spelled Yaquq), dates to the 15th century. The team found the stash within two jugs under the collapsed wall of the synagogue. Most of the coins are from medieval Venice or the Mamluk sultanate, which controlled the region at the time. It's unclear why the jugs were filled with coins and left at the site, Robert Kool, a curator in the Israel Antiquities Authority's coin department, wrote in a paper published in the latest issue of the American Journal of Numismatics. The earliest of the Venetian coins dates to the time that Francesco Dandolo was doge (leader of Venice), between 1329 and 1339, while the latest Venetian coins date to the reign of Francesco Foscari, from 1423 to 1457, Kool wrote. Many of the Venetian coins have images depicting St. Mark the Evangelist, who is traditionally ascribed as the author of the Gospel of Mark, as well as Latin inscriptions that can be translated as "It is to You, Christ, that this Duchy is entrusted which You govern," Kool wrote.
During medieval times in the eastern Mediterranean, Venetian coins were widely used as an export currency. "By the end of the fourteenth century [Venetian] ducats were the only European gold currency accepted in Mamluk Egypt and Syria," Kool wrote in the study. Most of the Mamluk coins in the hoard were minted during the reign of Sultan al-Ashraf Barsbay, from 1422 to 1438, Kool wrote. There are also a few coins from other locations in Southern Europe, such as a silver coin minted during the reign of James I, who was king of Sicily from 1285 to 1295, and even a coin from Serbia.
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Wayne Homren, Editor The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
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