Publications and Research
Periodicals
Bank of Canada Review
Spring 2000
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Recent Developments in the Monetary Aggregates and Their Implications by Joseph Atta-Mensah
Credibility and Monetary Policy
See also: Tables A1, A2, and Notes to the Tables |
Cover: A Seventeenth-Century Collector's Guide
Numismatics is not a new field. People have studied coins since ancient times, and since the invention of the printing press, reference books have been prepared for collectors. The first such works were printed in early sixteenth-century Italy towards the end of the Renaissance when there was a renewed interest in classical art and, consequently, in ancient coins. As interest in coins spread, printers in centres such as Venice, Rome, Bruges, Paris, and Amsterdam produced beautifully bound leather books in sizes that ranged from folio (over 13 inches) to trigesimo secundo (4 to 5 inches). Many works were embellished with fanciful frontispieces and well-engraved simulations of coins and medals. Given the classical tastes of early collectors, these works tended to focus on ancient coins. Surveys of the coinage in particular regions, such as the volume featured on our cover, were not uncommon.
The Traité Historique des Monnoyes de France, written by M. LeBlanc and printed in Amsterdam in 1692, was still recommended to collectors of French issues in the early nineteenth century. Copious biographical notes on the kings of France, coupled with references to the issues of each reign and woodcut illustrations of the obverse and reverse of hundreds of coins, made this a very popular reference.
Here, the title page is used as a backdrop for some of the coins described in the book. Clockwise from the upper left, they include a silver Carolingian denier of Odo (887–98), an écu d'or of Charles VI (1380–1422), a copper denier tournois of Henry III (1574–89) dated 1588, and a silver 1/4 écu of Louis XIV (1643–1715).
This volume, as well as the coins, forms part of the National Currency Collection, Bank of Canada, which, in addition to its numismatic holdings, also houses a reference library of more than 8,000 books, pamphlets, periodicals, and catalogues about money and banking.
Photography by James Zagon.