Coin Finds of the Huddersfield District
By Graham Teasdill
Edited By E. W. Aubrook

CHAPTER 1: ANCIENT BRITISH COINS

The gold staters and silver coins used by the Ancient Britons were local copies of the gold stater of Philip II of Macedon, which was used extensively in trade towards the end of the pre-Christian era. The laureate head of the Greek god Apollo on the obverse became a simple laurel wreath, and a crude horse represented the horse-drawn chariot on the reverse of the Macedonian stater. The Ancient British coinage ceased when the Roman armies occupied Yorkshire about 70 A.D.

Of the Ancient British coins found in the Huddersfield District one found at Lightcliffe is attributed to the Corisolites, an Armorican tribe inhabiting the Brittany coast, but the remainder belongs to a single group which was until recently regarded as the coinage of the Brigantes, the tribe which inhabited this part of Britain. A recent paper on this series by Mr. D.F. Allen has indicated the necessity of further consideration of these coins and the opportunity is now taken to describe them in the light of present knowledge.

Allen’s distribution of the series to the Coritani, the tribe which inhabited the territory immediately south of that of the Brigantes, is based upon a detailed survey of find spots and, as he points out, the presence of hoards such as those at Lightcliffe and Honley is no guarantee that the coins circulated in the Huddersfield district as they may have been deposited by Coritanian refugees.

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