-Lettre du 7 août 1647: Haec igitur et alia in nova Occonis editione recognoscenda sunt, ingensque ei ex diversis in Anglia Thesauris auctarium possit accedere. Merito quidem harum respectu flavissarum, ipsa Roma huic regno palmam concedere rogetur.
In Regia enim penu Numaria, Romanos tangentia Caesares, Augustas, aliosque Occoni memoratos, et familias, novem minimum millia aurea, argentea, et aenea Numismata conduntur, quae supremarum Abrahami Gorlaei Tabularum curatores, Henrico Stuarto Cambriae Principi, Regis nostri Caroli fratri germano primogenito, olim vendiderunt. Et mirum sane est, nullum Germaniae Principem, nec ipsum Henricum Magnum Galliae Monarcham, cui tam sibi oblata sunt pretio, tria librarum millia pro illis dependisse. Secundas omni procul dubio meo Thesauro (quousque Dei bonitate eo integro illibatoque fructurus sum) aequi concedent arbitri, in quo ultra ducenta aurea, duo millia aeneorum, et mille circiter et quadringenta argentea, Romanam rem mere spectantia maioribus inmoribusve differentiis inter se variata possideo. Sunt mihi praeterea aurea aliquot, et duo circiter millia aenea, et argentea redundantia, cuius etiam esse generis, minimum partem tertiam Legionum Numerum arbitror. ...
Tertius in Anglia Thesaurus in publica Oxoniensi reponitur Bibliotheca.Rarissimi aenei qui Areschotani Ducis erant, penes Georgium \Villers/ Ducem Bokamiae iam visuntur \numi/, ubi Plotinam unam, et duos Aemilianos, vetustatis indubiae, uti caeteros omnes \numero quadringentos/ (nisi unum excipias Othonem) nuper lustravi, valde enim suspicor ne ex genuino Claudio effictus sit, tanta tamen id factum arte, ut ipsum Vulcanum supremam huic adulterando peritiam adhibuisse facile veteres iurassent poetae, nec dubito quin idem sit, cuius tu in ultimis tuis memineris. In meo etiam musaeo alius etiamnum \aeneus/ mei iuris est, vetustissimus Numus, quem Othonis esse lemma in adverso testatur, praeter illum in postremis meis memoratum, pro quo, Thomae Finchio, Comiti Winchelsio dum viveret, octoginta oblatae sunt librae Anglicanae, quas ille genuinum reputans, generose respuit, etsi eundem viginti septem libris a Gallo quopiam coemerat; pulcherrimus sane est, caputque Imperatoris laureatum exhibet, sed cum lemma in adverso sit ANNONA AVGVSTI CERES S C. ego valde suspicans ex vero Nerone, fictitium esse Othonem, nec arculae meae illum addere sum ausus, ubi caeteros omnes, eburneis, non sine magno sumptu inclusos circulis, illisque in eam latitudinem extensis ut non dunmtaxat aenei, aurei, argentei omnes pulcherrimo simul ordine digerantur, sed et Caesarum aliorumque Occoni memoratorum nomina, et familiarum notae, maiusculis in illis litteris exarentur. Apud Henricum \Howardum/ Arundeliae Comitem et Thomam Knyvetum, vetustissima amplissimaque familia oriundum, Ashwell Thorpae in agro Norfolciensi degentem, lectissimi habentur \Romanorum/, qua aeneorum, qua argenteorum thesauri. Gualterus etiam Montaguus, Henrici nuper Comitis Mancastriae, filius natu secundus, et Jacobus Ravenscroftus ex Inferioris Templi Societatate iuris peritus aenea non vulgaria Romanum orbem spectantia numismata possidet (sic). Cot\t/onia vero Cimelia, quia non ad plurima aenea, aut argentea excurrunt, inter illas series, ubi diversa unius, eiusdemque Imperatoris reperta sint, locum non merentur.
Aliorum inter nos minoris notae arculas, etsi mihi visas, in quibus rarissima quaedam lustravi Numismata, omnino silere aequm duxi, ne tibi aut videndi pruritum, aut legendo nauseam ingererem. Unicum est, quod et verecundor referens, scilicet Joannem Greavesium in Academia Oxoniensi Astronomiae professorem, linguarumque Orientalium callentissimum, meum, Thesauro Numario ipsius Romam Pontificis praetulisse, qui utrumque exacta excussit diligentia, et plurimorum in utroque \aureorum/ pondera, diligenti trutinaxit curiositate. [...] Alia sunt diversa quae in illo viro, etsi eruditissimo, corrigenda. [He turns to the late empire, citing] Joannes Hemelarius in Numismatis suis Arschotianis.
[So these and other things should be recognised in a new edition of Occo, and a huge increase could be added from various Treasuries in England. Indeed after due examination of these treasuries, Rome herself would be asked to cede the victory palm to this kingdom.
In the Royal Coin Collection are kept at least nine thousand gold, silver and bronze coins relating to the Roman emperors, empresses (and others mentioned by Occo) and families [i.e. of the Roman Republic], which the executors of the last will of Abraham Gorlaeus originally sold to Henry Stuart Prince of Wales, the elder brother of our King Charles. And it is amazing that no German prince, nor even Henry King of France himself, to whom they were offered at the price, paid the three thousand pounds for them.
Without any doubt fair judges would agree that the second ones are in my Treasury (and with God’s good will I shall enjoy it complete and unimpaired), in which I possess more than 200 gold, 2000 bronze and about 1400 silver coins relating entirely to Roman affairs, and which vary among themselves to a greater or lesser degree. Further I have some gold, and about 2000 bronze and silver which are surplus, of which I think at least a third part are of the type of the numbers of the Legions. [He then discusses exchanging rare coins with Smetius.]
The third Treasury in England is kept in the public Library at Oxford.
The rarest bronze coins which belonged to the Duke of Arschot are now seen in the possession of George Villiers the Duke of Buckingham, where I recently examined a Plotina and two Aemilians, of undoubted antiquity, like all the other 400 by number, unless you were to make an exception for one Otho, since I really suspect that it may have been made from a genuine Claudius. Yet it is made with such skill that the ancient poets would have straightaway sworn that Vulcan himself had applied his matchless skill in faking it, and I do not doubt that it is the same one which you mentioned in your last letter. In my collection also there is now another bronze one, in my judgment a most ancient coin, which the inscription on the obverse shows that it is of Otho, as well as the one mentioned in my last letter, for which 80 English pounds were offered to Thomas Finch the Earl of Winchilsea while he was alive, which he, which he, rejecting it as genuine, generously refused, although he had bought the same from a certain Frenchman for 27 pounds. It is really the very finest, and has a laureate head of the emperor, but, since the inscription on the obverse [sic] is ANNONA AVGVSTI CERES S C, I really suspect that the Otho has been fabricated from a genuine Nero, and I have not dared to add it to my cabinet, where all the others have been set into ivory roundels, which have been made at no little expense and to such a size that all the bronze, gold and silver may also be exactly arranged in a very fine order, and the names of the Caesars and the others listed by Occo and the indications of families are set down in their capital letters.
Henry Howard Earl of Arundel and Thomas Knyvett, scion of a most ancient and grand family and who spends his time at Ashwellthorpe in Norfolk, have very choice collections of Romans, both of bronze and of silver. And Walter Montagu second son of the Henry the recent Count of Manchester, and James Ravenscroft a lawyer of the Inner Temple possess bronze coins referring to the Roman world which are by no means ordinary. But the Cotton treasures, which do not run to many bronze or silver, do not deserve a place among those collections where different ones of one and the same emperor are found.
I have thought it fair to remain silent about the cabinets of other people, which are of lesser note, amongst us, even though I have seen them, in which I have examined some very rare coins, in case I give you an itch to see them, or make you sick of reading about them. There is only one, and I am afraid even to mention it, namely mine, which John Greaves, the Professor of Astronomy at Oxford and a man most skilled in oriental languages, would rank even before the Numismatic Treasure of the Pope at Rome, since he has examined both in close detail and taken the weights of very many gold coin in each. [He goes on to specify how some of his coins can correct Occo’s views on coins of Victorinus and Tetricus.] There are other things to be corrected in that man, although he was very learned. [He turns to the late empire, citing Iohannes Hemelarius’s book on his Coins of Arschot, and discussing corrections for Constantinian coins. The letter then closes with remarks about the current political situation. (British Library, MS Harley 377, f.175v-177r; Burnett 2020b, pp. 1459-61).]]
