Аннотация:«THE ERA OF JEWELLERS»: FOREIGN COINS IN NORWAY (100-1000 AD). An academic paper outlines the stages of foreign coin use in the area of modern-day Norway from 100 AD till 1000 AD. It addresses the issue of the statehood emergence in Kievan Rus, too. Debates about the Rus state appearance are closely related to the processes that took place on the Scandinavian Peninsula in the Iron Age. Thus, the Russian historian and philologist Melnikova writes: «... in what historical context did the Rus state arise and formed...? For comparison: the Scandinavian tribes, who also developed themselves without close contacts with Classical Antiquity ... their first state formations date back to the time not earlier than the 8th century AD, and the early medieval states emerged in the second half of the 10th century – the first half of the 11th century AD, simultaneously with the Kievan Rus state» (Мельникова Е., 2012. С. 30-31). Did Scandinavia really have only rather insignificant contacts with Greco-Roman world in the classical period? The paper provides an answer to this question on the basis of the archaeological finds of foreign silver and gold coins in Norway, which is situated on the west coast of Scandinavia, a part in Northern Europe the most distant from the Greco-Roman world. Such a numismatic analysis of foreign coins in Iron Age Norway is the first attempt made in Slavic historiography. Foreign coins began penetrating the territory of contemporary Norway during the period of the Roman Empire, probably in the 2nd century AD. At that time there were no trading centres and money markets in Scandinavia, therefore for centuries the Roman coin import did not deliver money for the trade as coins went to the jewellers’ workshops. Most confidently we can talk about penetration of Roman coins to the territory of modern-day Norway on the basis of coin finds made in graves. Silver denarii and gold solidi found by archaeologists often had holes and loops to carry coins as ornaments or amulets. Gold Roman solidi in Scandinavia were imitated: gold loops were attached to these imitations; sometimes imitations had additional gold frames and gold imitations of a pearl bezel. This is the way how Norwegian luxury gold medallions were produced. The paper describes the basic product lines in Scandinavian jeweller workshops, as well as the composition of a large treasure of gold jewelry from the «golden swamp» dated back to the Viking Age. The treasure was found on August 12, 1834 in Eastern Norway in the marshy area of the estate Hoen in the province of Buskerud (Hoen-skatten: Buskerud, Øvre Eiker, Hoen/Hon Nedre 79). The weight of gold coins and gold jewellery was 2.5 kg. That amount makes the Hoen Treasure the largest finding of gold jewellery from the Viking Age and one of the most important European deposits of jewellery from the era when no state existed in Scandinavia. The Hoen Treasure is the most important hoarding of gold jewellery of the Viking Age not only in Norway, but in all of Scandinavia and Eastern Europe where the Rurik dynasty began to take a form at that time. The treasure from the «golden swamp» is rightfully considered to be one of the most important collections of jewellery made in the 9th century AD, to which scientific studies in Norway, England, Germany, Denmark and Sweden are devoted. The time of hiding the treasure is often attributed to the years 875-890, which makes it not only the most important, but also one of the earliest coin hoards in the West of the Scandinavian Peninsula during the Viking Age. In Norway, the hoard became the earliest treasure of the Viking Age, in which there were coins, 20 pieces. On one of the coins we can read runic inscription. Loops were attached to all specimens turning coins from the means of payment into medallions. Among the most intriguing remarks about the Hoen Treasure should be especially emphasized two. First, gold is rarely found in the archaeological finds dated by the Viking Age, silver always prevails. Hoen Treasure consisted of two and a half kg. gold, to be precise the maximum weight among all the Norwegian finds made up to 2018. Secondly, the nine gold dinarii in the «golden swamp» resembles the gold coins in a number of treasures discovered in North Africa and the Middle East. In 991, the Anglo-Saxons started to pay the Norwegian Vikings large sums of silver money, called the «Danish tax» or danegjeld to prevent country from devastating attacks. At the end of the Viking Age the Scandinavian kingdoms almost simultaneously, shortly before year 1000, began hammering own silver coins according to the Anglo-Saxon standards. The imitative practices evolved over time to the establishment of a nation-wide monetary policy in Norway in the 11th century AD. Studies in the origins and the stages of monetary and financial policies in Norway led to the emergence of extensive Norwegian historiography and contributed to the appearance of prominent Norwegian experts in the field, such as professor of numismatics Kolbjørn Skaare (1931-2017). Norwegian numismatists, archaeologists and historians have succeeded in tracing the long and profound influence of Greco-Roman and Anglo-Saxon worlds on the Scandinavian Peninsula in the Iron Age. Ключевые слова: денарий, солид, брактеат, пенни, скеат, дирхем, динар, полудрахма. Keywords: Hoen Hoard, gold bracteates, solidus, Kufic coins, jewellery.
