The Numismatic Museum owns 500,000 acquisitions -mainly coins, but also medals, lead seals, seal stones, weights, obols and talents- dating from the 14th century BC to modern days.

The richest collections are those of ancient coins, dating from the 6th century BC till the 5th century AD. These are the coins of the city-states, kings and rulers of the ancient Greek and Hellenistic world, the Roman Republic, the Roman emperors and the provinces of the Roman Empire.

Equally important are the collections of Byzantine and Medieval coins, dating from the 6th to the 15th century. They comprise a large number of coins of the Byzantine Empire with representative issues of all emperors and mints, issues of states and rulers of the Medieval West and East, as well as issues of the Western states founded in Greece from the 13th century onwards.

The period from the 15th to the 20th century is represented by coins of most countries of the modern and contemporary world. Emphasis is placed on the coins that circulated in Greece during this period, such as coins of the Ottoman Empire, coins of European states and empires, as well as coins and banknotes of the modern Greek state.

 

Other collections belonging to the museum include works of micro-sculpture and miniature art.

The ancient Greek, Roman, Byzantine and medieval coin and commercial weights for various products and currencies are an important sources of information on weighing standards and trade in different eras.

The seal stones are used as symbols of power, as jewellery and to declare identity, authenticity or value.

The rich collection of Byzantine lead seals is valuable for the study of Byzantine Sigillography and Sealing.

The medals preserve a wealth of information about historical figures and events. They also include representations of buildings, cities and entire areas, expressing the art of each era from the Renaissance to the present day.

To manage its collections, the Museum has a Department of Ancient Coins, Weights and Minor Art, a Department of Byzantine and Medieval Coins and Stamps, and a Department of Modern Coins and Medals.

 

 

As a whole, the national collection of the Numismatic Museum is one of the richest in the world, along with the collections of the British Museum in London, the National Library in Paris, the Hermitage in St. Petersburg, the Bode Museum in Berlin and the museum of the American Numismatic Society in New York. .

The core of the Collection consisted of 329 coins which came from the first Archaeological Museum, established in 1829 in Aegina, that was the earliest short-term capital of the newly founded Greek State. Since then, the Collection has been gradually enriched with coins and other objects that were deposited in the Museum as donations, deliveries, purchases, confiscations and excavation finds. Therefore, by the 1970s, more than 50,000 coins from excavations in Argos, Olympia, Corinth, Delphi, Olynthos, etc. have been handed over to the Museum.

More than 190,000 coins belong to 670 ancient Greek, Roman, Byzantine, medieval and modern “treasures” from all over Greece. These closed contexts are important sources of information on coin circulation and the Greek economy from antiquity till the beginning of the 20th century.