File:Saxon Coin 24.jpg

English: An early 7th-century gold tremissis minted in Merovingian France or Friesland by an otherwise unknown moneyer or petty king named Audulf,¹² misrepresented as one of the "Saxon" coins decorating the margins of Moll's map of Huntingdonshire, sold separately and as Map 24 in his Set of Fifty New and Correct Maps of England and Wales..., miscopied from Figure 20 of Tabula I Nummi Saxonici on Page 135 of Obadiah Walker's "Notes on the Saxon Coins" appended to Edmund Gibson's English edition of William Camden's Britannica, itself miscopied from a marginal illustration on page 310 of John Speed's History of Great Britaine... Speed misunderstood the coin as having been issued by the East Anglian king Ealdwulf of East Anglia. A 1606 note on the English coin by Fabri de Peiresc makes it clear that Speed's garbled inscription and misrepresentation of the coin as silver were mistakes and not the result of a coin type distinct from the 3 other surviving examples of this issue.¹ Whether Frankish or Frisian, the coin is a late example of the tremissis originally intended to represent ⅓ solidus. The tremissis is also described as a triens &c. in Frankish contexts and a thrymsa &c. in Anglo-Saxon English contexts. As such, this coin type is now usually described as an "Audulfus Frisia Triens".¹ Griegson notes this particular coin is AV 13 mm 1.34 g with a diademed bust facing right obverse and a cross potent on a triangular base and step reverse. The actual coin has an upper-case alpha (Α) under the cross's left arm and a lower-case omega (ω) under the cross's left arm, both connected upwards to create the appearance of a scale. Speed's engraving mistook these for a single vine, copied by subsequent printers and scholars until it was sometimes further mistaken for a snake. Speed's engraving turned the actual coin's 6-pointed star into a 5-pointed one; Walker and subsequent printings omitted it.

Notes:
Obverse: AVDVLF+VSPRISIN [AVDVLFI+VSPRISIN in Walker, AVDVLFI+VSFRISIN in Speed, AVDVLFVSFRISIA in De Peiresc & on the actual coin, Audulfus Frisia, generally understood as intending either "Audulf King in Frisia" or "Minted by Audulf the Frisian"]
Reverse: VICTVRIAADVLFO [idem in Walker & Speed, VICTVRIA AVDVLFO in De Peiresc & on the actual coin, intending VICTORIA AVDVLFO, generally understood as either commemorating "Victory by Audulf" over the Franks, some other local enemy, or paganism or as a partially garbled mimicking of earlier tremisses and solidi, particularly the CHLOTARII VICTVRIA issues of Clothar II³]
Walker's (erroneous) note stated "20. The twentieth, is of Adulf or Aldulf, King of the East Angles, son of Ethelwald's brother; a very worthy and pious prince, as appears by the reverse; a great friend to venerable Bede: what Prisin means I know not. The reverse is remarkable, because his name is otherwise spelled than upon the coins." Speed's (erroneous) note said "10 An Do. 664 ALdulfe, the eldest sonne of Ethelherd and Queene Hereswith, after the death of his vncle King Edelwald, obtained the Kingdome of the East-Angles, and therein raigned without any honour or honourable action by him performed: onely his name and time of his raigne, which was nineteene yeres, is left of him by Writers: and affordeth no further relation of vs here to be inserted, besides his Coine here set." William Clarke provided pages of discussion attempting to explain the meaning of the inscription garbled by these editions.

London: Sold by H. Moll over-against Devereux-Court in the Strand; Tho. Bowles, Print and Map-Seller near the Chapter-House in St. Paul's Church-Yard, and J. Bowles Print and Map-Seller over-against Stocks-Market. 1724.

¹ Griegson
² De Nederlandsche Bank

³ Vanbrabant