Coin finds in Tarnovo

• Golden HordeKhan Tokhta (1290–1312) · 1 coin; Khan Janibeg (1342–1357) · 3 coins; anonymous · 1 coinCopper puls struck in the Crimea.
• IsacceaKhan Nogai (1296–1300) · 3 coins; Khan Chaka (1296–1300) · 1 coin; imitations of Khan Tokhta · 2 coins; the despotate of Isaccea (1285–1296) · 1 coin; anonymous · 2 coinsSaqchi, Nogai's capital. The six dirhams are a single hoard from Tsarevets.
• DrastarDespot John Dobrotitsa (1367–1379) · 2 coins; Terter, son of Dobrotitsa (1386–1388) · 1 coin
• ArgeșVladislav I (1364–1377) · 10 coins; Radu I (1377–1383) · 1 coin; Mircea I (1386–1418) · 5 coinsThe sixteen Wallachian coins. Dochev does not divide them between the two mints.
• SeverinWallachia's second mint, working from the end of the 14th century.
• VidinIvan Sratsimir (1356–1396) · 46 coins
• AdrianopleTheodore Branas (1206–1208) · 4 coins
• Constantinoplethe Komnenoi and Angeloi (1092–1204); Latin imitations (1204–1261); the Palaiologoi (1258–1391)Constantinople and Thessaloniki together: 5,178 coins of the Komnenoi and Angeloi, 2,571 Latin imitations and 883 coins of the Palaiologoi.
• NicaeaTheodore I Laskaris (1208–1222) · 32 coins
• MagnesiaJohn III Doukas Vatatzes (1222–1254) · 13 coinsGold hyperpyra.
• ThessalonikiTheodore Komnenos Doukas (1224–1230) · 28 coins; Manuel Komnenos Doukas (1230–1237) · 119 coins; John Komnenos Doukas (1237–1244) · 156 coinsAlso Byzantine and Latin issues; see Constantinople.
• ThebesGuillaume de la Roche (1280–1287) · 1 coin; Guy II de la Roche (1287–1308) · 1 coinThe Duchy of Athens.
• ArtaDespot John II Orsini (1323–1335) · 117 coinsThe Despotate of Epirus.
• ClarentzaLouis of Burgundy (1313–1316) · 1 coinThe Principality of Achaea.
• DubrovnikLatin imitations, series C-D-U (1204–1261) · 624 coinsThe mint is uncertain: Constantinople or Dubrovnik.
• VeniceDoge Ranieri Zeno (1253–1268) · 1 coin; Doge Lorenzo Tiepolo (1268–1275) · 3 coins; Doge Jacopo Contarini (1275–1280) · 2 coins; Doge Pietro Gradenigo (1289–1311) · 1 coinSilver grossi. Five imitations struck in Bulgaria were also found.

After К. Дочев, „Монети и парично обръщение в Търново (XII–XIV в.)“, Велико Търново, 1992, fig. 4. Places are drawn at their real positions.

The capital paid in foreign coin too, above all when its own ran short.

• Byzantium: the Komnenoi and Angeloi

  1092–1204 · Gold, Electrum, Billon, Copper

  The money the restored kingdom started with. Coins from the early 12th century are few, but after Manuel I, and especially after 1186 when Tarnovo became the capital, their number jumps: over 4,700 of the 5,178 are Isaac II's and Alexios III's. Almost all are billon cup coins.

  5,178 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Latin imitations

  1204–1257 · Copper

  Copper cup coins struck after 1204 on Byzantine models: nearly 70% of all coins in Tarnovo for 1204–1257. They fall into three series: the large A-B (Constantinople) and A-C (Thessalonica) of 1204–1230, series C-D-U of 1220–1240, and the small series A-H of 1210–1240, which accounts for 1,858 of the Tarnovo coins. Dochev sees Venice behind them: a treaty of 1219 binds the Venetians not to copy Nicaea's coins, and some imitations show the patron saints of Venice and Dubrovnik, unknown on Byzantine coins. Dubrovnik, with the sweeping trade rights Ivan Asen II granted it, was their main importer into Bulgaria. The coins came in large sums and were adapted to the lower Bulgarian weight.

  2,571 coins found in Tarnovo

• Theodore Branas

  1206–1208 · Billon

  Four cup coins of the 'mysterious Theodore', credited either to a Byzantine rebel at Philadelphia or to Tsar Peter. Dochev reads the letters by the figure as BRANAS: these are coins of Theodore Branas, the Latin emperor's vassal who held Adrianople and Didymoteicho from 1206. No imperial title, but a double cross, the mark of a protector of the Orthodox. They were probably struck at Adrianople.

  4 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Empire of Nicaea

  1208–1258 · Gold, Billon

  Nicaea kept the Komnenian system: gold, silver and billon struck at Nicaea and Magnesia, and from 1246 at Thessalonica. The emperors' family patron saints appear on the coins, and so do the star and the lily that later mark the Palaiologoi. Of Theodore I Tarnovo has only billon, most of it small imitations. More telling are John III Vatatzes's 13 gold hyperpyra, all from the residential quarters of Tsarevets, where they filled the gap left by other money.

  69 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Empire of Thessalonica

  1224–1244 · Silver, Copper

  After Klokotnitsa (1230) Thessalonica depended on Bulgaria for some 10–15 years and its copper flowed north freely: Tarnovo has 28 of Theodore Doukas, 119 of Manuel Doukas and 156 of John Doukas. The young John Doukas's coins are the most inventive: he is shown as an angel with spread wings, with cherubim, seraphim and a crescent moon, and one type has the earliest Saint Nicholas on a Byzantine coin. He struck in three sizes, from 23–25 down to 13–16 mm, and nearly every type has a match in the smaller series.

  303 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Palaiologoi

  1258–1341 · Gold, Billon, Copper

  883 single finds of 128 types, more than 15 of them previously unknown: the largest number of Palaiologan coins found in Bulgaria. They arrived unevenly. Under Michael VIII they are few, because Constantine Asen's copper was enough, but from 1280 to 1330 they were used in bulk, while Bulgarian coin was scarce and trade with Byzantium – grain exports to Constantinople above all, after Theodore Svetoslav married a Byzantine princess – brought money in. After Andronikos III they almost vanish: Ivan Alexander's coins covered every need.

  883 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Frankish principalities: Achaea and Athens

  1280–1316 · Silver, Billon

  The crusader states in Greece struck flat tornesi on Louis IX's model from the mid-13th century, at Clarenza for Achaea and at Thebes for Athens. Tarnovo has yielded only three, of Guillaume and Guy II de la Roche and of Louis of Burgundy; elsewhere in Bulgaria they turn up only at Kardzhali and Melnik.

  3 coins found in Tarnovo

• Epirus: John II Orsini

  1323–1335 · Billon, Copper

  The Epirote despot's tornesi copy the French king Louis IX's denier and were struck in quantity. They reached Tarnovo because Michael Shishman's few coins did not cover petty trade. Some are overstruck with stamena of Andronikos III from Thessalonica, probably when the emperor brought Epirus under him in 1335.

  117 coins found in Tarnovo

• Serbia

  1282–1367 · Silver, Copper

  Three silver grossi of King Milutin and four copper coins of 1355–1367. Despite the shared border Serbian money barely came in: Serbia moved to silver on the mark as early as the 1250s, while Bulgaria stayed with the pound and the hyperpyron. Serbian grossi turn up mainly in western Bulgaria.

  7 coins found in Tarnovo

• Venice

  1253–1311 · Silver

  Only eight grossi, from Ranieri Zeno to Pietro Gradenigo, and five imitations struck somewhere in north-western Bulgaria at the weight of Bulgarian silver (1.40 g). The reason is not a lack of trade but different systems: Venice reckoned in a silver mark of 238.5 g, Bulgaria in hyperpyra. So in the 13th century Venice itself traded here with coins of Byzantine type, and the grosso came in only once Bulgaria began striking silver. After Ivan Alexander there are no grossi in Tarnovo, though Venetian records of trade with Bulgaria from that time are plentiful.

  13 coins found in Tarnovo

• The Golden Horde

  1285–1357 · Silver, Copper

  The earliest are a trace of the drama around 1300: a copper coin from Isaccea, Khan Nogai's capital in northern Dobrudzha, and a small hoard from Tsarevets with three dirhems of Nogai, one of his son Chaka and two imitations of Khan Tokhta's dirhems. Chaka briefly held the Tarnovo throne before Theodore Svetoslav overthrew him. The later copper puls of Tokhta, Janibeg and from the Crimea most likely came with the Tatar mercenaries Michael Shishman and Ivan Alexander led against Byzantium.

  14 coins found in Tarnovo

• Wallachia

  1364–1418 · Silver

  The Wallachian voivodes began striking silver only under Vladislav I (1364–1377), with Cyrillic legends and a weight close to the Bulgarian silver of Tarnovo and Vidin, because Wallachia had paid in Bulgarian coin until then and went on using it in large amounts. Tarnovo has yielded 16 Wallachian coins: 10 of Vladislav I, 1 of Radu I and 5 of Mircea I.

  16 coins found in Tarnovo

Most of the coins come from Tsarevets, the most densely settled hill, and from the monasteries below it. Trapezitsa and the other quarters have barely been dug.

• Tsarevets – the residential quarters

  The most densely settled part of the city. The quarters on the southern and north-western slopes, home to craftsmen, traders, soldiers and servants, have yielded about 4,500 single coins: the trace of everyday small trade.

  11 hoards found here

• Tsarevets – the Palace

  Few single coins come from the Palace and the Patriarchate. But a ground-floor room of the Palace held a hoard of 791 silver coins of Ivan Alexander with Michael Asen, a large sum for its day.

  5 hoards found here

• The Great Lavra and St Demetrius monasteries

  About 2,000 coins come from the two monasteries on the terraces by the Yantra. Fairs were held on their feast days, which made them centres of trade too. Here too are the rubbish pits full of cut coins thrown out after Constantine Asen's reform.

  5 hoards found here

• Strelbishteto

  Find-spot of the largest hoard from Tarnovo: 4,356 billon coins, mostly of Isaac II and Alexios III, with 443 Bulgarian imitations.

  1 hoard found here

• Trapezitsa

  The hill has hardly been excavated since the digs of 1900. Of 33 coins found there by chance, 24 are Bulgarian. A hoard of 20–30 silver coins of Ivan Alexander with Michael Asen came to light at its foot in 1984.

  1 hoard found here

• Momina Krepost and Frenk Hisar

  Only partly excavated, but the coins show money moving here as busily as on Tsarevets, whoever lived there.

• Tarnovo, spot unrecorded

  The hoards 'Tarnovo I–VI', known only to come from the city.

  5 hoards found here

28 hoards of the 12th–14th centuries found in Tarnovo, largest first.