Page 23 - Delcampe Collections classiques EN-006

Coins

out blindly with no idea where However, it is difficult to know at
you’re headed is the best way first what will thrill you, what will
to make a mistake and to give pique your curiosity and from
up quickly out of spite. Knowing antiquity to the present day, the
what you have requires consul- fields can be very varied, covering
tation, which can take several an infinity of periods and pos-
forms: visiting a professional coin sibilities. Is there anything spe-
specialist, or numismatist (on the cial about the coins you found?
web or face-to-face to ask ques- Consult books, look around to
tions), searching for numismatic get an idea; talk to experienced
books to buy or read in a library. or professional numismatists -
Depending on whether your re- some will be more forthcoming
search reveals that your coins, than others and provide you
albeit historically interesting, are with leads; you can ask them
neither rare nor expensive or, in honestly for advice. Ask them
contrast that you have just found what they personally collect, or
the coins stolen from the French even ‘how’ they collect. Reflect
Bibliothèque Nationale in 1831 on your personal experience, the
which were thought to have been region you come from, your job,
melted down, the consequences your family, the historical places
will be very different for the future that mean something to you or
of your collection. that you love... and things will
If your coins, as is almost always take shape until a core collection
the case, do not have a high mar- appears. Another key point is to
ket value, you at least now know know what these currencies are,
where they fit in history, and can what exists and what does not, Oscar Roty’s Sower coin trial (obverse).
identify their relatives. It also what is common and what is Union and Force Directoire coinage in
lets you know what you need if, out of the ordinary. This is done excellent condition.
for instance, you want to collect through discussion, and a lot of
one coin of each type, period by reading. There are often as many
period. If you are not looking for (or more) books as there are
exceptional conservations or rare coins in a numismatist’s shop.
variants, then for a very reaso- For modern French coins, a book
nable budget, you can set out on such as “Le Franc, les monnaies,
a large board of three hundred or les archives” (‘the Franc, curren-
so squares all that our immediate cies, archives’) covers the whole
ancestors had in their pockets, modern period of the Franc, from
fob pockets and other purses, the French Revolution to the tran-
from the French Revolution to the sition to the decimal system, and
changeover to the Euro... in other onward to the switch to the Euro,
words a history spanning some providing effective guidance and
220 years. information. A wealth of literature

Delcampe Magazine 23