La zecca merovingia di Avenches e le prime monete con il volto di Cristo

This paper examines a Merovingian tremissis of c. 625, known in a single specimen, whose iconography needed some revision: the facing bust, once thought to imitate that of Emperor Phocas, looks more likely to be an original image of Christ deriving from the Mandylion type. This new interpretation has been accepted and similar types are now known for Anglosaxon England, all earlier than the first bust of Christ on Byzantine coins (c. 692) (see Lord Stewartby and D.M.Metcalf in "Numismatic Chronicle", 167, 2207, p. 177.