BOOK REVIEW: BRITISH HISTORICAL MEDALS OF THE 17TH CENTURY

Reviews: PLATT, Jerome J. & PLATT, Arleen Kay. British historical medals of the 17th century: medallists, books, authors, collectors, book-sellers & antiquaries. London: Spink, 2017. xvi, 416 pp.: illus. isbn 9781907427480. £50.00.

This companion to the authors’ The English Civil Wars (2013) publishes material they could not include in those two volumes. The contents are: ‘Authors and published works associated with British medals of the 17 th century’, in chronological order apart from H. W. Henfrey (p.80); ‘Medallists associated with 17 th-century British medals’, and ‘Later medallists’; ‘Some eminent collectors and collections of 17 th c. British medals’, including the royal collections; and ‘Antiquaries, chroniclers, engravers, printers, book- & print-sellers’. The entry for Richard Southgate (p.280) helpfully names the author of the life prefixed to his sale catalogue as Charles Combe (see p.85), which I overlooked for my Southgate entry in the Oxford DNB.

This splendid volume will be mainly of use for illustrations of individuals and their title-pages. As regards the text, there are rather too many errors in names, e.g. ‘Sir’ Martin Folkes, which he never was (p. xi, but correct on p. 349), and the uncouth ‘Gouth’ for the eminent antiquary Richard GOUGH, nine times on p.397, yet the heading is correct. It is difficult to understand how this came about.

However, Dr and Mrs Platt have searched widely for illustrations of medals, portraits, and title-pages, and have ensured good reproductions in colour. The result is a very handsome bio-bibliography.

To read the earlier E-Sylum article, see:
NEW BOOK: BRITISH HISTORICAL MEDALS OF THE 17TH CENTURY (http://www.coinbooks.org/v20/esylum_v20n32a03.html)

	NBS (coinbooks.org) Web