DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.45277#0018
XIV
PREFACE.
est aureus et Corinthiorum quidem nullum omnino habemus numum
certum ex quocunque metallo antequam romanam coloniam recepissent.’
Passing from Greece to the East, we find Eckhel’s work all but
useless to the student. The Lycian, the Cypriote, the Arian and Indian
Pali alphabets and syllabaries were absolutely unknown in Eckhel’s
time. All these and many other series of coins, some now thoroughly,
and others as yet but partially investigated, were, in the beginning of
the present century still silent witnesses to the history of a dead past,
lying undiscovered, though fortunately uninjured by the lapse of ages
in the safe keeping of that mother-earth to whom they had been com-
mitted more than two thousand years ago.
I have still to mention two very important subjects concerning which
the author of the Podrina was very imperfectly acquainted : (i) The history
of the development of Greek art, and (ii) Metrology. With regard to the
first it is only indeed within quite recent years that archaeologists have
been aware of any strict scientific basis of criticism for determining the
exact age of works of ancient art. Archaeology as a science can hardly
be said to have existed in the last century. There was little or nothing
in the nature of things which precluded the possibility of assigning almost
any uninscribed coin, within certain limits, to almost any age. All this
is now changed, and we may approach the study of Greek Numismatics
armed with at least a general knowledge of the laws which hold good in
the growth, the development, and the decay of Greek art. Numismatics
and Epigraphy have been of immense assistance in determining these
fixed laws of criticism, and it is now a matter of no great difficulty foi'
the experienced Numismatist to place a coin within certain definite
temporal and local limits often surprisingly narrow. It is thus possible
with a tolerably complete series of the coins of any one city at our dis-
posal to arrange them in the order in which they were issued, and so to
reconstruct the numismatic history of the town. How much light may
be thrown upon the dark spaces of political history by a series of coins
classified and duly arranged in order of date can only be fully appreciated
by those who are familiar with the science of numismatics and accus-
tomed to handle and study minutely the money of the ancients.
One of the distinctive features of the present work is an attempt to set
forth clearly the chronological sequence of the various series, and thus to
build up in outline the history of the ancient world as it existed from the
seventh century before our era down to the closing years of the third
century A.D., a space of nearly a thousand years. If in some districts this
historical outline is of the barest and most fragmentary kind, it will
generally be found that this is due to the absence of numismatic evidence.
Wherever coins are at hand in any. quantities, there we have authentic
documents on which to work. However rash therefore and tentative
some of my chronological hypotheses may be thought to be by more
cautious numismatists, I have preferred to submit such judgments as I
PREFACE.
est aureus et Corinthiorum quidem nullum omnino habemus numum
certum ex quocunque metallo antequam romanam coloniam recepissent.’
Passing from Greece to the East, we find Eckhel’s work all but
useless to the student. The Lycian, the Cypriote, the Arian and Indian
Pali alphabets and syllabaries were absolutely unknown in Eckhel’s
time. All these and many other series of coins, some now thoroughly,
and others as yet but partially investigated, were, in the beginning of
the present century still silent witnesses to the history of a dead past,
lying undiscovered, though fortunately uninjured by the lapse of ages
in the safe keeping of that mother-earth to whom they had been com-
mitted more than two thousand years ago.
I have still to mention two very important subjects concerning which
the author of the Podrina was very imperfectly acquainted : (i) The history
of the development of Greek art, and (ii) Metrology. With regard to the
first it is only indeed within quite recent years that archaeologists have
been aware of any strict scientific basis of criticism for determining the
exact age of works of ancient art. Archaeology as a science can hardly
be said to have existed in the last century. There was little or nothing
in the nature of things which precluded the possibility of assigning almost
any uninscribed coin, within certain limits, to almost any age. All this
is now changed, and we may approach the study of Greek Numismatics
armed with at least a general knowledge of the laws which hold good in
the growth, the development, and the decay of Greek art. Numismatics
and Epigraphy have been of immense assistance in determining these
fixed laws of criticism, and it is now a matter of no great difficulty foi'
the experienced Numismatist to place a coin within certain definite
temporal and local limits often surprisingly narrow. It is thus possible
with a tolerably complete series of the coins of any one city at our dis-
posal to arrange them in the order in which they were issued, and so to
reconstruct the numismatic history of the town. How much light may
be thrown upon the dark spaces of political history by a series of coins
classified and duly arranged in order of date can only be fully appreciated
by those who are familiar with the science of numismatics and accus-
tomed to handle and study minutely the money of the ancients.
One of the distinctive features of the present work is an attempt to set
forth clearly the chronological sequence of the various series, and thus to
build up in outline the history of the ancient world as it existed from the
seventh century before our era down to the closing years of the third
century A.D., a space of nearly a thousand years. If in some districts this
historical outline is of the barest and most fragmentary kind, it will
generally be found that this is due to the absence of numismatic evidence.
Wherever coins are at hand in any. quantities, there we have authentic
documents on which to work. However rash therefore and tentative
some of my chronological hypotheses may be thought to be by more
cautious numismatists, I have preferred to submit such judgments as I