I thought it would worthwhile to take a moment to spotlight a book that has been a faithful companion to me on my collecting journey - Coins of the Roman Empire in the British Museum II: Vespasian to Domitian. Even though it has been largely superseded by the new RIC II.1, there isn't a day that goes by that doesn't see me consulting it for one reason or another. When I first began collecting Flavian coinage, this book was my bible - heck, the coins in my collection were arranged according to its catalogue until the publication of the new RIC. Today, despite being a bit outdated and missing many recently discovered rarities, BMCRE II is an invaluable source for citations of older provenances, collections, and sales. It also has the distinction of being based on an actual collection, which affords it to be a most useful resource for frequency ratings. The introductions for each reign are insightful containing information found nowhere else. H. Mattingly's early 20th century romantic prose is a joy to read - his enthusiasm for the subject is on almost every page. For all the above reasons, this book is an indispensable part of my library, I couldn't imagine collecting without it. Do you have a similar book?
I have never owned volume II but had similar history with BMCRE V. I do have III and IV but never warmed up to them as much. I prefer BMCRE to RIC where they exist but the later volumes never happened so we have to make do with RIC. Neither BMCRE nor RIC have held up to the test of time and now are really dated in the period of my specialty (Septimius Severus) but they were good to bring me to where I am today in the hobby and help me prepare for the online information that has to a large degree replaced them in my daily life. Just as they had to stop printing ink on paper unabridged dictionaries, we have entered a time where numismatic learning is no longer just from books. I will miss looking forward to new and updated versions on paper and learn to use the online material offered by the British Museum and a thousand other resources that now augment the books we once loved (perhaps too much?).
As a generalist Roman collector, my go-to book for attribution and brief biographical information is Sear. I started off with the one-volume fourth edition early in my collecting career, but acquired each volume of the fifth edition as they became available. Not a week goes by without me consulting Sear for one reason or another. I share your love for BMCRE, though. Nothing beats the introductory material in its volumes. As a reference for the coinage of "the five good emperors," it's hard to beat these:
I have many depending on what mood I am in to collect that month. If I am in a Sassanian mood, I reach for the Sunrise collection first. If Thai, I pull "From Funan to the Fifth Reign". If Chinese Cash, I pull Hartill. Great books makes collecting more enjoyable. If you are going to spend some "real money" on this hobby, its really dumb to do so without spending a little on a good boook on the series you are interested in.
David, when I saw your post I thought "That looks just like a part of my bookshelf". I use the same 4 books very often. I seem to have RIC and BMCRE open everyday for some type of research. They are both incredibly useful. I agree with everything you said about BMCRE. I love the introductions and I really like reading the notes for coins that I have.
Great post David (as always). I too am a great admirer of the BMCRE volumes written by Mattingly. I enjoy his writing style and meticulous research immensely. He presents such a great wealth of information in the introductory pages. I keep volume I (Augustus to Vitellius) within easy reach on my desk all of the time.
I hardly ever crack open the Sear volume any more - although it has the distinction of being one of my first numismatic book purchases. There are many catalogues not pictured I use almost daily, which are also deserving of their own posts!
I am somewhat bibliographically challenged at this point with a sole volume of the older book ROMAN COINS by J.P.C. Kent and Max & Albert Hirmer. The plates are beautiful and are accompanied by a lively historical text which keeps everything in context. I will be making some purchases here in the near future and now I have some ideas about what to get.
I spent some time cross referencing RSC BMC and RIC. I put sticky notes for all of my coins in each volume. It makes finding the coins much easier. It also made writing my post on the first year of Domitian much easier. However, although I did try to cross reference these sources with Sear, I just found that Sear was missing too many coins to make it worthwhile. The cross referencing did pay off. I found out that the Vespasian with Modius reverse with poppies earned a separate entry in RSC when it did not in RIC.
Although I have been in my job as bibliographer for 4 decades, from time to time I run across books in our library I have not seen. Given that our collection approaches 300,000 volumes, perhaps this can be forgiven me. Last week while browsing our rare book stacks I “discovered” the following, a 1615 Frankfurt publication by Octavius de Strada, of the biographies of the rulers of the western and eastern Roman empires, along with their wives and children. Author Strada, Octavius de, a Rosberg Title De vitis imperatorum et caesarum romanorum, tam occidentalium quam orientalium, nec non uxorum et liberorum eorum ... inde à C. Julio Caesare, primo monarcha, usque ad D.N. imperatorem, caesarem Matthiam .. Published Francofurti ad Moenum, Imprimebat Johannes Bringerus, 1615 While it will not be my “go to” book, many of the numismatic illustrations are utterly charming, if at times a little weird. Cf. my example of Sear 1693, a follis of Michael III with the illustration of that ruler in de Strada's book. My coin is DO 8. It is 9.11 gr. 27 mm. hr. 6, and ex Hunt coll., Sotheby's Dec. 5-6, 1990, lot 476. As a librarian, I guess I should proffer books that are actually edifying. Instead, another book I re-read every few years is anything but: Paul S. Szego's Collecting Greek Coins, (NY: Wayte Raymond, Inc, 1937). It's a delightfully written, somewhat naive essay, that in several passages could cause it to be banned from some public libraries. I will say no more on this, so as to tempt would be readers to try to find a copy! My main interest being in later Roman and in particular, in Byzantine coins, for me, the Dumbarton Oaks catalogs provide a continual source of knowledge and pleasure. Catalogue of the Byzantine coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and in the Whittemore Collection. Alfred Bellinger (v. 1); Philip Grierson (vols. 2-3, 5); Michael Hendy (v. 4). Washington: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, 1992 – 1999, c. 1966-1973.
I.m not a librarian but my wife of 50 years is a retired librarian so I have visited quite a few libraries just because they looked interesting when we we driving by. I see books as a dynamic subject. They are not what they were when Abe Lincoln read by the fireplace and a man with a thousand books was assumed to be brilliant and wealthy. Today, libraries are not just books and books have a meaning beyond the information they have. In fact, some books with almost no current informational value are still hugged like Teddy Bears by bibliophiles who do their research online. Old books have a charm missing in Google. I'm not sure where we go from here.
As a fervent collector of Antoninus Pius, I have been looking for one of Strack's three volumes he ever published in the thirties. It took me years and the I found all three volumes in a rather dillapidated state. I had them restored and they now have a special place on my overcrowded bookshelves. They are still of the best quality as for scientific information.
Dear Doug et al., In my field (Classics), I think we will continue to use printed books for some time to come. Electronic access to books in our area remains small, although it is growing. I'd say perhaps 5% of our materials are available electronically, although the numbers do increase. Although we subscribe to electronic journals when possible, we continue to keep our print subscriptions, for the holdings of many of our long running journals go back to their initial volume, published often over 100 years ago. For example, we have from the Revue Numismatique the first volume: ser.1:v.1(1836) to the present. And we only buy monographs in print format, because our researchers overwhelmingly prefer print. Certainly, electronic access is great, considering one can gain it wherever one has access to the internet, but ours is a destination library, regularly visited by scholars from all over the world, so they are happy to use our print holdings.
"I have been looking for Strack for a LONG TIME!" Nearly all surviving books are with libraries, museums and collectors. I had to pay $ 500 for the ruins and spend the same amount for restoration! Frans
I have one and use it weekly for research. The articles can be downloaded, which for me is a very useful feature of the site.
Oh that is great - I actually want to use my account much more frequently than I do at present - the wealth of reference material available (even just public domain) is staggering.
