The State
Hermitage Museum houses one of the world's greatest collections of numismatic
coins and medals - its Muenzkabinett. To mark the 150th anniversary o the
New Hermitage, the fifth building of the museum complex which opened in
1852, the numismatic department is staging a special exhibition of some
of the choicest items ranging from ancient Greek gold coins to splendid
medals commissioned by Catherine the Great. The display is set out in the
elegant setting of the great Hall of Twelve Columns (Gallery 244 on the
first floor).
The origins of the collection date back to Catherine the Great in the late
18th century, when the court numismatic collection was granted first claim
on all coins and medals that became available from private collections,
individual finds and archaeological excavations on Russian territory. In
1804 the first inventory of the collection was made, carefully written out
in French (then the language of the court) in leather-bound volumes. One
of the appeals of the current exhibition is that the pages of the original
catalogue are often placed alongside the coins in the display cases. Thus,
beside gold coins of Philip of Macedon and Alexander the Great from 4th-century
Greece, are the relevant notes.
The exhibition charts the evolution of gold coins over the following two
thousand years, from the gold solidus of the Byzantine emperors to the early
coins of European monarchs in the 14th and 15th centuries, and a Japanese
graceful gold koban of the mid-19th century sent as a gift to the Tsar.
The exhibition offers a fascinating short walk around the history of gold
and silver coins.
| Date |
Venue |
February
2002
-
May 2002
|
Hall of Twelve
Columns
The State Hermitage
38 Palace Embankment (Dvortsovaya Embankment)
St Petersburg
Russia
Open
Tuesday to Saturday 10.30 -18.00
Sunday 10.30 - 17.00
Closed Monday
| Tel. |
+7
812 311 3465 (General)
+7 812 110 9625 (Recorded info)
+7 812 311 3420 (Exhibitions) |
| Web |
www.hermitagemuseum.org |
|
|