iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 10/10/2026

Presumably proof to American fundamentalists that unicorns were real as they feature in the King James Version too 😉

Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 02/10/2026

For #FindsFriday unique pre-reform deniers from the same unidentified mint, struck by Pippin III (751-68) and Charlemagne (768-93), reading XPI (presumably: Christi). Found near Wijk bij Duurstede and Laon respectively. Both now up for auction in November. elsen.bidinside.com/en/cat/167/2...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 01/10/2026

This is brilliant! Congratulations to you both on a fascinating find and careful exposition of its implications.

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 28/09/2026

First autumn colours on my way to work - beautiful! 😍

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 27/09/2026

A fabulous collection of Carolingian coins is currently up for sale in Brussels, including no fewer than four (undoubtedly genuine) portrait coins of Charlemagne! #medievalsky elsen.bidinside.com/en/cat/167/2...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 25/09/2026

Latest post from the Mørstad hoard - a silver penny of Heinrich II (1014-24) copying a gold Byzantine coin from the 9th century. #medievalsky #findsFriday

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 24/09/2026

From The Week magazine a while back...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 23/09/2026

"c. 850"? That's a very weird date! 840 - yes! That makes sense in terms of elites and magnates. But 850? And even more strange, circa 850? I'm sure there's a reason but it's not obvious... 🤔

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 19/09/2026

I've had this cartoon on my pinboard for years - love a Viking cartoon 😀 www.chrisbeetles.com/artists/will...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

Just ordered! A remarkably reasonable price for an academic work...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 18/09/2026

A question we'd love to know the answer to for the early Middle Ages as well! @rorynaismith.bsky.social pur-editions.fr/product/1074...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 14/09/2026

I just submitted a 30,000 article to a Danish archaeology journal 😱 AND they are happy to publish it ☺️- maybe change disciplines? 😂

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 12/09/2026

I couldn't help thinking this French town (site of a coin find) sounds like a joke name from an Asterix book! 😂 (Oh yes it is!)

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 11/09/2026

The recent fires in Belgium have exposed stretches of the Merovingian road from Liege to Aachen - www.hbvl.be/nieuws/brand...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

I think you have to see the Latin A as representing it!

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Really unusual, so it wasn't correctly understood/ interpreted for decades.

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 10/09/2026

Up for auction soon: a very rare obole (halfpenny) of Charlemagne, minted 793-814. Obverse: KAROLVS monogram; reverse: Καρωλωс, Charles in Greek. Just 3 known, all from the Netherlands. Not in any reference works. I have attributed it to Aachen, like the denier (this one in the Berlin collection).

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

Thanks Steffen! Presumably someone had to survive the avalanche to tell her story? Or was that miraculously revealed as well as the light?

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

As an ignorant Brit, why is Sunniva a saint? Who was she and what saintly acts did she perform??

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

From Finland: the largest ever Viking age coin hoard - 4.5 kg, in two birch-bark containers. From Sysmä, north of Lahtis: archaeologists excavated, finding Swedish, English, German coins & dirhams dating it to 1000–1050, a silver ring & a few other small silver objects. fof.se/artikel/reko...

fof.se

Rekordstor vikingatida skatt hittad i Finland | Forskning & Framsteg

Den rutinerade fornfyndsletaren Kalle Lappinen var förra veckan ute med sin metallsökare i hopp om att hitta spår av ett gravfält från järnåldern i orten …

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 08/09/2026

Unusual because it's not very practical? (speaking as a vicar) I once stayed in a college guest room with an inset washbasin - it was a nightmare to use! 😉

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 05/09/2026

Rosamond with her first two PhD graduates - Doug Lee and myself. 1987 (or possibly early 1988). We were all so young!

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Some of the Rebild ingots have runic inscriptions...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 31/08/2026

Amazing news from Rebild in north Jutland! Denmark's largest ever silver hoard - 18.5kg, made up of 700 objects including 47 coins and a Thor's hammer. Dated to the 10th century - I eagerly await more details! videnskab.dk/kultur-samfu...

videnskab.dk

Havearbejde i Rebild førte til fundet af Danmarks største vikingesølvskat

I forbindelse med anlæggelsen af en ny terrasse i en privat have i Rebild i Nordjylland blev der gjort et overraskende fund:

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

More seriously, if you haven't seen the real story, here it is (in Danish) moesgaardmuseum.dk/nyheder/fund...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 28/08/2026

Have you noticed his resemblance to a young Putin? 🤔

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

A quiet week at (paid) work means time at last to upload some of my coinage publications to Knowledge Commons: on Italy, Germany, coins of Melle, and Charlemagne's portrait coinage.

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

Have just discovered that in 754 Pope Stephen II decreed that a priest who had baptised a child in wine was not to be censured if no water was to hand. (On the other hand if water was available the priest would be excommunicated!)

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

The first 100 coins from the Mørstad hoard have now been put online - read more here www.khm.uio.no/om/aktuelt/a...

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 25/08/2026

I was persuaded to buy this book on relics by the opening story on p. 1 - love it! 🤓

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 24/08/2026

Interested in Louis the Pious and his coinage? Independent coins of Venice minted in the 820s or 830s? Commerce on the Rhine under the Carolingians? Just added to my online articles: Drei karolingische Münzen aus der Gemarkung Rees (Kreis Kleve) works.hcommons.org/records/e33g...

works.hcommons.org

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 22/08/2026

But did you go in the church with the swing? Unser Lieben Frauen Kirche - wonderful ☺️

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 19/08/2026

Oh my goodness, why had I never heard of this? "Le duc des Francs, le roi Lothaire et l'Empereur Otton, continuent à s'affronter dans des combats impitoyables... Loup et ses fidèles compagnons, Knut le prince danois et Gabor le géant hongrois, se voient confier les missions les plus dangereuses." 😂😂

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 18/08/2026

In 1406 William Taylor, a Wyclifite reformer, preached on poverty, work and love, saying that Jesus healed the sick so they could get back to work. "Christ loathed begging, he healed such men not only in soul but also in body, that they might get what they need by their bodily labour."

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 17/08/2026

For #MosaicMonday a fabulous 3D geometric pattern from Boscoreale, just outside Pompeii. 📷 my own.

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

For #FindsFriday: In July 1862, a shepherd boy found 5 gold and silver rings – the rest turned up soon after. The Vulu hoard from Trøndelag is highly impressive. The large penannular silver brooch weighs c 500 grams and measures 25 cm. 📷 Mårten Teigen, Alexis Pantos, Vikingtidsmuseet Oslo

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Simon Coupland @scoupland.bsky.social · 14/08/2026

I once had a student write in an essay that the Icelanders did not become Christians in 1000 as widely claimed because they went on killing each other. Sadly maybe true but not the right answer in your history exam 🙄🤓

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