ABSTRACT
The term "quasi-imperial coinage" refers to a group of gold solidi and tremisses issued by cities of Provence in the decades around the end of the sixth century. They bore the names and portraits of Byzantine emperors on the obverse and some form of a globus cruciger on the reverse. At the end of the sixth century, Provence was politically divided. Different members of the Merovingian royal house ruled the north, at Orléans and Reims. Such division of the kingdom was both traditional and problematic. In Vienne and Valence, moneyers put their names on their quasi-imperial coins, just as they did on other types they issued. These coins therefore are peripheral to the primary corpus of quasi-imperials, just as their issuing cities were peripheral to the region of Provence in geographical and, perhaps, administrative terms. The other cities named on the quasi-imperials lay relatively close to each other and minted more or less simultaneously.
