Holiday guide - museums

[chrisild]

Side note: The Polish central bank (NBP) plans to open a "Money Center" on its premises in Warsaw. "The area of approx. 2000 square metres which has been designated for the purpose will span four storeys. These will accommodate, besides the numismatic collections of the NBP, items closely connected with money - from old machines and measuring equipment, through historical catalogues, books and pamphlets to modern devices used in production, counting and authentication of notes and coins." http://www.nbp.pl/homen.aspx?f=/en/aktualnosci/2010/centrumen.html

Christian

[Figleaf]

A glimpse of rare Roman coins at Museum
D Madhavan, Jan 19, 2011

CHENNAI: Coins are not only used as a mode of exchange but they also reflect heritage. Indian-Roman relations was one such area where coins played a major role in establishing and strengthening ties between two countries.

At a special exhibition on Roman coins and other Roman antiquities found in South India, inaugurated by the Italian Embassy Cultural Centre director Angela Trezza at the Government Museum in Egmore on Tuesday, rare coins and antiquities were put on display for the public. "The exhibition will showcase the story of Rome-India contacts through artefacts, photographs and charts. The museum has the biggest collection of Roman coins 4,000 outside Europe," TS Sridhar, secretary and commissioner of museums, told The Times Of India.

The exhibition, jointly organised by the Government Museum, Italian Embassy Cultural Centre and Indo-Italian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, will be open everyday between 10am and 4.30pm till February 2 at the museum's centenary exhibition hall.

Historically, trade between ancient Rome and India can be traced to the rule of Roman emperor Augustus (27 BC - 14 AD). Romans came to India in search of gemstones (mainly beryl), silk, cotton, ivory, spices (pepper and cardamom), sandalwood and peacocks. In return, India obtained coral, wine, olive oil and metals like gold, silver and copper.

Metals imported from Rome were mostly in the form of coins and medals. "The most striking feature of Roman coins found in India is that they have slash marks on them, generally 1 to 2 mm long and marked by a knife or a chisel or a file. In Tamil Nadu, Pudukkottai and Soriyapattu are the most important Roman coin hoards containing such slashed coins," said N Sundararajan, curator, Numismatics section of Government Museum.

Another peculiar feature of the coins found in India is the occurrence of countermarks on some. Roman coins found in India are of gold, silver and copper mostly between 2nd century BC and 6-7th century AD the closing years of the Roman Republic to the time of Byzantine rulers. A majority of the Roman coins found in India occur as hoards buried underground in earthenware pots.

Source: Times of India

[Figleaf]

Restored Mint in Novosibirsk Region to Become a Museum
19.01.2011

      Unique history monument - Suzunsky Smeltery and Mint, where the famous local currency "Siberian coin" was minted in the 18th -19th cc - will be restored and transformed into a tourist complex in the Novosibirsk Region.
     
      The news was reported by the press-service of the regional government following the results of the recent council on preservation of historical and cultural heritage.
     
      On the basis of the ancient constructions remaining in Suzun the authorities of the Novosibirsk Region plan to create a large-scale museum able to attract a considerable number of tourists.

Source: Russia-InfoCentre

[Figleaf]

Yapı Kredi has the world's largest coin collection in its safe
06 February 2011 / Sevim Şentürk

İstanbul It is a gigantic safe, one of those that we normally see in banks, but this safe has a completely different function. It does not house millions of today's banknotes, but rare coins from Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman and other lost empires.

In it, there are some 55,000 coins that are direct witnesses of history, taking you back in just glance to the time they were minted. Coming from different periods of the past, they all tell a different story. With one you travel back in time to the sixth century B.C., while you find in another the Lydians, who invented money, and in yet another, Ottoman Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent. There are more: coins minted in the image and time of Alexander the Great; those from the one-month reign of Sultan Cem, who is known for his tragic story; a unique golden coin from the reign of Tuğrul Bey, the founder of the Great Seljuk Empire; and the coins used during the time of the four great caliphs of Islam are favorites of this safe. Even the coins minted just for the immediate needs of the Ottoman army have a place in this safe, which is located in the Vedat Nedim Tör Museum.

This coin collection was brought into existence by Kazım Taşkent, the founder of Yapı Kredi Bank, who patiently bought these coins from other collectors over time. It is the world's largest coin collection. Although several exhibitions have previously been held, this collection has never been fully revealed to the general public. Now, Yapı Kredi Bank is preparing unveil the collection, unknown to many, but precious to anyone who seeks to learn more about how coins evolved over time. Yapı Kredi Vedat Nedim Tör Museum Director Şennur Şentürk and archeologist Nihat Tekdemir are taking individual photos of each coin in the collection with the purpose of transferring them to digital media. They will be displayed online with the state and monarch that issued them, the city where they were minted, the date of production and a brief history of each coin. The project aims to contribute to the correct understanding of history and facilitate the work of researchers. The outcome of this project will soon be accessible at the website of Yapı Kredi Kültür (http://www.ykykultur.com.tr/).

There is a historic treasure in the safe

The 55,000-piece Yapı Kredi coin collection is divided into three groups. The first group consists of 22,000 rare coins, including 7,500 Ottoman, 122 Arab, 525 Umayyad and 1,373 Abbasid coins. It also contains 714 coins of Classical Greece, 228 Greco-Roman coins, 432 Roman coins and 392 Byzantine coins. The second group has 10,570 Ottoman coins, 640 of which are gold. The third group is the collection created by Cüneyt Ölçer, a major numismatist in Turkey, containing some 15,000 items.

A collection worthy of Anatolia, where coins were invented

The story of the collection is as special as its content. In a meeting held some 65 years ago and attended by historian İbrahim Hakkı Konyalı, antiquarian Hüseyin Kocabaş, coin collector Behzat Butak, numismatist Ekrem Humbaracı, Şerafettin Erel, founder of İstanbul Radio Vedat Nedim Tör and some other famous figures of the time, Yapı Kredi Bank's founder, Kazım Taşkent, underlined that one of the purposes of his bank was to preserve the cultural assets of the country. The group's advice to him suited the logic of a bank and the past of Anatolia: They decided to build a Yapı Kredi coin collection that would include the world's first coin, minted by the Lydians. First, Kocabaş's and Erel's collections containing rare pieces were bought, followed by the collections of Butak, Humbaracı, Osman Ferit Sağlam, Muazzez Erman, Fethi Aktan and Nusret Karaca. Finally, Ölçer's collection was purchased in 1994 and eventually the world's largest coin collection was brought into existence.

Source: Sunday's Zaman

Contact details and opening hours of the museum are here

[Coinsforever]

There is a historic treasure in the safe

The 55,000-piece Yapı Kredi coin collection is divided into three groups. The first group consists of 22,000 rare coins, including 7,500 Ottoman, 122 Arab, 525 Umayyad and 1,373 Abbasid coins. It also contains 714 coins of Classical Greece, 228 Greco-Roman coins, 432 Roman coins and 392 Byzantine coins. The second group has 10,570 Ottoman coins, 640 of which are gold. The third group is the collection created by Cüneyt Ölçer, a major numismatist in Turkey, containing some 15,000 items.

Interesting , I am not sure if they have catalog of these coins displayed.

Cheers

[Figleaf]

BOK Museum symbolic of modern Korean history
The structure was built in 1912 to be the headquarters for the Bank of Joseon.
By Kim Jong-rok, February 07, 2011

The former home of the central bank of Korea on Namdaemun Street in Jung District, central Seoul, now houses the Bank of Korea Museum. The tall white building behind the museum is the current home of Bank of Korea. By Shin Dong-yeon

Across from Shinsegae Department Store near Myeong-dong in central Seoul, a two-story stone building inspired by Renaissance-style chateaus stands out magnificently among the shiny skyscrapers around it. This historic building that now houses the Bank of Korea Museum is a century-old landmark in the country's capital.

The classic structure rests in the shadow of the towering Bank of Korea high rise, which was completed in 1987 to be the new home of the central bank.

Although Namdaemun Street, where the museum sits, surrendered its "financial hub of Korea" status to Yeouido, this was long the hub of finance on the Korean Peninsula.

The building was completed in 1912 to become the headquarters for the Bank of Joseon, Korea's central bank during Japan's colonial occupation.

It was designed by renowned Japanese architect Tatsuno Kingo, also known for his work on the Tokyo's Bank of Japan building and Tokyo Station.

Only since 2001 has it been the Bank of Korea Museum.

Most of its visitors are children and students. There is also the occasional foreign tourist that wonders in from the Myeong-dong market across the street.

A popular exhibition is a collection of bills and coins that were used on the Korean Peninsula hundreds of years ago.

A coin known as dangbaekjeon, which was in circulation during Heungsun Daewongun's reign (1820-1898), is a metaphor for a lack of money. The Korean idiom "I don't even have a ddangjeon" came from this period of financial hardship and high inflation. Ddangjeon is a shortened term for dangbaekjeon.

"People just tried to make a living. I think that's what we got from the chaos we experienced in ... our recent history," said 71-year-old Jo Byeong-su, who used to design bills at Korea Minting and Security Printing Corporation.

"Currency design should transcend [financial history] down to several generations," he added.

Also on display are foreign currencies from 120 countries.

But the real estate the building occupies also has deep financial history.

The museum is located near Seonhyecheong (1608-1894), which was a government office and warehouse that effectively controlled the prices of rice and cloth, and the value of the currency by periodically increasing supply of commodities.

A monument called Hamabi stands to the right of the current bank building's east gate.

Hamabi was was erected during Joseon King Injo's reign (1623-1649). In the era of Injo, a coin known as sangpyeongtongbo was the longest-circulated coin in Joseon history.

History

The Japanese government established the Bank of Joseon to act as a central bank in 1909. It issued Korean yen from 1910 to 1945 and won from 1945 to 1950.

The Bank of Joseon was responsible for regulating prices, issuing currency and supporting international trade for domestic companies.

After the Japanese occupation of the peninsula came to an abrupt end in 1945, the bank was dissolved by allied forces and replaced by the newly created Bank of Korea.

Only two weeks after the remodeled Bank of Korea came to life, the Korean War (1950-1953) broke out. And two days after that - on June 27 - employees at the Bank of Korea transported 1,070 kilograms (2,359 pounds) of gold and 2,513 kilograms of silver to the Navy Control Area in Jinhae, South Gyeongsang, before eventually being moved to the United States' Federal Reserve Bank of New York for safe keeping.

What remained was 260 kilograms of gold and 19,570 kilograms of silver.

Function

The mission of the modern-day central bank is inscribed into the wall of its main lobby: "stabilized commodity prices."

The Bank of Korea controls the base interest rate and supervises the country's foreign exchange reserves - which now totals close to $300 billion.

Korea ranks No. 6 in the world for its stockpile of foreign exchange currencies.

"As a joke, employees at the Korean central bank say they need not be blinded by money," said Cha Hyun-jin, a 49-year-old manager at the bank's investigation department.

"The BOK is the only bank that does not strive to make a profit. From the beginning of the bank's establishment in 1950, it had been designated as a public corporation, exempt from paying corporate taxes.

"It was also off limits to tax auditors. But that all changed in 1998; now, it is classified as a general taxed corporation, which can be subject to tax audits."

Cha added that the profit model is reversed for the central bank when compared with most private corporations because it generally realizes profits when the Korean won appreciates in value and falls when demand wanes for the currency.

There was about 1,680 trillion won ($1.5 trillion) in circulation as of November 2010, according to the Bank of Korea.

Every year, the amount of currency that ends its life cycle could fill up 194 five ton trucks.

Source: Joong Ang Daily

Photo caption: From top, dangojeon (1884); a 100 won bill (1914); a 1,000 won bill (1950); a 500 won bill (1962) Provided by the Bank of Korea Museum

[Coinsforever]

MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS BOSTON

The original MFA opened its doors to the public on July 4, 1876, the nation's centennial. Built in Copley Square, the MFA was then home to 5,600 works of art. Over the next several years, the collection and number of visitors grew exponentially, and in 1909 the Museum moved to its current home on Huntington Avenue.

Today the MFA is one of the most comprehensive art museums in the world; the collection encompasses nearly 450,000 works of art. We welcome more than one million visitors each year to experience art from ancient Egyptian to contemporary, special exhibitions, and innovative educational programs.

November 2010 marks the opening of The New MFA. Designed by the world-renowned Foster and Partners architects, The New MFA comprises a new wing for Art of the Americas; renovated art of Europe galleries; improved conservation and education facilities;The Linde Family Wing devoted entirely to contemporary art; and a new, larger public space—the Ruth and Carl J. Shapiro Family Courtyard.

An Artists' Colony - Right Across the Street

Established in 1876, The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston is one of the oldest and most distinguished art schools in the United States. Through an affiliation with Tufts University established in 1945, the SMFA offers undergraduate and graduate degree programs, providing students with a full range of academic resources.

Source : MFA

Collections includes ancient & contemporary coins , weight , antiques etc.

[Figleaf]

Money: It's a hit at the Bank of Greece museum
By Iota Sykka, March 11, 2011

There's not much to catch the eye at 3 Amerikis Street in central Athens, though this is where the National Bank of Greece houses its museum.

The museum's current exhibition is on Greece's numismatic history. It is free of charge and is proving to be very popular, especially among younger visitors, who are captivated by the clever exhibits.

Children are able to make as much noise as they want, because here there are no guards to tell them to hush up. They can indulge their enthusiasm for learning about how money works and where it comes from, and that is what this museum, which has been in operation for just one year, is all about.

The first exhibit is an attention grabber: It is a large installation consisting of five transparent boxes containing 1.5 million euros. Visitors crane their necks to make out the bills they expect to see, but this exhibit highlights the euro's environmentally friendly character by showing the stuff that it's made of rather than the bills themselves: cotton fibers.

Another exhibit is one of the most ancient coins in the bank's collection: a small electrum coin from Chios featuring the emblem of the island, a sphinx.

Displays of banknotes from other parts of the world are also impressive. There are banknotes from Cuba adorned with portraits of Che Guevara, from India with Mahatma Gandhi and from Zaire, featuring a gorilla. There is also the first-ever banknote printed, which hails from China and comes with a warning to forgers that they will suffer a terrible punishment if caught.

The museum offers a brief lesson in the history of finance from the invention of the coin in Lydia, Anatolia, in the late 7th century BC and the Ionian Greeks' introduction of electrum coins, which were made of a naturally occurring alloy of gold and silver with traces of other metals. It casts a light on the artists who were inspired by the Parthenon to print its motifs on coins and it explains how the world's first bank was founded, in 1609 in the Netherlands. It also traces the history of the Bank of Greece, which was established in 1927 under the Geneva Protocol, as well as the history of the drachma, plastic money and, more recently, the introduction of the euro.

The basement level of the museum contains displays of bank bonds, including a fascinating bond depicting a female figure with two children and another for 100 billion drachmas. The designs for the bonds, all done by hand and in incredible detail, are kept in drawers that can be opened by visitors, while there are also special display cases showing the templates and shedding light on the fine etchings and prints that were used. Angelos Xenos, the head of the service in charge of the bank's archives and collections, is at hand to talk visitors through a display of all the tools and instruments used by those who designed and made banknotes and bonds.

It goes without saying that the most popular displays are the gold ingots and coins. The visual delight of the sparkling, well-polished gold bars is complemented by an audio stimulant as well, as the sound of tinkling coins from Pink Floyd's landmark song "Money" plays in the background. On a similar pop culture note, there is a projection of the miserly cartoon character Scrooge McDuck taking a dive into a pile of gold coins, as well as a massive photograph of the central bank's vault -- with security-sensitive details photoshopped out, of course.

Budding accountants will take great pleasure in the numbers games and interactive displays set up, one of which takes visitors through the technicalities of applying for and managing a loan, paying close attention to the interest rate.

Young visitors may be dreaming of becoming international financiers as they tour the displays and older visitors may be yearning for the simpler days of the drachma. The most frequent question they ask the museum's director, Alexandros Stylos, however, is whether the bank is printing drachmas. All the molds, he reassures them, are on display at the museum.

Source: Ekathimerini

[Figleaf]

MUSEUM OF MILITARY HISTORY (HADTORTENETI MUZEUM), BUDAPEST

The Institute and Museum of Military History is located in the building of the Nándor Barracks in the Buda Castle (Budai Vár). Besides the armoury, the collection of uniforms, flags, and numismatics are also significant.

The regiment flag of the Fifth (Prince Regent, later Radetzky) Hussar Regiment is considered to be one of the most significant artefacts of the museum; it was donated by King George of England. Also important is the sabre of General Lajos Damjanich, the honorary sabre of György Klapka, and the 'attila' coat of Ernő Kiss, from the 1848-49 War of Independence.

Permanent exhibitions: 'Hand Weapons', 'The History of the Hungarian Defence Forces (Honvédség)', and 'The 13 Days of the 1956 Revolution'. There is also a display of the siege of a medieval castle, almost 15 square metres in size.

This museum, which collects artefacts of Hungarian military history, was established in 1918 by the 'museum group' of the Military Archive (Hadi Levéltár). The institution became independent in 1929 and moved to its present location in 1929. 70 per cent of its collection was destroyed in 1944-45. Today the museum has over 50,000 hand arms, machine guns, and other military equipment. There are over 30,000 artefacts related to uniforms, of which there are 300 complete uniforms. A flag collection holds 5,000 pieces and the numismatic collection contains 28,000 coins.

The museum, which received the 'Museum of the Year' award in 1999, also hosts temporary exhibitions. The museum's library is open to the public.

Source: Hungary starts here

[Figleaf]

Udupi: Meet Banker Radhakrishna - King of Coins
Saturday, March 26, 2011

Udupi, Mar 25: Keen interest and efforts put in by a man named Kumble Radhakrishna from past 23 years has made him own a treasure of his own.

Enthusiastically travelling around the nation Radhakrishna has collected about 1360 coins of 115 nations of pre-historic era. The variety of coins collected by him has been displayed at Museum of Corporation bank, Udupi branch for public viewing.

Kumble Radhakrishna who is an employee of Corporation Bank has had immense interest towards collection of old coins. His interest in this venture was backed by an unflinching perseverance.

He has a collection of coins ranging from pre-historical period ie 2,600 years old to that of 20th century. Out of these 80% coins are of silver, rest are of coper and black metals. Coins belong to the ruling period of Magada, Maurya, Shathavahan, Kadamba, Kushana, Chutukalananda, Gupta, Mogal, Hyder, Tippu Sultan, Krishna Devaraya, Thughalak, Gajni among others.

Coins from England, Hong-Kong, Mauritius, West Indies, Africa, Fiji, Canada, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, USA, Philippines, Portugal, Netherlands, China, Germany, Nepal, Australia, Tibet, likewise from 115 different countries' coins are in his collection.

Though Radhakrishna is of Kumble, he was born in Chitthur of Andhra Pradesh. He finished his primary, higher education there and joined corporation bank in the year 1975. His friend Parthasarathi Rajagopalachari's father Dr C A Rajagopalachari was fond of this hobby.

Radhakrishna says he was inspired by him and was given training from 1973 to 1987 on numismatics.

Radhakrishna, who has strong command over six languages has worked in various braches of Corp bank like Chittur, Nijamabad, Bangalore, Hassan, Mumbai, Rajkot and Mangalore. Amidst all these, he was given a special call by the RBI to work in its Monetary Museum at Mumbai for 4 years.

Indo-Greek Coins

At the Museum 2230 years old (230 BC) silver coins of Indo-Greek period attract the viewers. Coins of various dynasties such as Indo-Euthydemus, Indo- Eukrutides, Indo-Philux, Indo-Senas, Indo-Parthiyan, Indo-Danish, Indo-French and Indo-Roman among others are also displayed.

Coins depicting gods prevailed during the rule of East India Company in Ramanath (presently in Tamil Nadu) and during the rule of Vijaynagara kings, and such coins in which lord Ganesh, Hanumantha, Rama Laxmana, Narasimha have been carved are also seen in the museum.

He has a collection of 144 crown size coins of 60 different countries of 17th or 18th century, each weighing 25 grams and all of pure silver.

Support by Corporation Bank

The ardent work of Radhakrishna was supported by managing director of the Bank Ramnath Pradeep who opened the museum in Udupi for displaying the old coins. This was inaugurated by finance minister Pranab Mukharjee on March 12 (the inauguration was done in New Delhi symbolically).

For the ones visiting the museum located in the premises of Corporation Bank Udupi, Radhakrishna eagerly explains about the history of every coin in languages like Kannada, English, Hindi, Konkani, Telugu, and Tamil.

Radhakrishna says the word Rupayi is derived from the Sanskrit word 'Ruppia'. Ruppia in Sanskrit means silver. As in earlier centuries coins used to be made out of silver, hence it was called as Rupayi.

For lay people, coins are just money with different denominations, but for those with enthusiastic eyes, they explain the history of particular land.

Source: Daiji world

See also Reply #101 below

Picture: Inchara Digitals

[chrisild]

Money Museum of the Bank of Lithuania

The Lithuanian Money Museum is "based in the heart of Vilnius in the Bank of Lithuania buildings complex. The Museum opened its doors in 1999. Today it's situated in very center of Vilnius at the intersection of Gediminas Avenue and Totorių Street. Here, in the five halls on two storeys visitors can be introduced to the history of world money and banking, Lithuanian money, development of banking in our country since the emergence of the first credit institutions to the present day." More information, including an English language video about the museum, is here: http://www.lb.lt/bol_money_museum

Christian

[Abhay]

I visited Singapore Notes and Coins Museum on 5th July.

The most noticeable thing, as you enter the Museum, is the large YAP COIN, made of stone.

The other attraction is the Souvenir, that you can mint for yourself. You have to pay 2 Dollars, to get a Blank. You have to put the blank in a coin minting machine, and the Blank is turned into a coin like Souvenir, in front of your eyes.

Abhay

[Figleaf]

Rich find inside the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago: a money museum
By Rachel Rice, Staff Reporter, June 20, 2011

The ka-ching you hear when you walk into the Money Museum at the Chicago branch of the Federal Reserve isn't the Reserve giving out money, but teaching about it.

The metal maze of wires bent into corkscrews with marbles rolling through it, making plenty of noise on the way down, is meant to symbolize the "path of cash through our economy," said Patrick Maun, Money Museum director. "The kids really like this one."

The children also really like the coin pit in the floor, protected by bulletproof glass with coins adding up to about $50,800, according to Maun. They also enjoy the glass cube on a rotating pedestal filled with one-dollar bills, representing $1 million.

"The Federal Reserve (of Chicago) at any given time has ten- to thirteen-billion dollars inside it," Maun said impressively. The Money Museum itself contains over $3 million, all on display to the public — but well-protected, of course.

The Money Museum teaches about "fundamental economic concepts and what the federal reserve does," Maun said, and has everything from the educational and historical to the purely fun and novel. Museum goers can calculate what salary they would have to be making in 10 years to have the same level of buying power that they have now, based on the rate of inflation. They can also look at real and counterfeit bills and test themselves to see if they can spot the fake.

The newest addition to the museum marks the start of modern banking system in America. It is a journal created by the American Bankers Association containing the country's first routing numbers printed on checks. "It symbolizes order out of chaos," said Hugh Jones, CEO of Accuity, the company solely in charge of keeping track of the country's routing numbers. "Before this system was put in place 100 years ago, in order to move money from A to B you would literally have to move your gold bullion from A to B. Now, because of this system, money can move across the country without a human being ever touching it."

The ABA Routing Number Registrar is on display at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's Money Museum to celebrate Accuity's centennial celebration.

The Money Museum, 230 S. La Salle, is open Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., with guided tours at 1 p.m. There is no fee.

Source: Chicago Sun-Times

[Figleaf]

Cashing in on the money
By Xu Junqian, 2011-07-02

Yu Liuliang and Luo Tiansheng may have one of the largest collections of money and stocks in the country - but they're not rich.

Most of their collection consists of delicate, yellowing bits of paper that have not been in circulation for decades. The pair's savings have been exhausted by the cost of adding to their collections.

Yu, who has more than 25,000 kinds of bills and coins from 230 countries, and Luo, who specializes in stock paper collecting, are holding a "red" exhibition featuring money and stocks issued between 1930 and 1949, when the People's Republic of China was founded.

Occupying the second floor of the glass-and-steel Nanmatou Community Center, near 2010 Expo Park in Shanghai, the exhibition displays about 300 items, many for the first time.

"The exhibition is the first of its kind in the city, specializing in bills, coins and stock notes from the most critical moments (in history) of China and our Party," says Liu Chao, director-general of Shanghai Collection Club, the exhibition's main organizer.

"Visitors will see a different side of history," Liu says. "For example, they can see how the first generation of money was made and what it looked like."

The collection has three versions of the 500 yuan note issued by Northeast Bank in 1947, with a portrait of former chairman Mao Zedong; the 1 jiao note issued by Shaanbei (Northern Shaanxi province) Industrial Bank in 1935 to commemorate the completion of the Long March; and the 10,000 yuan note issued by the People's Bank of China in 1949.

"The value of these notes lies in the fact they were made so coarsely - there is no way to replicate them today," says 69-year-old Yu, who is a coin-minting professor.

"Most of the notes were produced from low-quality paper and handmade with stones, which were the only accessible tools during the difficult wartime period," explains Yu, who has been a numismatologist (an expert in coins' relation to history) for more than 40 years.

One of the highlights of the exhibition is the "first stock" note issued after 1949. It was issued by Shen Laizhou, founder of Shanghai Hengfeng Lint Factory - one of the biggest factories in the city then - on the new government's founding day.

"It wasn't a coincidence that the two events fell on the same day," says Luo, who started his hobby of collecting stock notes while working as a stock trader.



"It was a deliberate choice made by Shen, a capitalist who used to distrust the new government but was later moved by its goodwill and then decided to show his support," he adds.

Luo says most of the stock papers were destroyed or lost during the "cultural revolution" (1966-1976) and it is difficult to track their value.

"But the historical and artistic value of these papers is everlasting," Luo says. "As they witnessed the ups and downs of the country's economy, I believe their economic value will also grow, as more people learn their history and they become increasingly difficult to find."

Luo got his stock papers from what he calls "a network of weird collectors".

"If you are still thinking about getting lucky at some street stalls, there is a large possibility that you will be fooled," Luo says, with a loud laugh.

Source: China Daily

[Figleaf]

History and beauty lessons at the Numismatic Museum
By Iota Sykka, Tuesday July 26, 2011   

While the riddle of the Greek debt dominates conversations, temperatures are rising and the atmosphere on Panepistimiou Street in central Athens* is decidedly stuffy.

But here's a chance to change your mood and take a journey back in time. The year is 1881, when German architect Ernst Ziller built a marvelous residence, known as the Iliou Melathron**, for his friend, the archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann.

Inside the restored building which now houses the Numismatic Museum of Athens, you can picture the day when elegantly dressed members of high society would gather on the mansion's arched terraces to admire floor mosiacs made by Italian artisans and walls covered by murals depicting scenes of life in Pompei. All around the building were elegantly decorated ceilings, including the residence's master bedrooms -- the private quarters of Schliemann and his spouse, Sophia Engastromenou, 30 years his junior and whose marriage to the German expatriate had been the result of matchmaking.

The building -- which at the time of its construction had cost the formidable sum of 439,650 drachmas -- became a point of reference for the city's social and cultural life all the way up to the beginning of 20th century. It was sold to the Greek state in 1926 and subsequently housed the Supreme Administrative Court and the Supreme Court.

Every Tuesday at noon, the Numismatic Museum offers history lessons through the prism of money and its myths, but also on the mansion and its celebrated residents.

"Myth and Coins," is the subject of a guided tour scheduled for Tuesday, July 26, followed by "Before Coins" on August 2, "Coins at Times of Crisis and Prosperity" on August 9 and "Iliou Melathron: an Exquisite 19th-Century Residence," on August 16, among others.

A visit to the Numismatic Museum might throw light on the meaning of the term "strong currency" or how ancient Greek coins were actually made. Things may get very exciting when comparisons are made between the past and the present: An Athenian soldier's hourly wage was set at 3 obols in the 5th century BC, while the daily wage of an untrained workman was an Attic drachma and a housewife had to pay three obols for three cotylae (828 ml) of olive oil.

Last year's guided tours pilot program proved successful, even in August, and the museum is hoping it will again prove a hit with visitors this year, even though local institutions are suffering due to staff shortages and a lack of funding.

In the meantime, the museum's upcoming temporary exhibition, "The Cost of Nutrition," will focus on the prices of products from antiquity to the present. Afterward, it will travel to the Museum of the History of Cypriot Coinage, which is housed at the Bank of Cyprus in Nicosia, in February next year.

Back in Athens, the Numismatic Museum is also preparing for the display of the so-called Abdera Hoard, a rare collection of ancient coins which were repatriated following a donation by an American collector who had purchased the items in New York in 2000. This exhibition is expected to open in November.

Numismatic Museum, Iliou Melathron, 12 Panepistimiou. For reservations, call 210.364.3774 or 210.363.2057.

Source: Ekathimerini

* see also reply #16
** Ilion palace