THE COIN COLLECTOR - World eBook Library

CONTINENT OF EUROPE
ban-ass the labours of the most indefatigable among
the Continental workers, and to compel them to leave
certain series with lacunas to be supplied hereafter;
and this condition of affairs, which may be partly
attributed to the loss of their archives by petty States
and the committal of the obsolete coinages to the
crucible, exists in the face of continuous research and
continuous discussion.
The grand series of groups of numismatic produc-
tion which the European Continental section of this
work offers to our view forms a virtual sequel to the
monetary history of Rome, and may be considered
as commencing at the point where the coinage
of the Western Empire, with the exception of the
ephemeral exarchate of Ravenna, determines. During
centuries we have to note the lingering influence of
the masters of the ancient world in the imitation
of their types, subject to such changes as modified
political and religious conditions insensibly accom-
plished, and at the same time necessitated. A mainly
new nomenclature and symbolism for the coins them-
selves arose, but classical history or mythology was
recollected in such forms as Hercules, Phcebus, Achilles,
Julius Caesar, Augustus, Cicero, Theodore, Demetrius,
Alexander, Michael, Philippus, Constantinus, Octavius,
occasionally disguised by linguistic postulates. Until
the Frankish authority was more or less consolidated
in the person of Charlemagne about the close of the
eighth century of our era, there was no central power
in succession to that of Rome on the Continent, nor
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