Vatican Library Coins - CBS Television 60 Minutes

WillieBoyd2

The CBS Television network ran their Sunday "60 Minutes" show yesterday evening (December 28, 2014)
and had a 15-minute episode on the Vatican Library in Rome, hosted by CBS correspondent Morley Safer.

The episode was originally broadcast on April 10, 2011.

Curators of the Vatican Library showed off some of their old books, along with some coins.

Here are some scans of the coins:


Morley Safer (on right) and curator, the curator was describing the coins in Italian


A group of coins and medals


Obverse, looks like a Greek Silver Decadrachm of Syracuse (Sicily), around BC 400


Reverse of above coin (Decadrachm)


Obverse, Greek Athens Classical Owl Tetradrachm
The episode did not show the reverse.

Iosephus

I remember seeing that segment after it originally aired. The selection of coins and medals in the second image is wonderful. Of interest to me, there looks to be a medal by Pisanello of John VIII Palaeologus in the center, a medal of Pope Alexander VII on the bottom left, and a piastra of Clement XI on the bottom center. Unfortunately, Giancarlo Alteri, the head of the Coins and Medals department who is shown here, was recently dismissed from his duties due to some very disappointing accusations against him. Thanks for posting the images!

BTW, if anyone else is interested, the video of this segment is available on YouTube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2nCN4rhlFw

The coins make a brief appearance around the 2:30 mark.

EVillageProwler

I saw part of that segment last night. Very interesting. I liked the part where they are caring for the books and manuscripts. They are priceless reminders of humanity's rich history.

worldcoinguy

Thanks for the heads up WillieBoyd2.

STLNATS

Well rats. Over Christmas week I was visited my daughter in OKC and I noticed that something about the Vatican holdings was on, and caught a couple of minutes of it before we headed out to dinner (or taking the dogs out, or some such activity). Sorry I missed the numismatic part.

I've only visited Vatican City once and recall that at the back of St Peters was a room referred to as the Treasury. Some pretty impressive items, but the one that caught my eye was a run of gold annual medals. It was the inspiration for my more modest silver set. I think there's a partial silver set in the "Old" cathedral here in STL and wonder if there aren't similar collections in other cathedrals. Its been a while since I visited so maybe a trip is in order real soon.

Thanks for the heads up!

STLNATS

Just read your post Joe, thanks for the link. The medal of John VIII Palaeologus is quite interesting in that he was soliciting support from the west to fight the Turks and styled himself as a western ruler. Nice propaganda piece that probably has the best provenance ever (ie sent by the emperor to the pope).

edited to add: Wow. Interesting story but the coins at ~2:30 were completely misattributed. The Syracuse dekadrachm was said to be the money of Palestine 2000 years ago and the Athenian tetradrachm was said to be the type coin used for the 30 pieces of silver - only off by 4 centuries or so and not even close to the types used at the time. Such obvious errors might be over the head of most 60 Minutes viewers, but they really make one a bit skeptical about the other "facts." Too bad, they highlighted some potentially interesting items.

Still, worth 12 minutes viewing for the "eye candy."

WillieBoyd2

Here is more on the Vatican Library numismatic section (in English):

The Numismatic Cabinet or Medagliere of the Vatican Library preserves coins, medals, seals, foil strips,
plaques, engraved stones, casts, and other similar materials.
It also keeps the official pontifical medals and coins.
The collection includes about 300,000 pieces.

https://www.vatlib.it/home.php?pag=dipartimento_numismatico&ling=eng