ANS CANCELS 'NUMISMATIC LITERATURE' #150

This week, without announcement, the American Numismatic Society decided to cease publication of Numismatic Literature, its long-running bibliographic journal which began in 1947. A few days ago I received a $50 refund check from ANS for a prepaid issue which would have been #150, and with it a slip of paper that said:

The publication was on a quarterly schedule through 1967. From 1968 through 2000, it appeared semiannually. Thereafter, six annual issues appeared, the last dated 2007.

It followed the format of, and considered itself a successor to, the German periodical Numismatisches Literatur-Blatt, started in 1880 by Max von Bahrfeldt who had previously edited a bibliographic supplement to the periodical Numismatisch-sphragistischen Anzeiger. Bahrfeldt’s publication was continued for several years following his death in 1936, then ceased during World War II.

In the first issue of Numismatic Literature, Arthur S. Dewing, then president of ANS, stated that following cessation of NL-B “there has existed nowhere such a single publication that covers” the broad field of world numismatics of all periods of history. NL, he said, “will, in its own way, attempt to provide a journal in which is recorded the literature of numismatics; it will afford a clearing-house for numismatic publications gathered from all over the world.”

Within their fields of expertise, NL’s international editorial staff reviewed newly published books as they came out, as well as hundreds of periodicals worldwide, preparing short annotations to accompany the listings. It also published citations to reviews appearing in other journals, and to obituaries of prominent numismatists.

Cost was probably one factor that brought about the demise of NL. Its price per issue had jumped from around $4.00 in the 1990s to $50.00 at the end. Obsolescence, however, must have been the primary reason, with the growth of research tools on line, including ANS’s own online Donum catalog.

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web