1870.] 1"" LFliillips. 



others are "well engraved counterfeits. These were originally sold only as 

 copies of antiques, but their makers were subsequently induced to dis- 

 pose of them as genuine. 



The boldness of design and power displayed in the treatment of their 

 subjects is of a very high degree of excellence. 



The coinage of the ancient Greeks was very rarely (if ever) of a circular 

 form, owing to the imperfection of the processes employed. They did not 

 possess the knowledge of the collar by which in modern times accuracy in 

 striking is ensured, and the result was in many instances that the coin con- 

 tains only a portion of the device or inscription, the rest having failed 

 to reach the planchet, as there was no means of holding it firmly in place 

 to receive the stroke of the hammer. 



The types that occur on the coinage of the ancients are manifold. The 

 bull, the emblem of strength and force, is often found joined to a human 

 head, as on the coins of Gelas, where it signifies human intellect and phys- 

 ical perfection. The bull occurs also in combat with the lion symbolizing 

 the conflict of the fire element (or the sun), and that of water (i. e. the bull) ; 

 this type is often found upon the Persian coinage. The serpent also fre- 

 quently represents the ocean. 



The earliest kings who placed their portraits upon coins, did so under tlic 

 garb or disguise of gods and heroes ; thus Alexander the Great appears as 

 Herakles and Jupiter Amnion ; Lysimachus, as the Horned Bacchus, and 

 other examples will readily be found. 



Their portraits, professedly as that of human beings, appeared on no coin 

 till after the death of Alexander the Great, and even then the change took 

 place with great caution and circumspection. 



The leading characteristic of the coinage of the ancient Greeks, and as 

 such it is to be found even upon their very earliest known specimens, is 

 sublimity.* This arises from the simplicity of thought and object with 

 which these early coins were designed and executed, and is the cause 

 of the calmness and the repose of the Grecian art. Even the most archaic 

 types possess this property, although in the transition stage from the rude 

 to the excellent. Neatness and stiffness constitute archaism in art, and the 

 condition of the early Greek mind has been compared by Humphreys very 

 justly to the quaint productions of the masters of the fifteenth century. 



Grecian art attained its highest perfection during the third period to 

 which I have already alluded, viz : From the accession of Philip the 

 Second of Macedon to the final subversion of the Roman liberty under 

 Augustus Caesar. In the cities of Magna Grecia, it reached a most extra- 

 ordinary degree of culture, regardless of their not far distant neighbor, the 

 robber city, founded by outlaws, and living by rapine, that city, whose am- 

 bition still comprised within petty limits, had not yet broken its bounds to 

 fly its conquering eagles above a prostrate world. 



Rome now claims our attention. Its series is composed of gold, silver 

 and bronze. The oldest silver pieces, denarii, are of the value of ten asses 



* Humphreys. 



