Spatha, cAD300

[Flavivs Aetivs]

Yeah, the academia article is right, they must both be early 4th century.

[Sextus Saturninus]

If a coin of Probus was found in the burial with the sword, then the date can be determined to be during or after the reign of Probus but within the circulating time of his coins.

[Flavivs Aetivs]

You're looking at a timeframe of roughly 278 through 313 then, because Constantine reformed the currency.

[Sextus Saturninus]

Constantine did reform the coinage, introducing the Solidus, Siliqua, and many more types of coins to replace the coins that were revived under Diocletian, but were destroyed again under his successors.

[Nathan Ross]

because Constantine reformed the currency.

He introduced new coinage to stabilise the old, but the older coins were not abolished or replaced and could have continued in use, albeit devalued. The article doesn't state what sort of coin was found, although it does mention that it was 'highly worn', so a later date is more probable. First couple of decades of the fourth century would seem about right.

The illustrations of the scabbard chapes shown in the first article are fascinating. The designs are very similar to a number of late Roman shield patterns - the well-known 'domestici' ones in the ND, for example, or the Brescia Casket (below) - besides the decorative roundels in the Luxor temple painting, which I've seen interpreted as shields. It's interesting to see such an identifiable late Roman aesthetic - or perhaps a visual language - informing so many different facets of military design.

[attachment=11243]Bres.jpg[/attachment]

[Urselius]

A good indication of the time of the adoption of bar-shaped guards on Roman swords is the depiction of such on the ivory diptychs of Honorius and Stilicho. The second leaf of the Honorius ivory shows an eagle hilted sword so we can be fairly sure that the other forms show Roman swords rather than ones of barbarian manufacture. So, by the early decades of the 5th century Roman swords had evolved into an Early Medieval-type form.

Interestingly, the swords from the diptychs show some unique features relative to "Germanic" sword types. As well as a second bar at the pommel, Honorius' sword also surmounts this with a sphere or wheel-shaped element. Stilicho's sword does not have a bar at the pommel but seems to swell out from the grip into a fluted expansion, though this too is surmounted by a ball or circular element.

The earlier Germans produced copies of the Roman gladius shortsword, I do not think that they suddenly became weapons innovators in the 3rc-4th centuries. I suspect that both the Germanic peoples and the Romans were adopting sword types introduced by the various Iranian Steppe peoples (Sarmatians, Alans etc.) who came into contact with both these cultures at much the same time.

[Flavivs Aetivs]

Constantine did reform the coinage, introducing the Solidus, Siliqua, and many more types of coins to replace the coins that were revived under Diocletian, but were destroyed again under his successors.

Yeah the Solidus, Semissis, Tremissis, Siliqua, etc. stabilized the currency and effectively ended the economic crisis. Most wouldn't be devalued for several centuries, the Solidus doesn't have evidence of debasing until the 10th, and it was by Arabs (or maybe Franks), not Romans.