Online coin books

From MedievalcoinageWiki

This page will be a listing of coin, numismatic, and economic related titles available for online viewing. These are full view books or scans of them, not a few sample pages. Many are from the amazing Google Book Search, others are scanned from personal sites. Sadly, the old Saurma catalogue that was online was removed by its creator and I do not wish to replace it without permission, which I have been unable to obtain because no contact address works. The books listed here are the ones I found most interesting and/or helpful. You can easily find more at the Google Books site by simply searching for "Coins" or its non-English translations in the book's title. Use the Advanced Search option and select the "Full view" option to find books that you can read and sometimes download in their entirety.

NOTE THAT GOOGLE IS APPARENTLY BANNING IP ADDRESSES OUTSIDE THE UNITED STATES FROM VIEWING THESE BOOKS BECAUSE OF ALLEGED COPYRIGHT CONCERNS. IF YOU CANNOT VIEW THESE, PLEASE CONTACT ME, talk_at_medievalcoinage_dot_com, AND I WILL PLACE THEM IN A FOLDER YOU CAN DOWNLOAD FROM.

Contents 1 General Works 2 Ancient Coins 3 European Coins 4 German Coins 4.1 General Coverage 4.2 Frankfurt am Maim 4.3 Münster and its Bishopric

General Works

• A Dictionary of Numismatic Names, Their Official and Popular Designations - Albert R. Frey, 1917 PDF Download
  Frey's classic work on numismatic terms that is still a very useful work and source for historical names.

Ancient Coins

• Catalogue of the Coins of Parthia - Warwick William Wroth, 1903 PDF Download
  A different copy was scanned in from the New York library which has none of the unexcuseable scanning errors from the previous book I had listed.

• Coins of Ancient Sicily - Sir George Francis Hill, 1903 PDF Download
  Self-explanatory title, nice plates and in-text engravings.

• The Coins of the Ancient Britons - John Evans, 1864 PDF Download
  The 1890 updated version is also available, but the scanning is of much poorer quality. A link to that work can be found on the page linked to here.

• Description générale des monnaies byzantines frappées sous les empereurs d'Orient... - Justin Sabatier, 1862 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 Vol. 2
  A still useful reference to the coins of the Byzantine Empire with many well-scanned plates.

• Greek Coins and Their Parent Cities - George Francis Hill, 1902 PDF Download
  Excellent quality scan of this work that, in addition to listing 930 coins, also includes a numismatic-themed history of the regions listed.

• Tables of Ancient Coins, Weights and Measures, Explain'd and Exemplify'd in Several Dissertations - John Arbuthnot, 1727 PDF Download
  Excellent lists of Roman prices. The introductory section on the history of money's origins, however, is comically outdated.

• Traité des monnaies gauloises - Adrien Blanchet, 1905 PDF Downloads: Part 1 (12.1 mb) Part 2 (13.3 mb)
  A comprehensive look at the coins of Celtic Gaul.

European Coins

• Allgemeines Taschenbuch der Münz-, Maass- und Gewichtskunde... - Johann Christian Nelkenbrecher, 1871 PDF Download (19.4 mb)
  Descriptions of the money and weight systems used in all corners of the world. Printed in old German fraktur typeface, and not too easy to discern.

• Appel's Repertorium zur Münzkunde des Mittelalters und der Neuern Zeit - Joseph Appel, 1820
  PDF Downloads Vol. 1 (18.1 mb) Vol. 2 (14.2 mb) Vol. 4 (15.6 mb) ··· Set #2 Vol. 2 Set #2 Vol. 3 Set #2 Vol. 4
  A large but difficult and terribly organized listing of medieval and modern coins from all of Europe. Few plates or illustrations, but possibly useful for 16th century pieces that are in other modern hard to find books.

• Catalogue de la collection de monnaies... - Christian Jürgensen Thomsen, Kirstian Sofus August Erslev, 1874 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 Vol. 2 Vol. 3
  A famous collection of medieval coins nicely catalogued, but scantly illustrated. There are some errors in the listings, but it is still a large and broad collection to peruse and covers a much wider area than Saurma.

• Compendium der Münz-, Maass-, Gewichts- und Wechselcours-verhältnisse sämmtlicher... - Friedrich Anton Strackerjan, Gustav Wagner, 1855 PDF Download (16.1 mb)
  A large set of tables of exchange, and information about various weight and measuring systems in most of the world's known lands at the time. Very good information about the relative values of one currency to another.

• The decimal system in numbers, coins, and accounts... - John Bowring, 1854 PDF Download
  A very detailed study of numbers and the decimal system with the overarching goal of promoting a decimal system for English coinage.

• Monnaies féodales de France - Faustin Poey d'Avant, 1858-1862 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 (12.6 mb) Vol. 2 (13.6 mb) Vol. 3 (18.1 mb)
  Still one of the finest works on French feudal coinage available, and scanned in very well. Includes dozens of plates in the three volumes, although the scanning resolution is such that the details are difficult to make out.

• De munten der voormalige graven en hertogen van Gelderland - Pieter Otto van der Chijs, 1852 PDF Download (22.4 mb)
  One of a set of highly sought-after and very expensive set of titles by P. O. van der Chijs on the coinages of the regions of Holland and Belgium. Nicely scanned, plates are a little indistinct but useable.

• Die Saurmasche Münzsammlung - Hugo, Freiherr von Saurma-Jeltsch, 1892
  Probably the most famous catalogue of medieval coinage ever printed, the "Saurma" is still a very useful work for identification despite its age and sparse cataloguing style. There is no information on metal composition, no cross-references, and the photos aren't the best. The online edition by James Roberts not only made searching and using the Saurma a breeze, but also added in a lot of the missing information like coin diameters and legend transcriptions. This was a FANTASTIC job well done by Jim, and I would like to ask his permission here to re-upload the site and host it from medievalcoinage.com. If you know a contact address for Jim that works, please let him know of your interest and mine.

• Simon's Essay on Irish Coins... - James Simon, Thomas Snelling, 1810
  A year-by-year chronological summary of the coins of Ireland and the proclamations issuing them.

• Traité de numismatique du moyen âge - Arthur Engel and Raymond Serrure, 1891 PDF downloads: Vol. 1 (11.8 mb) Vol. 2 (17.0 mb) Vol. 3 (14.1 mb)
  This three volume set in French is still the only major overview of medieval coinage published in the last 100 years (Grierson's book doesn't attempt to cover the material in this detail). Until the rest of the Medieval European Coinage titles being prepared are available, this remains a valuable work for general information and, to a lesser degree, identification of a coin at least to a specific state or region despite its age.

• Traité de numismatique moderne et contemporaine - Arthur Engel and Raymond Serrure, 1897 PDF Download (only vol. 1 available, 15.8 mb)
  Thoroughly outdated by modern works by Krause and others, this two volume set (only Volume 1 online so far) was a companion to the medieval set listed above. Useful only as a curiousity really unless you can't find something elsewhere and want to check here for completeness, the dearth of illustrations makes it even more hit and miss as to whether you'll find anything here.

• A Treatise on the Coins of the Realm: In a Letter to the King - Charles, Earl of Liverpool, 1805
  Study of British coins in part, but also delves into monetary history and other related topics such as debasement, the fluctuations of metal prices, and more. For whatever reason, the table of contents was placed clear at the end of the pages (Google's page 267).

• A View of the Coins at this Time Current Throughout Europe - Thomas Snelling, 1766
  Descriptions of coins in circulation in European states at the time, including monies of account. Also large sets of examples on determining finenesses from the smelting together of ingots with varying purities.

German Coins

General Coverage

• Beyträge zum Groschen-Cabinet nach Anleitung der hinterlassnen Sammlung deutscher Münzen des königlich sächsischen Finanz-Secretair Christopoph Friedrich Pohl - Christian Jacob Götz, 1810-1812 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 (20.2 mb) Vol. 2 (20.5 mb) Vol. 3 (30.7 mb)
  A large early collection of coins organized and described by issuing state starting from the Roman Empire through the publication date. Not comprehensive but a good overview of issuing states. There are a few plates but as they are on fold-out pages, Google did not scan them.

Frankfurt am Maim

• Die Münzen von Frankfurt-am-main nebst einer münzgeschichtlichen - Paul Joseph, Eduard Fellner, 1896 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 Vol. 2
  Very thorough listing of the coins from Frankfurt including many varieties. Covers the entire medieval and modern period.

Münster and its Bishopric

• Beiträge zur Münzkunde des ehemaligen Hochstifts Münster von der ältesten Zeit bis zur Verweltlichung desselben: mit historischen und kritischen Bemerkungen - Joseph Riesert, 1838-1840 PDF Downloads: Vol. 1 (6.30 mb) Vol. 2 (9.55 mb)
  Well described listing of coins from older sources compiled into one book. No plates or index, however. Largely superceded by Weingartner's book in general and other modern works for specific locations.