RPC Question?

[Charles M]

For example when an attribution reads "RPC 3396", what book exactly is being referred to?  Thanks.

[curtislclay]

For the answer just click on those letters RPC in my message or your own!

[peterpil19]

Hi Charles,

Numiswiki is an exceptional resource. Per Curtis's note above, words which are the names of articles will be hyperlinked so you can simply click on them and it will take you to the relevant page. I use numiswiki all the time.

RPC (Roman Provincial Coinage) is a series of volumes dealing with provincial coinage. It is the standard reference for most provincial coinage but each volume is quite expensive so it is not accessible to many collectors. I do not currently own any volumes myself.

Peter

[helvetica]

You can usually tell which volume is meant, by the emperor it is referring to.
e.g.
Early emperors, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero etc = RPC I
The Flavians, Vespasian, Titus, Domitian etc. = RPC II
Trajan, Nerva, Hadrian and families = RPC III
Gordian III and family = RPC VII (covers Asia only)

[Joe Sermarini]

Notice that RPC I, RPC II, RPC III, and RPC VII are also links.  Also RPC online. 

The RPC page was missing RPC III.  Since it is a Wiki, anyone could have updated it.  Unfortunately, it is mostly me that does that. 

Members please contribute to NumisWiki!!!!

[peterpil19]

Hi Joe,

I'm very happy to volunteer. I've made only modest changes so far so admittedly am getting more out of numiswiki than I have put in.  I've not come across anything that is missing so far though (to my surprise!).  I even searched 'sphendone' yesterday evening and was pleasantly surprised that there was a page for it.

RPC is not a reference I own yet, otherwise I would have spotted that missing entry as I am routinely looking up references on numiswiki!

If there is a list of known subjects without content, known pages which are incomplete, or perhaps top searches which did not yield results - perhaps they could go into a list on the numiswiki board and we could assist you by working through them and knocking them off one by one? Or you might have other ideas based on what has worked in the past?

Peter

[Joe Sermarini]

I don't have any great ideas for work that needs to be done right now.  If you ever ask yourself a numismatic or history question and the answer is not on NumisWiki please add it. I want NumisWiki to answer every question.

[Anaximander]

I've amassed the existing published volumes of RPC, but it hasn't escaped my notice that volume VII.1 (de Gordien Ier a Gordien III) is in French.  Not a problem for a French-speaker like myself, but I am curious if it also exists in English.  I've seen one poster at another site moaning about the book being in French.  The Numiswiki entry has the title in English. I've just noticed that there are separate ISBNs for British Museum Press and Bibliotheque nationale de France, so I suppose that's a dead giveaway.  

The online site at https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/ states that there is a new online edition as of July 1, 2019, including vol. II. Volume I has since been added.  Altogether, RPC Online has ten online works available (including four parts of volume IV) with six pending.  

I've updated the Numiswiki with the new (July 2019) links to the online volumes, adding the new volumes.  
Any mistakes on the links is on me.  Please advise if you see anything amiss.

Anaximander

[Joe Sermarini]

Thanks for updating the links.

[curtislclay]

An interesting question which had not occurred to me before!

In the online version of RPC  VII.1, all of the coin descriptions have been translated from French into English.

However, I am not aware of a printed English translation of the whole volume, including those online English descriptions plus the introductory chapters (pp. 19-97) and the shorter introductions to each mint.

In the Preface by M. Amandry, the Summary by A. Burnett, and the Acknowledgements and Introduction by M. Spoerri Butcher, I find no mention of the fact that this volume is exceptionally in French, nor of any intention to also publish an English translation. This suggests to me that no such translation was ever planned.

I would also assume that only the English translations of the coin description are available online, not the original French descriptions too or the whole volume in French.

[Anaximander]

Spink is now taking orders for the hardcopy edition of Roman Provincial Coinage, Volume VII.2 From Gordian I to Gordian III (AD 238–244) (Part 1).  Huzzah!

This volume presents for the first time an authoritative and systematic account of the coins minted in the Roman provinces between AD 238 and 244 (except the province of Asia, previously covered in volume VII.1), and shows how these coins can be regarded as an integral part of the coinage minted under the Roman emperors. The book gives a complete picture of the material, thereby not only meeting the needs of numismatists but also providing an essential reference for historians, archaeologists and other students of the Roman empire.

Jerome Mairat is curator of the Heberden Coin Room in the Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford. He is director of Roman Provincial Coinage online and general editor of Roman Provincial Coinage.

Marguerite Spoerri Butcher is Research Fellow on the Coin Hoards of the Roman Empire project, based at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. She is also Associate Fellow of the University of Warwick and a scientific member of the Swiss School of Archaeology in Greece.

I should rephrase that. A communiqué says that they're taking orders, but the link drops one off at the Spink Books website, where no such book is to be found.  Still, it's close to coming out, right?  The online edition has been available -in one form or another- for a couple of years now. UPDATE! Yes, it's on the site. £195+Shipping.

[helvetica]

By the way, in general, I do not use the "temporary" RPC online numbers for coins which I add to wildwinds. As it is, these numbers are only temporary, and may change at a later date, and I do not fancy changing several hundreds of entries. For the same reason, I generally did not use those temporary numbers in GRPC Lydia, something that a certain book critic complained about. 

[Kevin D]

^^ Makes sense to me. I wonder if the RIC Online numbers will change if and when there is a hard copy.