Yesterday, while in Boston for my choir tour, (I'll get to preform in the Boston Symphony Hall tomorrow!) I visited the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, where they have a wonderful collection of over 8,000 ancient coins (not all on display). Anyone else ever been? I have to say there were some pretty neat coins for sure. I like animals on coins, so I'll include a couple they had. Overall it was a great experience that I would recommend to anyone in the area. From the MFA website: "This coin, known as the Eid Mar or "Ides of March," is the most historically and politically significant in the MFA’s distinctive collection of more than 8,000 coins. The silver coin (called a denarius in Latin) commemorates the ultimate political act, the assassination of dictator Julius Caesar in 44 BC by Brutus and Cassius. Brutus’s portrait is emblazoned on the front of the coin with the name of L. Plaetorius Cestianus, the moneyer (a position for young elites rising through civic office). On the back is a simple cap flanked by two daggers, one for each assassin. In the Roman Republic, during the ceremony of enfranchisement, a slave was given a pileus (egg-shaped hat) to wear as a public sign of his freedom. The hat became a symbol of liberty and was used on coins minted under the magistracy of families that opposed dictators, like Caesar, and others who had earlier tried to consolidate power, like Pompey or the Gracchi. The hat was later used by Roman emperors as a sign of their commitment to the freedom of their subjects."
I bet it was fun to see. They used to have a phone app with many of the coins featured, I think it's long gone now.
The Boston MFA has a great collection. If you find yourself in LA go visit both branches of the Getty Museum, they also have a fine collection of numismatic treasures. How was the concert?
I went to the Boston Fine Arts Museum a number of times when I worked in the city many years ago. I was not aware of the coin collection. I often went to see the Gilbert Stuart George Washington Athenaeum painting. Stuart never finished this portrait because he wanted to keep it to use for future works. If you look at other painting of Washington by Stuart, you will see this same head over and over. Stuart was not good with money. He called the copies he made of this piece his "hundred dollar bills" because that was what he got for many of the copies he made.
