Another dumb question (sorry)

ok, so I would like to learn more about collecting (sigh - why do I have to find expensive hobbies?) What is the recommended pricing book (and hopefully with information too) for medieval coins....?

Larry

 

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Depends on which country you're thinking of. If it was say France then GD would be the one with the answer.

If you're thinking Scottish, Ian's the one.

If you had English coins in mind then i can get you started on that one. Two books i very highly recommend you invest in;

1) Spinks Coins of England and the UK 2005
2) Coincraft's Standard Catalogue of English and UK Coins 2000


There are more specialist works solely devoted to English Hammered such as the North Catalogue which is the hammered coin collector's Koran. However that book is not what i'd deem user friendly (certainly not for a beginner), plus there's no prices quoted in it, coins are denoted as C, N, S, R, VF or ER. (Common, Normal, Scarce, Rare, V. Rare, Ext. Rare). Which is not a deal of help to you.

For prices you want the Spinks, that catalogue is far from perfect pricewise but it's more in tune with the market (often underpricing) than the Coincraft. The latter's prices are somewhat above the market prices, even five years after publishing, but the market is catching it up.

For knowledge and identification purposes though the Coincraft is a masterpiece as far as general works go and is far easier to use than North when it comes to say identifying Edward III coins. (Which is my worst nightmare), along with the Henries.

The Coincraft is now out of print though, but if you can pick up a copy (even a pre-2000 edition) it's well worth the money. The Spinks shouldn't be hard to find.


Spinks covers English coinage from Celtic (i.e pre-Roman Conquest), through Roman, Saxon, Norman and right upto the year before the year stated on the front cover.

Coincraft 2000 covers William I (that is 1066) to 1999.

 

Good grief. Oh how little you know me.

OK I have a few books on scottish coins. I even have a few Scottish coins, but I have next to no interest in the subject of Scots (or English) mediaeval coinages. I gave up collecting Brit coins a good few years ago and have disposed of some in the past two years. Not many mind you.

My main collection and collecting interest is French. I started branching into French mediaeval coinages in 2000 having worked my way back from Louis Napoleon to Francis I. My most recent acquisition being a denier of Charles the Bald (Charles II of France) and another ruler crossed off my hit list. I'm slowly but surely getting a coin for every king, Duke and Archbishop who issued coinages in france, but the subject area is HUGE. Suffice it to say that it will keep me adequately occupied between the purchase of jetons.

As such, i'm more than happy to defer to GD regarding literature on the subject, as per your recommendation .

 

Ian,
I read your post and thought to myself....hmmm..Charles the Bald?..I have one of those,so I went to my album and looked..and looked some more and then I found what I THOUGHT I was looking for..Charles the Bold (my "label" says double patard of Flanders?)..LOLOL.So I went to Wikipedia to look up Charles II..823-877 AD????..don't think I'll be getting one any time soon.Congrats to you.

 

Thanks for the info...I actually thought there might be a "Spinks" book since I keep seeing it referenced. I looked for a copy on eBay - I guess I always assume one can find almost anything there, but alas, no Spinks book. Oh well, I'm sure that I can find it now that I know it exists. I didn't realize it was only English coinage - I hoped that maybe it was medieval coins in general...I am nt sure if I am looking for English or French...

If I can ask another dumb newbie question - is it worth looking on eBay for coins? It would seem that so many people look on eBay that it might be hard to get a decent deal on a coin? Any thoughts?

Larry

 

There is NO such thing as a dumb question!!! Only dummies who don't ask questions!

 

Yes, 823 -877. It hasn't arrived with me yet. Hopefully today.

So then, do you have others from the Flanders area....or Burgundy?

I love the double gros and gros coins. Thin as can be, but large enough to get a meaningful design on

Here's my favourite french mediaeval coin in my collection. A Blanc of Henry VI of England (Troyes Mint). They are becoming more and more difficult to find. Sorry for the poor quality of image. I need to re-scan it sans holder.

 

I knew you collected French Ian... but i figured having most likely started out on English and Scottish coins you'd know some references i did not.

Take me i can provide references for Modern UK coins but the coins themselves have no appeal to me.

 

Probably not. The relevance anyway is all down to the original posters actual `interest'.

Sure, Henry I of England was married to Malcolm Canmore's daughter (Matilda) and that their daughter (another Matilda) was the first Scot to become Empress of The Holy Roman Empire. Sure, Matilda's second marriage to George V D'Anjou is perhaps a tad more significant to England in relation to the subsequent Plantaganet and Angevin lineages......but I very much doubt if scottish coinage itself would be of much interest to the original poster, let alone books on the subject. ;-)

Ian

 

...careful where you lead your conversations Ian, otherwise i think the Bishop of Winchester will be putting in yet another appearance.

I don't see why medieval Scottish coinage wouldn't be of interest. I mean if you're into continental coinage of that period, a la France, then surely the Auld Alliance would creep in there.

 

It was Geoff actually.

 

Now THAT was a brain fart. I don't know where George came from, especially when I was typing Geoffrey at the time. I remember thinking...will I mention she left him but was later reconciled...or is that just `too much information'.

That must have been when the keyboard gremlins struck!

 

Lol! Empress Maude....what an unholy mixture eh? What a name for a wee bit lassie born in England to a Scottish mother, married at the age of 10 (or was it 11?) to Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor. Doesn't sound particularly `holy' to me but my, how societal mores change. No point in `waltzing' around Matilda though. She had rightful claims......

erm....while some may claim that the Auld Alliance existed as early as 1165, the earliest documentary evidence of such an alliance is a treaty signed by Philip IV (Le Bel) and John Baliol in 1295. That is, well outwith time frame of OP's stated interests.

 

Hey Larry. I currently mainly collect the french 20 franc gold coin series. I love how it starts off with the granduar of Napoleon and ends with a chicken that can't even lay an egg. The broad history of the coin sums up the fall of france in my mind. Plus I like the art work of the coins. With that said I wish to inquire what got you interested in pondering the collecting of medieval coins?

 

It wasn't uncommon, i think Richard II's second wife was like 9 when he married her, he was in his thirties. Of course they didn't consumate them until both parties were over the age of 13 or 14.

All these marriages were for diplomatic alliances, never for love... aka Geoffrey and Maude, they hated each other, absolutely despised one another. Funny when you think about it though... watching how their marriage played out, you'd have thought their son Henry II would have known better than to marry Eleanor of Aquitane!

Oh well... sometimes the sequel is better.

 

Ian,
I'm looking through my albums now,which basically consist of a timeline of coinage...let's see..I have Louis IX (St. Louis).. Hugh V,Burgundy... John the Blind,Luxembourg,Someone called Phillipe VI de Valois(denier),Charles V (the Wise?) Charles VI,Paris mint,Charles the Bold,Burgundy (pictured in my last post),Philip the Fair.Belg.... Henry II,Bayonne mint...Henry III Paris mint...Henry IV (1st Bourbon king?)Henry VI...Louis XIII and XV...and a biggie sized 30 Sols from Louis XVI..some are deniers but most of these are large gros sized pieces.that's about it from France unless you count celtic potins from the Seine valley (I was amazed to see that the celts in Gaul used the fleur de lis on their coins in 60BC!!). ..and some crusades era coins.
If you want to see pics of any particular one(s) just let me know.
Here's one of the potins

 

I suppose there's a bais to the old addage about `a fighting start'. You've got to admit though, they are spirited creatures these french fillies! (ooops! that might not be PC for this board eh?)

Eleanor was a fine woman. She didn't swap sides or get blown about in the wind of `opinion' like Henry de Blois

 

Sounds like some interesting stuff you have there sport! I'd quite like to see the one of Hugh V of Burgundy. I can't remember if I have one of him or not.

I've got a supposed french electrum piece somewhere which was apparently struck as a means of raising the cash to fight off Julius Caesar. Needless to say the gold content is pretty low. I'll see if i can dig that one out too.

I've got scans of some of my lowlands and Burgundy stuff but the coins are pretty well blurred due to still being in their holders. One day i'll remedy that. If you want to see any a tad clearer i'll make a point of scanning them for you.

Here's a couple or six or so: