Changes to "Mint Field"

3 posts • viewed 84 times

This message aims at: suggesting an idea to improve Numista

Status: Rejected
Upvotes: 4
Downvotes: 0
After not getting new coins for a while I recently returned to Numista and to my pleasant surprise the option to add the mint(s) where coins were made was added. I think this is a great feature but have a few remarks about it:

1. Some of the dates mentioned next to the mints seem to be wrong. Is there an easy way to fix this?
For example: -the Royal Dutch Mint (in Utrecht) is mentioned "1911-date", but 1911/1912 is only the date the mint moved to a new building. It has been producing the coins for the Kingdom of the Netherlands since that country was founded in 1815 and before for that for Utrecht itself since 1567 (the date is even incorporated in the mint's official logo).
I think the 1567 date is fair, as the company uses it itself and so has probably been more or less the same since then.
( https://www.royaldutchmint.com/corporate-information/en/page/2366/ )
The Berlin mint (mint mark A) is for example also listed as being founded in 1280 and I am sure it has changed a bit since then.
Speaking of German mints: the Hamburg mint (mint mark J) is listed as being founded in 801, but the mint's website lists its earliest form as being founded in 834.
( https://muenze.hamburg.de/historie/ )

2. Related but slightly different is the question, if a mint moving to a new building justifies listing it as a different mint in the list. This year the RDM moved to a new building (from Utrecht to the neighbouring town of Houten). I suspect a part of 2020's coins and of course following years' will be produced there. I think it would be strange to have to add it as a "second mint" for later years, even thought it was made by the same company that just moved locations. (This is also applicable for the British Royal Mint, which moved to Wales and is therefore listed as a different mint.)

3. The mint mark of RDM coins since 1816 is the caduceus (except for some colonial coins). When I looked at modifying the data of a coin from the RDM, I saw it is possible to add a picture (generic, not of the mark on a certain coin) to the Mint Field. This mint mark is only a distinguishing factor for some WWII era coins, showing that the ones with the caduceus were made in Utrecht in stead of the USA. Would it be desirable for someone to add this picture to all the coins which have been made by the RDM?

4. This leads to my last point: if you want to add/modify many coins' mints, what is the best source to name? I am not very experienced at modifying pages so it might be a stupid question, but to me it seems there often aren't clear sources for pointing to what mint made a coin. A Dutch coin featuring the caduceus is simply always from the RDM.

Like I said before I really appreciate the added Mint Field function, and thank who worked on it. I just want to help improve it, if I can.
Hello,

Thanks for the suggestions.

Re. the change of locations: we add a distinct mint in the database only if the location changes to a new city. For changes of address in the same city, we list them together. We make an exception if there is a clear historic discontinuity (eg. Londinium / London). As a guideline, 100 years+. Also, if two distinct mints operated simultaneously in one city, we add separate entries.

I fixed Berlin for now:
https://en.numista.com/catalogue/mint.php?id=5

I may have a look at Utrecht some other time.

Best
strato
Hi Strato,

Thanks for replying.
I think the list with all the mints and information about their history is very interesting!
Thanks for the good work on the website.

Kind regards,
Alberich
Status changed to Rejected (Xavier, 15 Feb 2021, 11:34)

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