No. 58.— 1907.] 



ROMAN COINS. 



167 



In size and in general appearance the imitation and the real 

 Roman money tally pretty well ; but a closer examination of 

 the workmanship and design at once makes evident the decep- 

 tion. Of the ninety-four specimens which are sufficiently well 

 preserved to be determined, no less than twenty-six bear heads 

 facing left, the remaining sixty-eight face right. This is 27J 

 per cent, of heads to left, whereas the ordinary Roman coins 

 with hardly an exception face right. This discrepancy is 

 explainable by the fact that, although the Sinhalese coiners 

 were used to making dies for coining money, yet their own 

 designs presented" few, if any, designs that would suffer 

 from reversal, whereas in the picture of a head it is very 

 noticeable. 



Most of the faces are distinguished by rather full lips, 

 characteristic more of the Asiatic than of the European type of 

 feature; and the noses are not Roman but straight, owing, I 

 think, to lack of skill on the part of the artist. The diadem has 

 been retained ; but in several specimens the two ends of the 

 fillet, which show in the Roman coins behind the head, have 

 been exaggerated and multiplied into something resembling 

 locks of hair. But, though of crude execution, these coins 

 retain sufficient resemblance to the Roman coins to render 

 them infinitely better representations of the human form 

 divine than the figures on the later coins of Parakrama Bahu 

 and his successors. 



Evidently the craftsmen who manufactured the coins had no 

 knowledge of the Roman writing, for the inscription round the 

 head is replaced by various makeshifts, which serve to fill the 

 coin, and which indeed at a little distance or in worn specimens 

 give quite the effect of letters. In some specimens the writing 

 is represented by a series of small stars, in others by rows of 

 dots or of the figure 1, and in yet another by a serrated line 

 like a piece of string knotted at short intervals. Four or five 

 of the heads bear helmets, and in one or more this has de- 

 generated into a sort of cap, or even a turban. 



Now to turn to the reverses. Sixty of the 117 coins are 

 sufficiently clear to enable one to describe them in some detail. 

 f 36-07 



