An Old Ancient Coin
Collection of a Wittem Redemptorist
Monk
The village of Wittem, in the Dutch province of Limburg, is home to a
monastery that is almost three centuries old. Today it is still home to monks
of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, more commonly known as Redemptorists.
Not so long ago a small
collection of Roman coins was found in the room of a monk who was recently
deceased. It was accompanied by a small hand-written catalogue written in Latin.
Unfortunately the only thing the monastery could tell me about these coins, was
that they came from a very old collection, handed over two or possibly three
generations of monks. There is certainly evidence of multiple hand writings in
the catalogue and on the envelopes The catalogue seems to be from the early
1900’s, but there is the date “±1870” written on the first page. If the text
was copied from an even older catalogue, that might account for some
discrepancies in the discriptions and numbering.
In general the coins are not in
prime condition. I think it is safe to assume that most of them have a Dutch
provenance; they were given to the monk-collector in Wittem
by people in the region who found the coins themselves, as is still happening
today. This is confirmed by the fact that the late Roman bronzes in the
collection are almost all from Western mints – Trier, Arles and Lyon – as is
typical in Dutch finds. Moreover, many coins have the corroded surfaces
typically found on coins coming from Dutch soil.
There are, however, some coins
that stand out. Some nice 3rd century antoniniani,
and most notably, a Trier mint argenteus of
Diocletian. Almost all 86 coins described in the hand-written catalogue are
accounted for. I could not locate three of them. A smaller number of other
coins were bought together with the ‘core collection’ described in the
catalogue. Some of these coins were probably later additions, perhaps partly
purchased in the trade.
The catalogue is what sets this
collection apart from other ‘old collections’ that come to market after
multiple centuries or decades. Of course it shows traces of wear and use, and
most pages have fallen apart, but its stained paper and the graciously written
Latin words have a beauty of their own. It also gives an insight into the
history of collecting ancients and it reveals the mind-set of a collector that
is surprisingly recognizable. The writer tries to describe his coins as
thoroughly and correctly as possible. He gets the attributions right most of
the time, but the occasions where he fails are in a way more interesting, for
example when ascribing a coin of Severus Alexander to M. Aurelius and reading a
Ticinum mint mark for Trier. These are exactly the
same things that show up frequently on the many numismatic fora
on the internet today still. The writer also includes short pieces of
historical background and occasionally makes a numismatic comment, especially
when he is not sure of its attribution.
