XI-XX Bekob [Translation of Russian Title Russian Numismatics XI-XX Centuries]; Materialy i Issledovaniya [Translation of Russian subtitle Materials and Research]

Leningrad: Avrora, 1979. Presumed First Edition, First printing [1 of 3,000]. Hardcover. Very good. 167, [3] pages. Color frontis. Abbreviations. Indexes. TEXT IS PRIMARILY IN RUSSIAN. English language summaries 159-161. Unpaginated Contents page in English. Contents include: Foreign Gold Coins in Fourteenth to Seventeenth Century Russia by V. Potin; Novgorodki of Grand Princes: A Study in the Comparative Die Linkage Analysis of Fifteenth Century Russian Coins by M. Lvov; Russian Hoards of Ingots and Coins in the Hermitage by M. Sotnikova and L. Spassky; Russian Hoard Pottery in the Hermitage Collection by V. Kallinin, and Materials Relating to the Topography of Finds of Russian Coins (Fourteenth to twentieth Centuries) Registered by the Hermitage in 1948-74 by M. Sotnikova. For Russian numismatics, the socialistic era started with the end of all private coin collections: most of them were seized by the new government and distributed amongst nationalized museums. Others were taken abroad while some were simply stolen and got lost. During the entire Soviet period, the numismatic science had only a quasi official status: it was a matter of the national academic institutes and museums. The reason was that in the USSR the circulation of precious metal of all shapes and kinds - that includes coins - was strictly supervised by the state. The purchase and sale of coins made of precious metal that were regarded "exchange valuables" was the privilege of the state and prohibited for private persons since 1918. Anyone undertaking such transactions was severely punished. The only things allowed to collect were coins made of copper, bronze or similar metals.