Possible site of Late Anglo-Saxon mint, Niweport (EHER 81850)

The Saxon mint at 'Niweport' (Newport) struck coins from 960-1059. The location of the mint has not been confirmed, with several Newports laying claim to the location, notably Newport Pagnell and Newport (Essex). The possibility that Newport in Essex was the site of the burh of Wigingamere adds weight to the possibility that a mint was situated here in the Late Anglo-Saxon period.

NRHE data transfer: The mint at Niweport operated intermittently from 960-1028, and was reopened from 1050, minting until 1062. <1> The location of the Niweport mint has long been unknown, but thought to be in the area North or North-East of London. Thus Newport Pagnell or Newport (Essex) have been suggested as sites of the mint. It is argued that in the reign of Edward the Confessor, locating the mint at Newport Pagnell, in an area where several mints were operating and that at Northampton was increasing production, would be unlikely. Furthermore, there is no parallel for opening a mint in an area where two mints, at Buckingham and Aylesbury, were operating and closed at the same time as the mint at Niweport. The opposite is true of Newport. Here the mint served to 'infill' a blank area of mint production, its distance to nearby mints is comparably greater, and it would have been adjacent to an area of expanding coin production (at Sudbury, Hornden, Maldon, Bury St Edmunds and DERNE). Newport is therefore the more likely site for the mint. <2> In isolation, the evidence of <2> is probably not enough to locate the mint at Newport, but there is increasing evidence that Newport is the site of the burh of Wigingamere (EHER 81857), and as an existing burh would have been a more suitable site for a mint than Newport Pagnell. <3>