E-Sylum Feature Writer and and Coryphaeus American Numismatic Biographies, Pete Smith submitted this article on the "Father of Numismatic Science." Thanks! -Editor

"ECKHEL. JOSEPH HILARIUS (1737-1798). Austrian numismatist. Was born at Enzersfeld in lower Austria, 1737. His father was the farm-steward to Count Zinzendorf, and he received his early education at the Jesuits' College, Vienna, where at the age of fourteen he was admitted to the order. He devoted himself to antiquities and numismatics. After being engaged as professor of poetry and rhetoric, first at Steyer and afterwards at Vienna, he was appointed in 1772 keeper of the cabinet of coins at the Jesuits' College, and in the same year he was sent to Italy for the purpose of personal inspection and studies of antiquities and coins. At Florence he was employed to arrange the collection of the grand duke of Tuscany; and the first-fruits of his study of this and other collections appeared in his Numi veteres anecdoti, published in 1773. On the dissolution of the order of Jesuits in 1773, Eckhel was appointed by the empress Maria Theresa professor of antiquities and numismatics at the university of Vienna, and this post he held for twenty-four years. He was in the following year made keeper of the imperial cabinet of coins, and in 1779 appeared his Catalogus Vindobonensis numorum veterum. Eckhel's great work is the Doctrina numorum veterum in 8 vols., the first of which was published in 1792. The author's rich learning, comprehensive grasp of his subject, admirable order, and precision of statement, in this masterpiece drew from Heyne enthusiastic praise, and the acknowledgement that Eckhel, as the Coryphaeus of numismatists, had, out of the mass of previously loose and confused facts, constructed a true science. A volume of Addenda, was published in 1826. Among his other works are Choix de pierres gravees du Cabinet Imperial des Antiques (1788), a useful school-book on coins entitled Kurzgefasste Anfangsgrunde zur alten Numismatik (1787), of which a French version enlarged by Jacob appeared in 1823, &c. Eckhel died at Vienna on the 16th of May 1798."

"His delivery is described as being simple, clear, instructive, inspiring, and often abounding in humour. He was highly regarded by his pupils. That he also enjoyed high repute among his colleagues is attested by his appointment as dean of the philosophical faculty in 1789. However, he soon resigned this position."

"Misguided dilettantism had produced most mischievous results in the field of Numismatics. Lack of system, want of critical judgement, and the disorderly arrangement of the literature had begotten confusion and distrust, which prevented numismatists from taking the place among other sciences to which it was entitled. … Numismatics, hitherto despised, he changed into a kind of encyclopedia of classical antiquities, which includes extensive and much-used sources for other branches of archaeology."