Die Gewichte und Werte der ptolemäischen Münzen, 3. Aufl. = Βάρη και αξίες των πτολεµαϊκών νοµισµάτων = Weights and Values of the Ptolemaic Coinage

Siatras Series of Numismatic Studies, No. 9. Athens, 2023. Soft cover, 24 cm, 160 pp. New edition incl. Greek and English translations. ISBN: 978-618-84558-8-7.

Friedrich Otto Hultsch (1833-1906) studied classical philology at the University of Leipzig from 1851 to 1855; then he was specialized in the history of mathematics and the numismatic metrology. He is credited with a series of excellent works, among them the famous ''Griechische und römische Metrologie'' (Berlin 1862). The first edition of the current work was published by Teubner under the title ''Die ptolemäischen Münz- und Rechnungswerte'' (Leipzig, 1903) and then it was also reprinted in the ''Abhandlungen der phil.-hist. Klasse der Königlich Sächsischen Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften'', Band 22 (1904). More than 25 reprints by various publishers followed during the 20th century, despite the fact that Hultsch had in part revised the text of the first edition, just before his death in 1906. The year 1904 was also the year of the publication of Jean Svoronos' great work on the coins of the Ptolemies (Τὰ νομίσματα τῶν Πτολεμαίων, Athens 1904), in three volumes. Svoronos had also planned a French edition of this book for his international audience, but finally he preferred to proceed to the edition of a revised fourth volume in German, four years later; in the foreword he writes that six months before the release of the Greek edition and while he was preparing the international version, the German metrologist sent him a copy of his study. One of the main differences of the fourth volume of Svoronos, in comparison to the previous ones, would be the addition of a chapter on the Ptolemaic metrology; but the reading of Hultsch's study convinced him that the two texts were incompatible. Therefore, Svoronos wrote a long letter to Hultsch, exposing his opinions and urging the German savant to revise his treatise in the light of the new data; he also added that he could omit his own chapter on metrology from the fourth volume and replace it with an appendix containing the revised text by Hultsch; and the great Hultch consents and —when after a few months receives the first three volumes of Svoronos — says that the new finds and the new classification was a pleasant surprise to him! Unfortunately, Hultsch was already seriously ill when he began revising his treatise; despite his ilness, he managed to finish it but could not correct the proofs sent from Athens by Svoronos; this was done by Franz Poland who, returning the corrected proofs, also announced to Svoronos the death of the German savant. The new text was published as an Appendix in the fourth volume of Svoronos (''Die Münzen der Ptolemaeer'', Athen 1908); since actually it was the second edition of the 1903 study, we may consider the current edition as the third one: it contains the revised German text and the footnotes as published by Svoronos; a few corrections were silently made, among them the formula on page 58.