NUMISMATIC COLLECTION
The first piece that had formed the founding act of the numismatic collection was the purchase, for the sum of 30 scudi, of ancient medals, to which, with purchases and donations over time, all the distinctive elements of the collection would be added. Such exchanges, when studied and analyzed in their dynamics, return to us in great detail the pulse of collecting at the time (18th-19th centuries), of the buying and selling of antiquities and attached “souvenirs.”
In 1782, given the considerable increase in the numismatic collection, Father Giovanni Battista Audiffredi (1714-1794) had a wooden medal box made as a container, on which he had the inscription in memory of the Archbishop of Ragusa Giacinto Maria Milcovich (1690 – 1756) affixed. His donation had been one of the key contributions made to the prosperity of the collection, enriching it with more than four hundred ancient coins.
The advent of the Roman Republic (1798-1799) had led to an initial mutilation of the collections: with the French occupation valuable works had been consigned, later taken to Paris, and the Casanatense found itself in serious difficulties that led Father Giacomo Magno (prefect from 1798 to 1840) “with very serious regret to sell some gold medals that were in the small museum.” Among the first numismatic finds offered for sale was to be the valuable gold coin of Gnaeus Domitius Enobarbus, described by Audiffredi himself in an appendix to his work, printed in Rome in 1762, Transitus Veneris ante Solem observati apud PP. S. Mariae super Minervam VI Junii MDCCLXI. Expositio historico-astronomica. Accedit descriptio aurei nummi Cn. Domitii Ahenobarbi.
By 1873 the law on the suppression of religious corporations had been extended to Rome as well, and in 1884, at the end of the lengthy lawsuit brought by the Dominican Order, the ownership of the Casanatense finally passed to the Italian state. Following this law, the newly formed Liquidating Council of the Ecclesiastical Axis had managed this transitional phase and had been responsible for getting all book and non-book assets in the Institute registered. From this time the dismemberment of the collections began; in fact, in 1927 much of the numismatic collection was deposited in the medal collection of the National Roman Museum. In any case, a small part of it had not been transferred and, locked in three metal boxes, remained in the custody of the Casanatense until the present day.
The twelve Caesars
The white marble bas-reliefs depict the profiles of Julius Caesar (49 BC-44 BC, the years in which he held the office of dictator) and eleven Roman emperors from the Julio-Claudian dynasty to the Flavian dynasty (27 BC-96 AD). The bas-reliefs, donated to the Casanatense by Prefect Audiffredi, offer confirmation of how the collecting of coins, medals and antiquities in general was not merely a fad of the times, but a decidedly relevant element in the erudition, study and reconstruction of ancient history.
Read more:
S. Pennestrì, Dalla Biblioteca al Museo. Il Nummophylaceum casanatense e l’eredità di Giovanni Battista Audiffredi, in “Rischiarare il vero, rilevare il bello. Storie e modelli di tutela e valorizzazione del patrimonio culturale”, a cura di Serafina Pennestrì, Roma, Ministero della Cultura, 2021 (Notiziario del Portale Numismatico dello Stato. Serie Medaglieri italiani, 15), p. 58-266
P. F. Magnanti, La Bibliotheca Numismatica a corredo del museolum casanatense, in “Rischiarare il vero, rilevare il bello. Storie e modelli di tutela e valorizzazione del patrimonio culturale”, a cura di Serafina Pennestrì, Roma, Ministero della Cultura, 2021 (Notiziario del Portale Numismatico dello Stato. Serie Medaglieri italiani, 15), p. 267-300