Gold Coins of the World (Friedberg)

The last edition of Gold Coins of the World, by Arthur L. Friedberg and Ira S. Friedberg, was published by the Coin & Currency Institute six years ago, in 2017. That edition—the ninth—and each one before are derived from the original, groundbreaking 1958 work by Robert Friedberg, whose cataloging and numbering system revolutionized the way gold coins are collected. It changed the face of world-gold collecting at that time, and it remains unparalleled in its scope and universal usage today, six decades later. Collectors and dealers around the world rely on the Friedberg Numbering System™ to systematically identify and study any gold coin ever made. Now, the Friedberg legacy is renewed yet again with the all-new, tenth edition of Gold Coins of the World. Three years in the making, the newest edition calls on the expertise of a numismatic who’s-who of more than one hundred expert contributors and consultants from across the globe.

The continued respect commanded by each edition of the volume is due to the expertise of both the authors and the impressive contributors they bring together. The popularity of gold coins, however, is due to a whole host of factors. It is not an overstatement to say that the history of gold coinage parallels, and has helped define, the trajectory of civilization.

From the preface:

Since the first gold coins were struck in ancient Lydia, about 700 BC, they have been the subject of collecting, hoarding, accumulating, and investing. For over two and a half millennia, they, along with gold itself, have been man’s ultimate measure of economic value. For rarity, purity, luster, resistance to the ravages of the elements and time, for unique color and for sheer beauty, they have nary a rival among the creations of either man or nature. In times of uncertainty and war, depression and panic, inflation, and disaster, they have served their purpose as symbols of security when all else lay in ruin.

This impressive metal, and the coins made from it, have never been more popular than they are today. Even more remarkable than the rise in the gold price is the dramatic, unparalleled, and sometimes frenzied increase in the value of numismatic gold coins. Collectors and investors now realize the relative rarity of coins compared not only to other forms of art and antiques, but also to other numismatic categories. The tenth edition of Gold Coins of the World is arriving at just the right time to meet the needs of this ever-expanding market.

Like each edition before it, the tenth expands on its predecessor, digging more deeply into new areas of collector interest, and expanding many sections. It includes the addition of many new discoveries for dozens of countries. From the 384 pages of the 1958 edition, the work has expanded to 852 pages, which have been completely revised and updated. The authors have listed more than 22,000 coin types, which are illustrated with more than 8,500 photos—now, for the first time, each one of them in color. Each country’s section includes tables of weight and fineness. The market valuations are extensively revised to reflect both the higher price of gold as well as the skyrocketing demand for numismatic rarities. Valuations are now provided, for the first time, in up to three states of preservation. Many of the prices, especially for great rarities and coins in higher grades, have at least doubled. In fact, as collectors recognize the scarcity of coins in the highest states of preservation, the premium for such coins relative to lower-graded ones is escalating beyond traditional proportions. The coinage of India and the Islamic world, long dismissed by western collectors as difficult to decipher, unimportant, and lacking in value, is now the subject of intense interest, and has shown some of the most dramatic increases of all. The reader will also find a useful directory of the world’s leading gold-coin dealers and auction houses.

For the numismatist, banker, economist, historian, or institution of higher learning, the tenth edition of Gold Coins of the World (ISBN 978-0-87184-310-4) is a book for every library, public and private.

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