The Damhus Hoard: New Insights Into Some of the Earliest Viking Silver Coinage

Abstract

In 2018, a hoard totalling 266 silver Viking Age coins was discovered near Damhus, south of Ribe (Denmark). The coins belong to the early ninth-century ‘KG 4’ series, with the vast majority, 262 coins, identified as having Face/Forward Looking Deer on the obverse/reverse. They are among the earliest type of a reformed coinage from Scandinavia's first town, Ribe (Denmark)—some of the first Viking silver pennies. Chemical and lead isotopic analyses of 25 specimens reveal that they are consistent with the admixture of contemporaneous Western (European) silver coinage and the arrival of Eastern silver (homogenised Islamic dirhams) from the first half of the ninth-century. The results indicate that, aside from recycling existing Western silver in circulation, Eastern Islamic silver was being used in Denmark on a major scale from as early as the 820/30s—providing valuable insights into the origins of early Viking Age silver.