Coin Descriptions on Numista

If you have followed this blog for a while, you know that for the last few years, I was trying to figure out how to have coins described in great detail for blind people. I have to say, all my ventures have failed. The original idea was that blind people would understand what a coin looks like, particularly features which are impossible to feel by touch. But there were two problems. The first was that I don’t think too many people were interested. The second, I could not find enough people to describe a good number of coins. But I have missed the obvious. There is already such a thing. Though it wasn’t used to the fullest several years ago, but today it seems that it can be the solution. It is the ability to describe coins on Numista. This feature is also helpful for all collectors. At this point, I am ready to give up my original intention to have coins described for blind people, because it is no longer relevant. I will, however, maintain the related posts on the blog, for the sake of historical documentation.

When I started to use online coin catalogs, probably around 2007, there was very little information out there, mostly coin weight, diameter, and a few words of descriptions. But over the years this has changed. I noticed that these days Numista has much more elaborate descriptions. Originally it used to be just keywords, for example, date, value, coat of arm, etc. But these days there is so much more. In fact, so much that those descriptions are often sufficient for blind people to get a sense of what is on a coin and be able to do further research.

But why is this relevant to most collectors? Obviously, the purpose of a coin catalog is not to provide sufficient information for blind people. But just like many other things, what is necessary for a group of people, it can be a benefit to others.

The reason why detailed coin descriptions can help collectors is because it makes the catalog so much more searchable. The more detailed a description is, the more ways people can look for coins without having any background knowledge. And this can be anything, a keyword, a topic, name of a king, etc. Over the years, Numista included other ways of describing coins, people can add comments, and choose from a list of categories when they describe their coins.

Let’s look at a simple example. Lets say we are looking for coins with elephants. When we search for the word elephant on Numista, today we get 906 results. The result is somewhat deceiving, because it doesn’t mean that the main theme of the coin is an elephant on all 906 coins, for example, one of the results will be the Australian 10 Cents from the Planetary Coins series. Even though the coin does have an elephant, it may not be a coin we are looking for when we are searching for elephants. But this is helpful, and useful, regardless. But if we look at another coin from the results, the Cambodian 20 Riels, it is a much better match. And on this coin, the category is also indicated, which is elephant. Once we follow this category, we get 457 results, where the coin was specifically marked with the elephant category. The big difference between the two result sets maybe that not all coins with an elephant were marked with a category, but for all practical purposes, we have no shortage of coins with elephants. Just imagine without descriptions and categories, what would it take to find coins with elephants. You would probably have to flip through paper catalogs and do complex internet searches.

So what is a good coin description? Lets look at one of my favorite coins, the Portuguese 200 Escudos commemorating the Treaty of Tordesilhas. At the time of this writing, the following information appears on Numista about the 200 Escudos coin: (I did not correct any of the typos)

Obverse

2 ships, map of the Atlantic, Portuguese coat of Arms and value. The vertical line North-south represents the line of demarcation newly defined by the Treaty of Tordesillas (7 June 1494) that mooved the previously defined line by 50 miles to the west. Portuguese expeditions were to stay east of this line, hence the underlined areas on the map of South America, future Brazil, and the Arms of Portugal on the map of Africa.

Lettering:

REPUBLICA PORTUGUESA
200
ESCUDOS

Reverse

Above the name of the treaty that led to moving the line of demarcation (defined by Pope Alexander VI in 1493) between Spanish and Portugueses areas to 370 miles West of the Cap Verde Islands (about 1770 km, 46°30′ West Greenwich). Portraits on the left=West of Isabel de Castilla and Ferdinand II de Aragon, Castillan flag, on the right= East, Joao II king of Portugal and flag.

Lettering:

TRATADO DE TORDESILHAS 1494-1994
FERNANDO·E·ISABEL·REIS·DE·ESPANA
JOÃO II·REI·DE·PORTUGAL
ISABEL C.-F.BRANCO

This is definitely sufficient information to understand what is on the coin. Even though the coat of arms is not described in detail, once we know what it is, we can easily find the Portuguese coat of arms on the internet and since we know the date of the coin, we can narrow it down to what it is.

This particular coin currently doesn’t have anything in the comment section, some information is included in the description, but the comment section is a place where one can provide any relevant information about the coin which is not necessarily part of the description, such as any historical details or interesting facts.

I have to say, this is a dream come true. A few years ago, sometimes I had to do extensive research on coins just to figure out what can be seen on them, today often it is enough to check Numista where I can get enough information to get started. It is a great tool for blind people who would be interested in numismatics. But most importantly, it has evolved to be an excellent tool for anyone who is using the catalog.

I would encourage collectors to contribute to the catalog. If you find that a coin is not listed, or does not have too much information, something is incorrect, you find a typo, or you just know something about it that could be interesting for others, please take a moment and add some information. The site owners made it quite easy. When you display information about a coin, at the bottom you can find a title to contribute to the catalog, under that click “modify or add data”, and you can add all kinds of information. For the first time, it makes sense to read through all the fields you can fill out about a particular coin. Once you submit the information, the moderators check it before the update appears on the site, but usually it doesn’t take too long. Once the update is made, your profile will display how many pages you have contributed to.

If you want to describe a coin which does not exist in the catalog, you can do it here.

For the sake of completeness, since Numista recently added a banknote catalog, all of the above applies to banknotes as well.

Have fun searching Numista, and think about contributing for the sake of all collectors. Also, leave a comment below and tell me about your experience of adding and updating coins.