1833. ] Cabinet of the Asiatic Society. 29 
ry was one of my pursuits: and in the rainy season I had a’pérson 
employed at Mathurd and other old cities to collect all that were 
brought to light by the action of the water while tearing up old foun- 
dations, and levelling mouldering walls. 
In this manner I accumulated about 20,000 coins of all denomina- 
tions; among which there may be not above one hundred calculated to 
excite interest, and perhaps not above one-third of that number to be 
considered of value: but among them there is an ApoLLopotus anda 
MeENANDER, besides some rare medals of a Parthian dynasty, probably 
yet unknown to history.” 
The coins of Greece are divided by numismatologists into two prin- 
cipal series: the civic, and the monarchical. The former comprehends 
all the moneys of the different states of Ancient Greece, bearing the 
names of their cities and people, and the symbols and devices em- 
blematical of them, or the figures of the tutelary deities under 
whose especial protection they considered themselves placed. The 
monarchical series begins with the Macedonian dynasty, or about 
500 years before Christ, continuing throughout the kings of Macedon, 
and, after the division of Alexander’s empire among his generals and 
successors, subdividing itself into the several branches of the Seleucian 
or Syrian, the Egyptian, the Bactrian, the Parthian and Armenian 
dynasties ; besides, which may be enumerated the Pontine kings and se- 
veral of minor importance. 
The civic coins, of which the Hunterian Cabinet at Glasgow contains 
so magnificent a collection, are generally supposed to be more ancient 
than the monarchical series; they are mostly of ruder fabrication, but 
the figures of animals and gods are sometimes executed with great 
skill: the period of the highest proficiency in the arts is, however, uni- 
versally acknowledged to be the age of Alexander, or the third century 
before Christ : the coins of this distant age, even the meagre and 
scattered specimens which we have picked up in India, are so exquisitely 
finished as to furnish models to artists and sculptors of the present day, 
while they almost defy their best powers of imitation. 
The inscriptions found upon the earlier coins are generally the rude 
initials of the names of cities or people, becoming more complete as we 
descend in the series: the names of chiefs or principal men and priests 
are introduced sometimes at a later period, but as no dates are given 
it is impossible to assign any exact age to most of the civic coinage. 
Throughout the Macedonian series the names of princes are introduced, 
and history affords chronological data for their classification. The inscrip- 
tions are generally written in straight and parallel lines, differing in 
