Contribution of the Jesuits to the Development of Numismatics before the Suppression of the Society in 1773

Abstract The introductory essay explores the main aspects of the Jesuits’ contribution to the development of numismatics—the study and collection of coins, medals, and related objects—from using coins as inspiration for emblems and historical sources in the seventeenth century to the autonomous study of (mostly ancient) coins in the eighteenth century. In the seventeenth century, a philological approach prevailed among the Jesuits: Athanasius Kircher (1602–80) and Jean Hadrouin (1646–1729) were primarily interested in inscriptions on coins that could be used to help establish ancient biblical chronology. However, Louis Jobert (1637–1719) saw coins and later medals not only as historical sources but also as strictly collector’s objects. By the eighteenth century, the Jesuits were already present in every strand of numismatics at the time: they assembled their collections, cataloged the collections of rulers and institutions, wrote cross-sectional monographs, and took part in subtle academic polemics like the “Bellum Pollarum” (War over Polla) in Vienna in the 1760s.