A new series of books by DAVID SEAR

This is the first of a series of 3 volumes, an introductory guide to Greek and Roman coinage for beginners and also for more advanced collectors. Consequently, do not seek numbering or quotation, but a historical and numismatic introduction.

Each chapter includes a description of the main coinages of each city covered, accompanied by a rich iconography borrowed from computer sources currently available on the market.
The first chapter is devoted to the coins of the Celts and the Greek colonies in the western part of the Mediterranean (p. 63-78) followed by the coinage of Italy and Sicily in a second chapter (p. 79- 113). The following is devoted to the coinage of Greece and its islands (pp. 115-144). The fourth chapter deals with the coinage of the territories of the North and the Black Sea (p. 145-188). The following chapter describes the coinages of the Aegean Islands and Crete (pp. 189-215). The sixth and penultimate chapter of the work is reserved for the very important coinage of Asia Minor (p. 217-370). Finally, the seventh and final chapter of the book reveals the coins of Cyprus, the Levant and North Africa (p. 371-445).

The work ends with a series of maps (p. 451-462) borrowed from Greek Coins and their values, 2 volumes, London, 1978-1979 and with two indexes, the first devoted to ethnic Greeks (p. 465-487 ) very useful for the reader not familiar with the reading of ancient Greek and the second which is an index of cities in alphabetical order from Abbaïtis in Phrygia to Zilis in Mauretania (p. 489-495). Available right now for 75 USD $.

 

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Pre-ordered today through Amazon! Thanks for the heads-up!

 

Very impressive for a man his age to embark on a new series of books! (I know he first went to work at Seaby's in 1958, so I think he must be about 80.)

 

I will be interested in seeing what this is. My fear is that the three volume set will be too expensive for the beginner market and too cursory for the even slightly advanced collector. As I understand it, the first is basically Greek before Alexander??? He announced that the second volume would cover Hellenistic while the last will do Rome and what he calls Greek Imperials. That is a lot of ground to do justice in 500 pages per book. Leaving out a catalog of types may leave room for interesting material but the third volume covering all Roman (Imperial and Provincial) especially strikes me a quite a bit to cover in one volume. Will many people buy just one book or will more say the set is too expensive and glosses over each of their specialties. I hope to get to see the set someday. The Millennium Sear volumes took a long time to complete.