THE COIN COLLECTOR - World eBook Library

COLLECTORS AND COLLECTIONS
The formation of Collections of Coins originated, not
in the Numismatist, but in the Hoarder. Individuals,
from an early stage in the history of coined money, laid
pieces aside, as (nearer to our day) Samuel Pepys did,
because they were striking or novel, or secreted them
in the ground, like Pepys, because they were thought
to be insecure. The former habit may be considered
the germ of the coin-cabinet, as we know it ; the latter
accounts for those Finds which in modern times have
enriched and advanced numismatic science to so pro-
digious and unlooked for an extent.
The French term medaille, as commonly applied either
to a medal or a coin, is a key to the inducement, in
the first instance, to treat this class of monuments as
objects of study. During a prolonged period, when
coins had fairly begun to attract attention beyond their
commercial and current aspects, it was their historical
and biographical interest which awakened and stimu-
lated curiosity. It was as records of public occurrences
and as portraitures of celebrated men and women that,
first of all, the Greeks, then the Romans, and finally
the modern Europeans, sought
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and cherished them
;