-Lettre du 12 août 1689 (?): “… Friends, Dr. Gale, Mr. Henshaw, Hill, Monsieur Justel, upon whose skill and judgment you may rely…
Mr. Ashmole (our common friend) had collected all the Antient, and Modern Coines of this Kingdome, which was very rare, together with Several Medals of our British, Saxon and other Kings upon Occasion of Births, Corononations, Mariages and other Solemnities: I know not whether they escaped the burning of his study at the Middle Temple. But for the most accurate Ordering, and disposal of Medals (so as one may more commodiously take them out of their Repositaries) Mr. Charleton of that Society, has a peculiar Method, as he is the most elegant, and rarely furnish’d, in all his other Collections. In the meane time, the Curious of this sort of Erudition (I meane of Medalls) were formerly, and I believe at present, very few in England; for besides Sir Robert Cotton, Mr. Selden, Sir Simon D’Ewes, Sir Thomas Hanmer of Hanmer, Sir William Paston, the late Mr.
Hervey, I find hardly any: Thomas (that greate lover of Antiquity) Earle of Arundel, had a very rich Collection, as well of Medals, as other Intaglios, belonging to the cabinet he purchased of Daniel Nice, at a cost of Ten-thousand pounds, which, with innumerable other Rarities, have been scatter’d, and squander’d away by his Countesse, when she got that Treasure to Amsterdam, whilst my Lord was in Italy where he died: Aboundance of them she bestowed also, on the late unhappy Viscount Stafford, her beloved Son, and such as remain’d, Lely, Wright, and the rest of the Painters, Foxes, Panders, and Misses have cheated the late Duke of Norfolck of: the same Fate befell a noble Collection of Medals belonging to the then curious Sir Simon [recte Henry] Fanshaw of Ware-park: They were after his Desease, thrown about the house (as that worthy gentleman his son Sir Richard, Lord Ambassador in Portugal to whom I had Relation has told me) for children to play with at Counter with; as were those elegant Types of Sir
Henry Savels at Eaton, which that learned knight procurd for, with greate Coste, for his edition of Saint Chrysostome, and as it commonly fares with such Curiosities, where the next Heire is not a Virtuoso: So vaine a thing it is, to set one’s heart upon any-thing of this nature, with that Passion and Mania, that insatiable Earle (whom I mention’d) did, to the detriment of his Estate and Family: Mediocria Firma. The Medals in our Universitie Libraries are not yet at all Considerable; though Obadiah Walker were an
industrious promoter of it, and not unskillfull in them; Mr. Ralph Sheldon of Weston in Warwickshire left a very handsome Collection both of Gold, Silver and Coper; Antient and Moderne (part of which were bequeathed to a Sister of my Lady Tukes [marginal note: Mrs. Cenlivre Maid of Honor to the Queene Katherine] who not so long since offer’d to have sold them: I brought Monsieur Justel to see them, but they were much over-valu’d, and whether she have since dispos’d of them, I never inquir’d: At present I know of none who can shew a better chosen Set of Medals, than the Earle of Clarendon, to whose late Father (after all this tedious parenthesis) I returne…
For thus has a cabinet of above ten-thousand medals (not inferior to most abroad, and far Superior, to any at home) which were collected by that hopeful cherisher of greate, and noble things, Prince Henry; imbezild and carried away during our late barbarous Rebellion, by whom, and wither none can, or list to discover.
What that Collection was, not onely of Books, and Medals, but of Statues, and other [word deleted] Furniture; let the learned Library-keeper Patritius Junius tell you in his Notes ad Epist[ol]am Sancti Clementi ad Corinthos: Quem locum (speaking of St. James’s) si vicinam pinacothecam, Bibliothecae celeberrimae conjunctam: si Numismata Antiqua Graeca ac Romana; si Statuas et Signa ex aere et Marmore consideres, non immerito Thesaurum Antiquitatis, & ταμιεῖον instructissimum nominare potes, etc. Were this losse enough to breake a Lovers heart?” (Chambers & Galbraith 2014, Epistle 616, p. 895-916 ; Burnett 2020b, p. 1559).
