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Publius Quinctilius Varus has become widely known as commander-in-chief of the three Roman legions that were annihilated in the battle of the Teutoburg forest in 9 CE by a federation of Germanic tribes. Coins bearing his countermark VAR are common on Roman sites in the Rhineland and are generally accepted to mark coins distributed as donations to the troops during his time as legatus Augusti pro praetore from 7 to 9 CE. In this study, 37 coins with these countermarks have been recorded from different archaeological sites using high-resolution 3D-scanning. Having substantiated prior ascriptions of these countermarks to individual countermark dies by procrustes analysis, a combination of metric statistics and use-wear analysis was applied to attribute ten countermarks to different wear-stages within the life-cycle of the same specific die. While coins with countermarks produced by the die during early phases of attrition are confined to the upper Rhineland and Mosel area, later phases have been found in the lower Rhineland at Asciburgium and on the battlefield of Kalkriese. Coins that bear countermarks of an already heavily worn and irreversibly damaged die are found in Nijmegen, Mainz and Wiesbaden. We discuss if these different groups of coins were emitted together at one site and may be related to a demobilisation after a joint operation.

Historic mining activities are assumed to rank among the most significant human activities that reshaped the landscape of the European uplands, especially since the medieval period. Mining requires both the extraction of timber for mining construction as well as the production of charcoal for ore smelting. Analysing the occurrence of different wood taxa in construction or charcoal assemblages may help to shed light on the question of whether different taxa had been chosen for different purposes depending on their local availability, specific cost–benefit considerations or their physical properties. Here, we present the results of taxonomical and dendrochronological analyses performed on timber and macro-remains from an outstandingly well-preserved medieval underground mining complex in the Erzgebirge region (Ore Mountains, Eastern Germany). The complementary use of wood for charcoal production was reconstructed by anthracological and chronological analyses of medieval to modern charcoal kilns preserved in the same area. Dated colluvial layers served as additional indicators for phases of local soil erosion following forest clearances. The onset of mining activities in the late 12th century was contemporary with the start of charcoal production and soil erosion. While Abies alba was prevalent among the timbers from the main construction phase around AD 1270/1280, Fagus sylvatica was the most frequently occurring wood in the oldest charcoal kilns from the mid-13th century. The latter declined during the 13th century in favour of taxa like Betula , Corylus and Acer . Supported by the evidence of massive soil erosion, this may reflect changes in forest composition induced by highly intensive use or shifts of the areas used for wood exploitation. Whereas mining ceased in the area shortly after AD 1291, charcoal production continued during the 14th and 15th century and the rising proportion of Abies alba is discussed to be related to a lessened local demand of this species for timber. The rising share of Picea during the younger phases probably resulted from changes in selective forest exploitation rather than mirroring vegetation changes. After a hiatus, a last phase of charcoal production is identified to have occurred during the mid-16th century, again with a high share of Fagus sylvatica as fuel wood.