I recently came across an interesting book called Out of the Past, The Istanbul Grand Bazaar by Burton Y. Berry (Arco Publishing Co., 1977). Mr. Berry was in the US Consular service posted to Turkey, starting in 1928 (the Preface is dated 1974). He wrote this book about his experiences as a collector. Mostly the book deals with textiles, glass, metal, weapons, etc. - he collected a little of everything. But the last two chapters are devoted to coins, one on Byzantine, the other on Greek, including professional-grade old school black and white plates. His anecdotes are both charming and horrifying. Apparently gold Byzantine coins pretty much flooded the Bazaar c. 1928-1940s, but with very few collectors, these were often just melted down after some desultory cherry-picking. Here is an excerpt: More small-scale and pretty funny, I thought, was the practice of Anatolian peasants saving gold coins they came across to give to their dentist for some new gold teeth! I left other info as thumbnails so this post isn't gigantic. Ah, to be a time-traveler... Happy Thanksgiving to all!
