Library Additions

Discussion in 'Ancient Coins' started by Carausius, Jul 30, 2017.

  1. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

    Just arrived today!

    coe.jpg
     
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  3. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    As anticipated in my OP, I brought the above Santamaria catalogue - actually ALL of my Santamaria catalogues - to my bookbinder. This is the result (left crimson board color is accurate; purple on right is illusory):

    20170910_101721.jpg
     
    dlhill132, red_spork, akeady and 7 others like this.
  4. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

    Beautifully done. I really like a fine binding on a book.
     
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  5. RAGNAROK

    RAGNAROK Naebody chaws me wi impunitY

  6. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

    Yes indeed. One on pre-decimal issues (a large hardcover) and the other on modern issues (a small paperback).

    I am expecting delivery today of yet another coin book. I will post it when I get it.
     
    RAGNAROK likes this.
  7. Cheech9712

    Cheech9712 Every thing is a guess

    Really im not trying to offend How and why do you collect bronze castings. They look like rocks right. Are there any way to identify where they come from. And how can you tell if their forged?
     
  8. Cheech9712

    Cheech9712 Every thing is a guess

    Wait. Casting bronze are coins with figures on them right. What do you call the type of money that looks like rocks or such
     
  9. rrdenarius

    rrdenarius non omnibus dormio Supporter

    I have been a coin collector and history buff for a long time, about 5 decades. I bought my first Roman Coin in the 8th grade and the second one about 10 years ago. I did not merge history and coin collecting until I decided that ancient coins were interesting and available. I spent some time deciding on a collecting area and picked the Roman Republic. I have a few RR denarii, but this collection is not like filling Whitman folders with Lincoln Cents. There is a limited number of these coins available at reasonable prices.
    007.JPG

    While collecting coins, I started reading Roman history. I am especially fond of books with lots of pictures, but also read history text books. (The 12 Caesars by Suetonius is a favorite.) Rome was founded in 750 BC, but did not start issuing coins until about 300 BC. They started paying soldiers about 400 BC during their battle Veii. How were these soldiers paid???

    Titus Livius in his History of Rome spoke on this.
    Ab urbe condita 4.59
    "... the senate decreed that the soldiery should receive pay from the public treasury. Previously, each man had served at his own expense."
    Ab urbe condita 4.60
    "... The senators were determined to uphold a measure so happily inaugurated, they were themselves the first to contribute, and as coined money was not yet introduced, they carried the copper by weight in wagons to the treasury, thereby drawing public attention to the fact of their contributing. After the senators had contributed most conscientiously the full amount at which they were assessed, the leading plebeians, personal friends of the nobles, began, as had been agreed, to pay in their share. When the crowd saw these men applauded by the senate and looked up to by the men of military age as patriotic citizens, they hastily rejected the proffered protection of the tribunes and vied with one another in their eagerness to contribute."

    This piece of history sent me down the path of finding what Romans did before they introduced coins. I have posted on that subject often in this forum. You can go back to some of my posts or go to my blog. The pic below was taken while packing my collection for a trip to the bank for safe keeping before Hurricane Harvey.
    http://rrdenarius.blogspot.com/
    DSCN0858.JPG
    how do I know they are "real" - trusted suppliers, study the subject, and faith
     
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  10. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

    A wonderful collection
     
    RAGNAROK likes this.
  11. RAGNAROK

    RAGNAROK Naebody chaws me wi impunitY

    Great collection! Thanks for the pic :)
     
  12. Alegandron

    Alegandron "ΤΩΙ ΚΡΑΤΙΣΤΩΙ..." ΜΕΓΑΣ ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ, June 323 BCE

    I share the same fascination with early Roman monies, however I have not taken the depth of my collection to your level. Well done Gene. There are still several issues and classes of issues that I am still pursuing. Fun stuff.
     
    RAGNAROK likes this.
  13. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    We might also note that there was plenty of coined money in Italy starting in the 6th century. The US went for quite a while using foreign coins before they decided they needed to mint their own. I suspect this pattern is common elsewhere as well.
    r00010bb1834.jpg
     
    Ajax, RAGNAROK, dlhill132 and 6 others like this.
  14. Cheech9712

    Cheech9712 Every thing is a guess

    Will check you blog etc.. Thanks
     
  15. Cheech9712

    Cheech9712 Every thing is a guess

    I like luceria
     
  16. red_spork

    red_spork Triumvir monetalis

    My copy of "Essays in Honour of Roberto Russo"(Essays Russo) came in today and I spent a considerable portion of the day reading it and forming an opinion. In short, I honestly believe that this book should be in anyone's library who aims to really study Republican numismatics, either from an academic perspective or simply a collector who wants to better understand these coins. I'm not going to review every single paper in the book but here are some highlights of a few of them:
    • Andrew McCabe "The Anonymous Struck Bronze Coinage of the Roman Republic: A Provisional Arrangement" - I think this paper will become the standard for attribution of anonymous Roman Republic bronzes. The arrangement is far more granular than that presented in Crawford and with far more thorough treatment of these coins and its importance cannot be understated. Essential if you want to collect and understand these types
    • Richard Schaefer "A Find of Roman Coins from Campamento Ampurias" - a short paper on an interesting find from the Roman camp, which later became a town, beside the Greek city of Emporion(modern Empúries in Northern Spain). Rather than being a savings hoard or hastily hidden emergency hoard, this hoard seems to have simply been an average citizen or soldier's coinpurse that somehow was lost. No shocking conclusions from this hoard, but an interesting look at coins in circulation in Roman Spain circa 145 B.C.
    • Roberto Russo "The Retariffing of the Denarius" - Interestingly, Roberto Russo himself wrote what I consider to be the most thought provoking of the papers published in the festschrift compiled in his honor. I cannot easily summarize the conclusions of this paper in any way that does it justice but I can tell you that, for me, it has satisfactorily answered two questions that I've wondered about since I began collecting RR bronzes: "Why did the Romans temporarily stop minting bronze in connection with the retariffing of the denarius to 16 asses?" and "Why, after minting so much during the Social War, did the Romans cease minting of bronze after Sulla's march on Rome?". Read Russo's paper to find out!
    • Richard Witschonke "Some Unpublished Roman Republican Coins" - Provides an excellent and concise summary and discussion of the unpublished types and varieties(and also some published but not illustrated in Crawford) that showed up in the RBW Collection and JD Collection sales held by NAC. Once again, this paper really should be seen as an essential update to Crawford for a student of these coins

    I could go on and on about this volume, it really is worth every penny even if you have to buy it at full retail price. I consider this an important update to Crawford in many ways and until(and probably even after) a new standard reference for Roman Republican types is written that incorporates much of this new information, this should be considered an essential part of any library on Republican numismatics.
     
    Volodya, Ajax, Orfew and 5 others like this.
  17. rrdenarius

    rrdenarius non omnibus dormio Supporter

    I agree RS. The book covers several interesting areas. McCabe's anonymous struck bronze paper is well written. He arranges the series by style as well as weight.
     
    red_spork and Carausius like this.
  18. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    Although one of Andrew's suggestions is that the post-semiuncial weights didn't matter as much as previously thought!
     
  19. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    Post-semilibral is what I meant to type....
     
  20. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    Apparently, I'm raising the profile of CoinTalk to a new level. :smuggrin: Take a look at this article from this week's Esylum, the weekly newsletter for the Numismatic Bibliomania Society.

    http://www.coinbooks.org/v20/club_nbs_esylum_v20n38.html#article8

    Any of you numismatic book nerds who have not joined the NBS should strongly consider it. They publish the weekly newsletter, a quarterly journal, and generally try to keep numismatic books alive. Plus, they link to CoinTalk!!
     
    Last edited: Sep 18, 2017
  21. Alegandron

    Alegandron "ΤΩΙ ΚΡΑΤΙΣΤΩΙ..." ΜΕΓΑΣ ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΣ, June 323 BCE

    Congrats!!! Very nice! Carausius Library, can I check some books out?
     
    Carausius likes this.
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