page_title: Visigothic coinage
section_title: Historical context
hierarchical_section_title: Visigothic coinage / Historical context
caption_attribution_description: English: Map of the Visigothic kingdom. I created this work entirely by myself. Sources: Cambridge medieval history, Euratlas.
context_page_description: The coinage of the Visigoths was minted in Gaul and Hispania during the early middle ages, between the fifth century and approximately 710.
  The principal denominations were the solidus and the tremissis, gold coins issued in the late imperial era by both Western and Eastern emperors. The earliest coinage is from Gaul, where the Visigoths settled at the beginning of the fifth century, and was followed by coinage from Hispania in the beginning of the sixth century, which became the centre of Visigothic rule after they lost the majority of their territory in Gaul to the Franks.
  The first coins, commonly known as the pseudo-imperial series, imitate contemporary Roman and Byzantine coinage, with copied legends. After 580 coins were issued in the name of the Visigothic kings. This royal coinage continued until the second decade of the eighth century, when Visigothic rule was ended by the Islamic conquest of Iberia.
context_section_description: The history of the Visigoths can be divided into three important periods:
  a migratory period, which started in 376 and ended with the Visigothic settlement of south-west Gaul in 418.
  a Gallic period which ended in 507 with the battle of Vouillé, after which Clovis I, King of the Franks, conquered most of the Visigothic territories of Gaul.
  an Iberian period, which was ended by the Islamic conquest of the Iberian peninsula in 714.
  The Visigoths migrated to the Western Roman Empire in the 370s and became significantly romanized.  In 418 they were recognised as foederati, and were granted Aquitane by Honorius. This was the first centre of the Visigothic Kingdom, which over the course of the fifth century extended over the Pyrenees, including a significant portion of Hispania. In the first half of the seventh century, after the fall of the Kingdom of the Suebi (in c. 585) and the final abandonment of continental Spain by the Byzantine Empire, the Visigoths became sovereign rulers of most of the Iberian peninsula. The resulting state survived until the Islamic invasion of 711.
  In the study of the coinage of the Visigoths a different periodisation is applied. The coinage of the migratory and Gallic periods are not distinguishable, both consisting of pseudo-Imperial issues. The third period coinage can be divided into two phases, the first which continues the imitation of Imperial coinage, and the latter in which the coins are issued in the names of the Visigothic Kings.
caption: The Visigothic Kingdom under Alaric II (484-507, c. 500)
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