British Numismatic Society

Minutes of the May meeting

Minutes of the Meeting of the British Numismatic Society, held at Swedenborg Hall on Tuesday, 28 May 2024, Dr Screen, President, being in the chair and 12 other people present.

The minutes of the meeting held on 22 April 2024 were approved.

NOMINATIONS: Christopher James Ainsworth (London) and Dr John Luke Carson (Co Durham) were nominated for Ordinary Membership. 

ELECTIONS: Andrew Paul Crellin (Australia) and Carol Hartman (Devon) were elected to Ordinary Membership.

RESIGNATIONS: Thomas Bowman (Glasgow, 2022), Robin Rackley (Surrey, 2020) and Daniel James Wallace (Perthshire, 2021) had resigned with immediate effect.

Shreya Gupta then read a paper entitled The story of Indian coin collections in UK museums: facilitating, negotiating and contesting their journey from India to England.

The President then announced the date of the next meeting and closed the meeting. The Spring Reception, which had been scheduled to take place after the meeting, was cancelled for logistical reasons.

 


 

Our next meeting – and the link to join it on Zoom

This month sees us return to our regular venue, the Society of Antiquaries of London (SAL), next Monday, 24 June, at 6.15pm BST.

Our speaker is Richard Purkiss, from Oxford, who is currently writing a monograph on administration and society in East Anglia, c. 880–1066. His paper is entitled Coinage and political authority in East Anglia, 917-1066.

Mr Purkiss works on the social and administrative history of late Anglo-Saxon England. His doctoral thesis examined the administrative development of East Anglia between 917 and 1066, the period which saw the region integrated into a growing English kingdom. He sought to explain how this process operated at a local level by considering what claims underpinned it, how new administrative structures were introduced, and what gave royal officers power in the localities. His thesis argued that the ‘Anglo-Saxon state’ of this period drew its strength not so much from military and bureaucratic organisation as from the widespread and direct relationship between the king and his subjects.

The SAL is located at Burlington House, on the north side of Piccadilly, opposite the Fortnum & Mason department store. Proceed through the archway leading to the House and the SAL is on the ground floor of the west wing of the building, at the far end of the courtyard, entered through a pair of brown doors.

The nearest Underground stations are Piccadilly Circus and Green Park, both 5 minutes' walk away. Those attending meetings in person will be required to sign the SAL's Visitors' Book.

If you are in London that day we look forward to your company, otherwise please join us on Zoom. To join the meeting online, please use the following link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88970371093 and the passcode 563473. Pre-registration is not necessary. If you are using the desktop version of Zoom, please ensure that you employ the most up-to-date version before joining us. The meeting itself will commence with formal business at 6.15pm and the lecture will begin immediately after that. 

Please note: by request of the speaker, this meeting will NOT be recorded for future transmission on the Society's website.

Images courtesy of Noonans Mayfair and Classical Numismatic Group
 
Our lecture on 24 June
 
Tenth- and eleventh-century England is commonly associated with institutional regularity, not least for the organisation, uniformity and control of its coinage. How administrative control was first achieved is comparatively obscure, and nowhere more so than in East Anglia, over which Edward the Elder first asserted his authority in 917. In the absence of documents earlier than c. 950, coins represent the only local and contemporary witnesses to political integration. What can the East Anglian coinage tell us about the process – and vice versa? Recent studies have tended to date the development of uniform institutions to the second, rather than the first half of the tenth-century. The revised chronology finds support in East Anglia, where conventional patterns of office-holding were slow to develop and the numismatic record illustrates a gradual and selective imposition of royal control.

 

A day at the Royal Mint – Saturday 13 July – last call

The Society’s 2024 Summer meeting will take the form of a day-long visit on Saturday, 13 July, to the Royal Mint at Llantrisant, South Wales. The Royal Mint has been at the centre of British coinage production for centuries. Its operations are among the best in the world and its Museum has an exceptional collection of British coins. The day has been formulated to provide an insight into the work of the Royal Mint and its collections.

The morning will take in 'The Royal Mint Experience', comprising a tour of the Mint and the exhibition gallery, and will be followed by four talks in the afternoon about designing coins, the Trial of the Pyx, diversification and recycling and a close look at six numismatic treasures from the Museum collection. The day will commence at 10.45am (with access from 10am) and finish at 4.30pm.

Participants travelling from a distance are advised to book into a hotel for the night of the 12 July. Details of suitable accommodation can be found at https://www.britnumsoc.org/meetings/summer-2024-visit-royal-mint. There is ample parking on site  – the satellite navigation postcode is CF72 8YT.

Attendance is free, but registration via Eventbrite is required. Please use the link above. Only a few places left, so book now!

 

 

Dr Barrie Cook is presented with the Sanford Saltus Medal for 2023

The Society's premier award, triennially given, is the Sanford Saltus Medal, and we were particularly pleased to present its latest recipient, Dr Barrie Cook of the newly-renamed Department of Money and Medals at the British Museum, with his medal at the meeting of the Society last month. 

Instituted in 1910 by a former President, John Sanford Saltus (1854-1922), Dr Cook is the 40th recipient, and joins six other living members who have won this distinguished prize: Hugh Pagan, Edward Besly, Martin Allen, Nicholas Mayhew, Nicholas Holmes and David Dykes. Congratulations!

 

Library latest

The Art Déco entrance to the Warburg Institute, home to the Society's Library since 1957, is re-opening this week as work on the Institute's Renaissance building project nears completion. It is anticipated that the ground floor Reading Room will re-open in mid-July and, once it is, access to the Library will be by scanning the barcode on your reader's ticket through new entry and exit gates in the Reading Room.

Access to the Society's Library is solely by a valid reader's card, available upon personal application to the Warburg Institute. Those intending to apply need not prove they are a member of the Society, but will need to provide two forms of identification (one with a photographic image), one of which must show proof of a residential address.

 
Special Publications Summer Sale!

To assist the Society in reducing stocks of some of our Special Publications, we are having a bumper Summer Sale. But hurry – stocks of some of these titles are low – and in any case, these offers will end on 30 September. Prices are per title: postage and packing is extra.

All orders should be made to the Society's distributor, Spink in London, at www.spinkbooks.com
 
SP 4. The Durham Mint, by Martin Allen, 2003.   WAS £45 NOW £10
SP 5. The Abbey and Mint of Bury St Edmunds to 1279, by Robin Eaglen, 2006.   WAS £55 NOW £20
SP 6. The Coinage of Offa and His Contemporaries, by Derek Chick, edited by Mark Blackburn and Rory Naismith, 2010.   WAS £40 NOW £20
SP 7. Viking Coinage and Currency in the British Isles, by Mark Blackburn, 2011, reprinted 2019.   WAS £48 NOW £20
SP 8. The Coinage of Southern England 796–865, by Rory Naismith, 2011.   WAS £90 NOW £30
SP 10. Hard at Work. The Diary of Leonard Wyon 1853–1867, edited by Philip Attwood, 2014.   WAS £45 NOW £10
SP 11. The Abbey and Mint of Bury St Edmunds from 1279, by Robin Eaglen, 2014.   WAS £45 NOW £20
SP 12. Coin Hoards in Iron Age Britain, by Philip de Jersey, 2014.   WAS £65 NOW £30

SP 14. ‘The hidden treasures of this happy island’. A History of Numismatics in Britain from the Renaissance to theEnlightenment, by Andrew Burnett, 2020.

   WAS £95 NOW £50
Dates for your diary

June 22.  Historical Medallion Congress (Warwick).  historicalmedalsociety@gmail.com

June 24.  Society meeting (London)

June 26.  Pritchard Collection (London).  spink.com

July 13.  Society Summer Meeting (Llantrisant).  britnumsoc.org/meetings/summer-2024-visit-royal-mint

July 18.  The Britannia Nummaria 2024 numismatic conference (York).  britannianummaria2024.blogspot.com/

July 19-20.  York Stamp & Coin Fair (York).  stampshows.net

August 6 to 10.  ANA World's Fair of Money (Chicago).  money.org/events/future-conventions/

September 6 to 8.  BANS Autumn Conference (Lichfield).  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

September 11.  Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles Symposium on Money and Coinage (London).  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

September 18.  Sabberton Collection (London).  noonans.co.uk

September 23.  Society meeting (London)

September 25 to 28.  International Committee for Banking and Money Museums Conference (Stockholm). icomon.mini.icom.museum/

September 27-28.  COINEX (London).  bnta.net

October 1-2.  Puddester Collection, Part II (London).  noonans.co.uk

October 4 to 6.  42nd Annual Token Congress (Northampton).  tim.everson@btinternet.com

October 16.  Silich Collection, Part II (London).  noonans.co.uk

November 2.  London Coin Fair (London).  coinfairs.co.uk
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