The Airgead Exhibition (Collins Barracks, Dublin)

[chrisild]

While I could not be with the tour group on Saturday (see this topic), I did go to the Collins Barracks location of the National Museum in Dublin, primarily to see "Airgead", its permanent exhibition about Irish money, mostly coinage, from the Middle Ages to the euro.

I am sure others took great pictures there too, so I will just show very few here. And they do not even feature coins. What you see is designs (for the first Free State pieces) that did not make it ...

Christian

[chrisild]

Some shilling design options ...

[chrisild]

... a few designs by Jerome Connor that (see the text below the 3d model) did not meet the criteria ...

[<k>]

Nice photos. I've never seen that design of the woman with the sickle. The bull designs all appear in my topic, The coinage of the Irish Free State, if you look carefully.

Of the Jerome Connor designs, I've only ever seen the boy's head.

[chrisild]

Elsewhere in the exhibition they show some Rechenpfennig jets and an abacus. Note by the way that the explanatory boards are all bilingual, in English and Irish. The name of the exhibition, "Airgead", is the Irish word for silver but also for money, much like "argent" in French. Both have the same Latin or even earlier Indo-European roots ...

Christian

[chrisild]

A few more images. Let's start with some Irish silver pennies that are about 1,000 years old ...

[chrisild]

A nice example of how money is used as a weapon, by either side. Gun money issued by James II ... and William's revenge. Hope the image quality allows reading the texts.

[chrisild]

A coin that is no longer legal tender can still be used if somebody guarantees its value, and somebody else accepts it.

[chrisild]

Here we have a penny token. Even my camera could take that nice photo, as some of the exhibits are enlarged copies of coins.

[Figleaf]

Here is a series of plasters from the museum. There is probably a degree of duplication with Chrisild's pictures, for which I apologise in advance. They may also overlap with pictures posted by <k>. Sorry. The pictures slightly deform the plasters into ovals, as it was not possible to hold the camera exactly parallel with them. I adjusted colours for visibility, as bright white is very hard to photograph if you have no influence on the lighting.

My pictures are rights free for non-commercial use.

Peter

[Figleaf]

Some more to enjoy. Can you identify the head?

Peter

[Figleaf]

A token I saw for the first time in the museum.

Peter

[chrisild]

Ah, nice detailed photos of the plaster models. And no, I don't know whose head that is - not mine.

By the way, while Ireland did not issue any coins when the country joined the European Communities in 1973, the Airgead exhibition features this medal. (Sorry for the blurry image, but due to the glass and lighting, several objects were difficult to photograph, at least for me.) The inscription says "TO COMMEMORATE IRELAND'S ACCESSION TO THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES", in the center you see three flying birds (swans, I suppose), and the date 1973 is at the bottom. Since at that time Denmark, Ireland and the UK joined the Communities, the birds may represent the three. Just a guess ...

Christian

[<k>]

Excellent photos, all in all. The woman with wolfhound is another design I had never seen.