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NEW BOOK: FROM THE SILVER CZECH TOLAR TO A WORLDWIDE DOLLAR
Last year a book arrived at the Numismatic Bibliomania Society address with a note asking us to accept it for the NBS library. Well, we don't have a library and our Treasurer David Sundman forwarded the book to me for The E-Sylum. It ended up deep in my review pile and only now surfaced. It's out of my area of interest and I haven't had a chance to read it, but I will add some comments at the end. Below is information about the book taken from the web site of the publisher, Columbia University Press.
-Editor
1st English
This publication may be of especial interest for American readers in that, perhaps for the first time, the complex power and political relationships existing in Central Europe at the beginning of the early modern period, which led to the emergence of the dollar, are clearly explained. It goes on to explain the relationships that existed between the different thaler currencies that were involved in the development of the European currency systems right up to modern times and explains the reasons why the term "dollar" was used in the late 18th Century, at the time of the founding of the United States of America. This book offers a very specific perspective on the common historical roots of the contemporary Euro-American civilization and contains significant new information not only for historians concerned with economic and political history, but that is also of importance for numismatists and collectors. The text is illustrated by 84 color photographs of coins and paper currency. Petr Vorel is a Czech historian, numismatist and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Philosophy at the University of Pardubice. His long-term research interest is the economic and political history of Central Europe and specifically with the history of monetary circulation. He considers as his most important publications on this topic the books Monetary Circulation in Central Europe at the Beginning of the Early Modern Age – Attempts to Establish a Shared Currency as an Aspect of the Political Culture of the 16th Century (1524-1573), and Silver in the European Monetary Circulation of the 16th and 17th Centuries (1472-1717). At the most recent XXI International Congress of Historical Sciences (Amsterdam 2010) he was the organizer of the independent session “Trade and Civilization from Ancient Times to Present.” Currently he is the Chairman of the Czech National Committee of Historians.
As a scholarly publication, the book certainly passes my back-of-the-book test.
There are seven pages of Recommended Readings, and each of the seven chapters has an endnotes section. At the end of the book is an 80-page set of color plates encompassing dollar-type coins and banknotes from the 1480s to date.
The dust jacket on our copy is maroon, but the image shown here (taken from another web site) looks purple. It seems like a very nice book for numismatists interested in economic history, and economists interested in numismatics. First person to commit to writing a review for The E-Sylum gets the book for the cost of shipping. -Editor
For more information, or to order, see:
From the Silver Czech Tolar to a Worldwide Dollar
(cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-88033-705-2/from-the-silver-czech-tolar-to-a-worldwide-dollar)
The Numismatic Bibliomania Society is a non-profit organization promoting numismatic literature. See our web site at coinbooks.org. To submit items for publication in The E-Sylum, write to the Editor at this address: whomren@gmail.com To subscribe go to: https://my.binhost.com/lists/listinfo/esylum All Rights Reserved. NBS Home Page Contact the NBS webmaster 
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