THE result of the excavations made round Alise-Sainte-Reine would be sufficient to establish the identity of that locality with the Alesia of Cæsar; but the abundance of proofs can do no injury to the argument, and there is one the value of which cannot be disputed: we mean that furnished by the ancient coins found in the fosses of Camp D. (See Plate 23.) Lost in a combat, and falling into a fosse full of water, they thus escaped discovery in the immediate search made usually on a battle-field.
To establish the date of an event which has occasioned the burial of certain coins, we must first show that these coins have been struck at a period anterior to that event. Thus the coins lost at Alesia must naturally belong to a period anterior to the siege of that town.
The coins collected are in number 619; they may be divided into two distinct groups: some bear the impression of the Roman Mint, others are of the Gaulish Mint.
This being understood, let us examine separately the age of the two groups. M. le Comte de Salis and M. de Saulcy have kindly undertaken the classification.
All the Roman coins, without exception, have been struck by order and under the direction of the monetary magistrates, appointed by the government of the Republic: they belong to the republican period, and appertain to the class of coins called consular. Thanks to the labours of men like Morell, Borghesi, Cavedoni, Cohen, Mommsen, and, above all, the Comte de Salis, the age of the coins of this class is now pretty clearly determined. On the date of their emission, in general, it would be, so to say, impossible to commit an error of several years. The series of denarii and quinarii offers us the names of eighty-two magistrates, and the club, the symbol of an eighty-third; four of these denarii present neither name nor symbol; it is the same case with an as in copper, of the type of Janus with the prow of a ship, which has probably borne no other legend but the word ROMA. The most recent of these coins belong to the year 700 of Rome, or 54 B.C. The year in which the siege of Alesia took place was 702. This fact alone would serve, if needed, to demonstrate that Alise and Alesia are the same place.
The examination of the coins of Gaulish fabrication is equally important. They belong to twenty-four civitates, or different tribes. Military contingents, assembled from all parts of the Gaulish territory, have therefore taken part in the war in which these coins were lost and scattered in the soil. But the decisive fact is, that in this number we find 103 which are incontestably of Arvernan origin; one of them bears, distinctly inscribed, the name of Vercingetorix. Of 487 Gaulish coins, 103 belong to the Arverni.
We may add that, among the latter, 61 bear the name of Epasnactus, who became, after the capitulation of Alesia, a faithful ally of the Romans, and the chief of Arvernia. (De Bello Gallico, VIII. 44.) Now the coins of Epasnactus have been long well known; they may be subdivided into two classes: some, anterior to the submission of that personage, present pure Gaulish types; others, of later date, offer only Romanised types, if we may use the expression. In the fosses of Camp D have been found only coins of Epasnactus of the primitive type. The battle in which these coins were lost by the Arverni before Alise was, therefore, anterior to the year 51 B.C., the year of the submission of Epasnactus.
LIST OF ANCIENT COINS
FOUND IN THE EXCAVATIONS AT ALISE.
COINS STRUCK IN THE MINT AT ROME.