The Tereshky coin and material hoard (2025) as a source for studying the monetary circulation in the settlements of the Chernyakhiv culture during the Gothic-Roman wars and the crisis of the Roman Empire of the 3rd-century AD

Abstract

The purpose of the new scientific research was to comprehensively analyze and introduce into the scientific circulation a new Roman coin-material hoard of the 2nd-early 4th centuries AD, discovered in the fall of 2025 in a garden near the village of Tereshky, Zhmerynka (former Bar) district, Vinnytsia region. The research methodology is based on the widespread use of the scientific principles during the study of the Tereshky Treasure 2025: historicism, objectivity, reliability. When studying the numismatic material, the methods of comparing coin finds with the catalogues, visual and stamp analysis, chronological, weighing and measuring were used. The scientific novelty lies in the value of studying the rare in composition and understudied treasures of the 3rd – early 4th centuries consisting of the Roman coins, in particular antoninians from the period of the Gothic-Roman wars and the crisis of the Roman Empire of the 3rd century. Conclusions. Having examined 9 Roman coins, including 6 coins of the so-called “soldier emperor”: Gordian III, Philip I, Trebonial Gallus, Claudius Gothicus, Aurelian, Maximian, we discovered the close connection between the policy of these Roman emperors and the Gothic-Slavic population of the Chernyakhiv settlements between the Dniester and Southern Buh rivers. The author of the research, analyzing the Roman antoninians, the composition of the metal, and their state of preservation, concludes that there were intense economic and political crisis processes in the Roman society during the Gothic-Roman wars of the 30s-70s of the 3rd century AD which led to the devaluation of the main monetary units of the Roman coins: gold aurei, silver denarii, billon antoninians, brass sesterces and dupondii and the accumulation of full-fledged gold and silver coins in the treasuries. At the end of the 3rd – beginning of the 4th century AD, bronze and copper antoninians, denarii, follis and ases began to prevail in the monetary circulation of the Roman Empire and its provinces. The local Chernyakhiv population continued to use in the monetary circulation, along with the inferior coin of the middle of the 3rd – beginning of the 4th century, high-quality silver denarii of the 1st-2nd centuries AD, as evidenced by the presence in the Tereshky treasure of silver denarii of the emperors Antoninus Pius (138 – 161) and Marcus Aurelius (161 – 180) in good condition with the silver content of over 70%. Thus, similar to the Tereshky, Haisyn, Perehin and Tereshovets’ hoards of the Roman denarii and antoninians found in Podillya in the recent decades, raise the urgent problem of the Roman-barbarian relations, the sources and ways of spreading the Roman coins and plastic, the consequences of the Roman-Gothic wars of the 30s – 70s of the 3rd century AD, which deepened the crisis of the slave-owning Roman society and the attempt to use the Slavic-Gothic military units to protect the eastern Roman provinces for a certain monetary reward. The material available in 60 coin-and-thing hoards and individual finds in the Bar land of Podillya, which contains Roman coins of the 1st – 4th centuries AD, confirms the high density of the settlement of the studied territory by the Slavic and Gothic tribes of the Chernyakhiv culture of the 3rd – 4th centuries AD convincingly testify to the stable, long-term ties of the local population with the Roman Empire.