COINAGE OF THE NORWEGIANS IN DUBLIN.
(See page 338.)
While this work was going through the press, a silver coin, forming an entirely new and highly remarkable contribution to our knowledge of the early Norwegian coinage in the capital of Ireland, was discovered among the collection bequeathed by the late Mr. Devegge to the Royal Cabinet of Coins in Copenhagen. It is represented in the annexed woodcut.
[[++]] Coin: Olaf in Dublin.
The legend on the obverse is “Oolaf i divielin,” or “Olaf in Dublin.” That on the reverse almost seems to be “Oolafn me feci(t),” or “Olaf made me;” in which case the coiner must have had the same Scandinavian name as the king. However this may be, it is clear enough that the coin owes its origin to a Norwegian or Scandinavian king Olaf in Dublin; and, as the stamp shows, it must have been struck in the tenth century. It thus forms a link between the runic coin of Canute in Dublin, and the somewhat later coins of Sigtryg, before described. (See p. 338, et seq.)
A great number of coins have been mentioned as minted in Ireland by Scandinavian kings named Olaf; but that above delineated is in reality the first, and, as far as is known, the only one on which we can with certainty read “Olaf in Dublin.”
Kings of that name are mentioned in the Irish chronicles in the years 853, 934, 954, 962, &c. (See the list of Norwegian Kings in Ireland, p. 317.)
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