NEW BOOK: GREEK COIN ART

One day, while attending a coin show in New York City, a dealer recognized me and asked me what I collected. I told him I did not know, but those marvelous 2,000-year-old pieces of silver were masterpieces of ancient sculpture. "Ah!" he said, "Art on coins!" I ended up learning about the fascinating world of ancient Greece, their endemic warfare, their philosophy, and their life.

The book, Greek Coin Art, shows many of the commonest available Greek coins as full page color pictures. The layout is mainly a full page coin photograph on one page with the history behind it on the page opposite. It starts with the "grand tour" (the way collectors classify the different parts of the ancient Greek world), denominations, and pay in ancient times.

Subsequent chapters cover: Non-Greek Europe, Southern Italy and Sicily, Macedonia, Thrace, Thessaly Central Greece and the Peloponnese, Crete, Asia Minor (present-day Turkey), Cyprus and the Levant, The Achaemenids (ancient Persia), The Seleukid Empire, The Parthian Empire, Greco-Baktrians, Indo-Greeks, Ptolemaic Egypt.

The book finishes with a glossary, including a classification of divine beings, a list of gods, allegories and their attributes, mythical animals, weight standards, ancient Greek tribes, and ways to collect Greek coins.

COMMENTS BY ROBERT HOGE, Curator Emeritus, American Numismatic Society

372 pages
148 full-page coin photographs
Hardback 8.5 by 11 inches
Copyright 2025
$89.95 plus postage and packing at BookBaby.com, Amazon, Barnes Noble, etc.

From the Introduction by Robert W. Hoge:
Under the somewhat misleading title of his work, Dr. Peter Jones, with his characteristic British modesty, has hidden what is in reality actually nothing less than a charming tour de force succinctly exploring the entire field of ancient Greek numismatics. While it can indeed be viewed as an examination of artwork from the birthplace of Western civilization — the imagery supplied by Dr. Jones' own exceptionally fine efforts in appropriate photography makes this clear — it is in fact a compendium of the many aspects and by-ways of the field, clearly conveying why the collecting and study of ancient Greek coins has been a popular, fascinating and cherished pastime for hundreds of years.

Greek Coin Art begins with the "Grand Tour" of the field, discussing just what a survey of ancient Greek coinage entails, what is and what is not a part of the scope of the subject matter. In thirteen following chapters, Dr. Jones pursues the coins and the artwork they feature in what, since the eighteenth century, has come to be the standard arrangement of the various series of emissions. Moving circum-Mediterranean from the Hellenic colonies in the West, present day Spain and France, from the Italian "Greater Greece" (Magna Graecia), as the Romans called it, then on into the various regions of the ancient Greek-speaking world, and on to the issues of non-Greek neighbors who shared in the coinage traditions, he examines and explicates many of the most prominent series. And it is these examinations and explications that make this book particularly enjoyable!

Peter Jones is a true polymath! It was my pleasure and honor to first make his acquaintance years ago when, as a student in the American Numismatic Association's Summer Seminar, he took the class that I taught on coinages of the ancient world while I served as curator in charge of the Association's Money Museum. Peter became an outstanding numismatist and collector.

The host of lovely specimens upon which Greek Coin Art is grounded was personally assembled by him; however, his activity did not stop there. Part of the charm and delight to be found in this work lies in the meticulous side-investigations in which his wide-ranging knowledge and curiosity have been brought to bear. Strange features of the relevant religious mythologies and little-known cultural practices are interlaced into the narrative. One will learn about how the ancients actually counted numbers, and where super-fecundation appears in origin stories! As a medical Dr., Peter uses his clinical expertise to expand our understanding of that world in which Greek coin art flourished.

About The Author:
Peter is a life member of ANA, NENA, and USMEXNA, and a member of ANS, IBSS, C4 and MCA, and president of his local coin club, the Mansfield Numismatic Society. He has also authored Notable Notes, Colonial History In Your Hands, Dow Jones by Peter Jones, Commemorative Coin Tales, The First Medals of America, The First Coins of the Americas, TREASURE, Beautiful Banknotes of France, Stock Certificates Art and History, Greek Coin Art, and with Prof. Cynthia Adams, Therapeutic Communication, now in its third edition. A graduate of both Oxford and Cambridge, and an MBA from the University of Connecticut, Peter moved from England with his wife and three daughters to rural Connecticut in 1977, where he practiced internal medicine for 39 years.

For more information, or to order, see:
https://www.booksoncoins.com/
Greek Coin Art (https://store.bookbaby.com/book/greek-coin-art1)

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