ROMAN COINS FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE FALL OF
THE WESTERN EMPIRE. By Harold Mattingly. (Methiien. 21.s.)Mr. Mattingly's thorough and scholarly treatize on the ROman coinage was very Mach. needed. Much detailed work has been done on the - subject since Mommsen wrote lig classic. monograph, and the new material is fully .utilized in Mr. Mattingly's book. The author must be commended for his Plan. He deals separately with the Republic, . the early Empire and the late Empire, and in each Section he treats Of the mints, the coin-types, and the financial policy. Thus the student who is less concerned with numismatic details than with broad questions of currency can read the three chapters on financial policy and obtain a clear idea of the rise, development, and decay of the Roman coinage and of the consequences both political and com- mercial. Mr. Mattingly's conclusions may be compared with thOse of M. Rostovtzev in his recent epoch-making economic history of Rome. The debasement of the coinage under the EMpire had calamitous results ; it cut at the root of Rome's prestige and hastened the end. Inflation is' no merely modern phericimenon ; the Emperors who reduced the proportion of precious metal in the silver coins made the same excuses as those-Who advocate the printing of more paper-money to-day.
The book has sixty-four excellent plates of-"eoins. -
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