Haim Gitler
Born in Mexico in 1962, Dr. Haim Gitler immigrated to Israel in 1974.
He received his BA and MA in Archaeology from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and was awarded a PhD from Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń, Poland in 2011.
Professional Background
Haim joined the staff of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, in 1987, becoming Curator of Numismatics in 1994. In this capacity, he oversaw the renewal of the permanent galleries of Numismatics in 1994 and 2010, as well as curating numerous temporary exhibitions of numismatics.
In 2013, Dr. Gitler was appointed the Tamar and Teddy Kollek Chief Curator of Archaeology at the Israel Museum, with overall responsibility for the management of the Museum’s Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Archeology Wing, as well as the Shrine of the Book, which houses the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the off-site Rockefeller Archaeological Museum.
Haim taught Numismatics at the Rehovot campus of the Hebrew University from 1996 through 1998, and at Tel Aviv University from 2010 through 2014.
From 2005 through 2016, he served as President of the Israel Numismatic Society (INS) (http://www.ins.org.il), founding its prestigious journal Israel Numismatic Research in 2006 (http://www.ins.org.il/23/Israel-Numismatic-Research). He was previously Associate Editor of the Israel Numismatic Journal.
In 2018, Haim was reelected President of the INS, a position he still holds today. In 2022, Gitler was elected to be one of the nine members of the Committee of the International Numismatic Council and was appointed Secretary of the committee.
Dr. Gitler has also served as a member of the Bank of Israel’s Committee for Planning Coins, Banknotes, and Commemorative Issues.
Haim has been a member of archaeological expeditions in Israel and Jordan. In Israel, he has published numerous articles on the numismatic findings from the excavations of the Jewish Quarter, Jerusalem; Ashkelon; the Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee; Har Adar; and Khirbet el-‘Aqd. He has also presented papers on excavations in Jordan conducted by Father Michele Piccirillo of the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum: Mount Nebo, Umm al–Rasas and Madaba; and the excavations at Az-Zanṭūr in Petra, conducted by Prof. Bernhard Kolb of Basel University.
Areas of Scholarship and Publications
Haim’s main areas of specialization include the coinages of Persian Late Period Palestine: Philistia, Samaria, Judah and Edom. He has published more than 90 articles on Electrum, Persian, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Islamic, Crusader, and Modern coinages. Other topics on which he has written extensively include papers on metallurgical analyses of coins and jewelry; Hacksilber hoards; Roman and Islamic coin dies; clay bullae from the excavations in Petra; Byzantine and Islamic weights; Crusader lead seals; magical amulets; and museology. He has collaborated with more than 40 scholars worldwide on these publications.
Phone: +972 2-670-8938
Address: The Israel Museum
P.O.Box 71117
Jerusalem 91710
Israel
He received his BA and MA in Archaeology from the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and was awarded a PhD from Nicolaus Copernicus University, Toruń, Poland in 2011.
Professional Background
Haim joined the staff of the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, in 1987, becoming Curator of Numismatics in 1994. In this capacity, he oversaw the renewal of the permanent galleries of Numismatics in 1994 and 2010, as well as curating numerous temporary exhibitions of numismatics.
In 2013, Dr. Gitler was appointed the Tamar and Teddy Kollek Chief Curator of Archaeology at the Israel Museum, with overall responsibility for the management of the Museum’s Samuel and Saidye Bronfman Archeology Wing, as well as the Shrine of the Book, which houses the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the off-site Rockefeller Archaeological Museum.
Haim taught Numismatics at the Rehovot campus of the Hebrew University from 1996 through 1998, and at Tel Aviv University from 2010 through 2014.
From 2005 through 2016, he served as President of the Israel Numismatic Society (INS) (http://www.ins.org.il), founding its prestigious journal Israel Numismatic Research in 2006 (http://www.ins.org.il/23/Israel-Numismatic-Research). He was previously Associate Editor of the Israel Numismatic Journal.
In 2018, Haim was reelected President of the INS, a position he still holds today. In 2022, Gitler was elected to be one of the nine members of the Committee of the International Numismatic Council and was appointed Secretary of the committee.
Dr. Gitler has also served as a member of the Bank of Israel’s Committee for Planning Coins, Banknotes, and Commemorative Issues.
Haim has been a member of archaeological expeditions in Israel and Jordan. In Israel, he has published numerous articles on the numismatic findings from the excavations of the Jewish Quarter, Jerusalem; Ashkelon; the Ancient Boat in the Sea of Galilee; Har Adar; and Khirbet el-‘Aqd. He has also presented papers on excavations in Jordan conducted by Father Michele Piccirillo of the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum: Mount Nebo, Umm al–Rasas and Madaba; and the excavations at Az-Zanṭūr in Petra, conducted by Prof. Bernhard Kolb of Basel University.
Areas of Scholarship and Publications
Haim’s main areas of specialization include the coinages of Persian Late Period Palestine: Philistia, Samaria, Judah and Edom. He has published more than 90 articles on Electrum, Persian, Hellenistic, Roman, Byzantine, Islamic, Crusader, and Modern coinages. Other topics on which he has written extensively include papers on metallurgical analyses of coins and jewelry; Hacksilber hoards; Roman and Islamic coin dies; clay bullae from the excavations in Petra; Byzantine and Islamic weights; Crusader lead seals; magical amulets; and museology. He has collaborated with more than 40 scholars worldwide on these publications.
Phone: +972 2-670-8938
Address: The Israel Museum
P.O.Box 71117
Jerusalem 91710
Israel
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Videos by Haim Gitler
The first coins were produced from white gold, an alloy also called
electrum. Though they are small and irregular in shape, they bear a vast
range of powerful visual images, executed in startling detail and with
impressive plasticity.
Books by Haim Gitler
The two centuries of Achaemenid dominion in the Near East, from 538 until 332 BCE, constitute a crucial period in the history of the southern part of the Fifth Persian Satrapy, also known as “Beyond the River” (‘Abar Naharâ). This period is marked by a profound transformation in the economic, political and cultural life of the region. From the mid-fifth century BCE we witness a transition in the means of payment from the use of weighed metal (mostly silver) to that of foreign coinage, and, subsequently, to local issues. The issuing of local coins by civic minting authorities should be seen as a part of a longer process of monetization by which the use of precious metals in various shapes for economic transactions was transformed into the use of coins for such transactions in the southern Levant.
The current volume, covers the Persian and Early Hellenistic Coinage, i.e. from the Persian (Achaemenid) and early Hellenistic (Ptolemaic and Seleucid) periods, roughly 450 to 250 BCE, as well as three Hacksilber and jewelry hoards and varia. This includes the coinage of Philistia, Samaria, Judah and possibly Dor and Edom.
The iconography of the coin types is examined in depth, with comparisons to motifs in Greek, Persian, and ancient Near Eastern art, including other local coinages and sources in Judahite material culture. The monograph also analyzes data relating to the metrology, metal content, and circulation of the coinage. Overall, the study attempts to place the Yehud coinage in its historical context and to define its role in the economy of the ancient province of Judah.
Pamphylien bis Mauretanien, Nachträge, Erwerbungen 1970-1976 und Incerta, ausgewählte Erwerbungen bis 2005
at the Israel Museum displays 75 coins that Jackie Adda Coen donated and as a tribute to a great collector and connoisseur, Victor A. Adda. These 75 eye-catching golden coins from Adda’s collection have never before been displayed to the public. Bearing the portraits of Roman emperors and their family members, these coins offer a rare glimpse into the world of the rulers of the Roman Empire, as well as revealing the great artistic skill involved in their creation and the use of the human face to reflect a person’s character, mostly as a means of propaganda. The exhibition follows the development of portraits on coinage over a period of almost 350 years, and relates to the slogans on the coins –– the majority of which include words relating to victory, security and peace –– displaying how little propaganda has changed over thousands of years.
In conjunction with the exhibition we published a book with the same name as that of the exhibition. The content of this book is a result of numerous discussions I had with Jackie and our mutual interest in bringing together a group of specialists on Roman numismatics to contribute from their knowledge in order to produce an extensive work that covers the periods to which the 75 gold coins date. This publication is a result of the work of 17 devoted scholars who are first of all my friends. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to each one of them.
The book begins with a personal touch, the life story of Victor A. Adda in Jackie’s own words. This lovely text takes us back to Alexandria at the turn of the twentieth century.
Arturo Russo, to whom we are ever indebted for funding and publishing this volume, describes the Adda collection in context, as one of the century’s major collections of Roman gold coins. The collection consists of just over 1,000 coins, of which the main nucleus is Roman: 761 aurei and solidi covering a period from Julius Caesar to Romulus Augustulus, from the last years of the republic to the end of the empire. Side by side with Roman coins, the Adda collection also included 38 Byzantine gold coins; 65 Bosporus staters; 28 Greek pieces and the 11 issues (+ one small cake ingot) of the renowned Delta hoard.
The attractive selection of 106 Egyptian coins begins with a beautiful Nectenebo II stater depicting a bridled horse and two hieroglyphs: collar with six beads (nwb = gold), heart and windpipe (nfr = good). It is followed by an impressive selection of Ptolemaic gold and silver issues, which culminated with Cleopatra at Ascalon. Catharine Lorber, a leading expert on Ptolemaic coins and one of my dearest friends, commented the following on this section of the collection: “The greatest rarity that should be pointed out, even more than the wonderful Cleopatra tetradrachm of Ascalon, is a unique mnaieion depicting the radiate Ptolemy V (without the spear), dated to year 6. Also important and worth mentioning are two extremely rare portrait mnaieia of Arsinoe III, one from Alexandria and the other from a Syro-Phoenician mint, and a tetradrachm and didrachm of Paphos depicting Ptolemy VIII with a radiate diadem and wearing the aegis like a chlamys. These varieties are the only coin portraits of Arsinoe III and Ptolemy VIII and accordingly the only reliable evidence we have for their appearance. Overall, I would observe that the Ptolemaic collection favors gold over silver and is especially strong in third-century issues, no doubt reflecting Victor A. Adda’s ability to acquire coins from the Benha hoard of 1936 (IGCH 1694). Adda made a point of collecting unpublished varieties, especially of mnaieia in the name of Arsinoe Philadelphus, and very rare small denominations like the half mnaieion depicting the radiate Ptolemy III and the quarter mnaieion of the K-series Arsinoes. One can observe that he was interested in style, favoring coins of beautiful style but also ensuring that his collection included a range of attractive or interesting styles, especially in the portraiture of Arsinoe Philadelphus. It’s obvious that Victor A. Adda was extremely knowledgeable about Ptolemaic gold coinage, and that he possessed exquisite taste”.
A selection of 16 pages of Victor’s Adda’s handwritten French catalogue are illustrated along with scannings of the plates of the entire Victor A. Adda collection, which appeared in a private catalogue produced by Christie’s in 1986 for the family (part of the Victor A. Adda collection was sold in two Christie’s auctions in 1984 and 1985).
A brief introduction about the aureus as the premier coin in the Roman monetary economy is followed by papers written by 14 scholars, covering a period of more than 300 years, from the end of the republic (first century BCE) to the beginning of the fourth century CE (Richard Abdy, Michel Amandry, Roger Bland, Andrew Burnett, Aleksander Bursche, Gil Gambash, Cristian Gazdac, Haim Gitler, Achim Lichtenberger, Jerome Mairat, Rodolfo Martini, Markus Peter, Johan van Heesch, Bernhard E. Woytek). These papers focus on crucial developments during the Golden Age of the Roman Empire as reflected by the Adda coins.
In a comprehensive overview of this volume, Matti Fischer outlines a framework for analysis of the Roman emperors’ portraits themselves. This includes the use of art-historical methods such as analysis of the frame, composition, the physiognomy, the iconography of the bust and face and meanings inherent in the use of style, and the special type of production and distribution unique to coins. He provides insights into the meaning of identity and value while projecting new concepts relevant to research both of ancient coins and of modern uses of the face.
Yaniv Schauer, co-curator of the exhibition, prepared with the help of Jonathan Grimaldi from NAC an extensive catalogue of 611 of 1,012 coins from the original collection that are dated to the period under discussion. This catalogue includes valuable information on the provenance of those specimens that Victor Adda purchased on the antiquities market.
I would like to thank my dear friend Gil Gambash for co-editing this volume and for his most productive insights during our dialogues about the exhibition.
Curator: Dr. Haim Gitler
White Gold: Revealing the World's Earliest Coins is the first public display of an outstanding group of five hundred miniature masterpieces from two important collections of electrum coins (http://www.imj.org.il/exhibition/WhiteGold.html). The exhibition provides an intimate glimpse into the dawn of coinage, shedding light on the story of one of the most important innovations in human history. Electrum coins are not only historically significant, but also astonishingly beautiful. Reflecting a rich diversity of subjects, they trace the evolution of Greek art from the seventh through the fourth century BC and draw us magnetically into a vibrant and fascinating iconographic world (http://www.imj.org.il/exhibitions/2012/WhiteGold/GalleryView.html).
The present work includes issues from the most important public and private collections, as well as coins retrieved from archaeological excavations in Israel and neighboring countries. It aims to compile all the published material and the numerous previously unrecorded coin-types catalogued according to the minting authorities, and according to their iconography.
Since its first appearance in numismatic literature in 1867, this exceptional coin has acquired a remarkable reputation and is considered among the most splendid achievements of Greek classical art. “The Aitna Tetradrachm, a coin of particular beauty, is rich in historical and iconographic significance, shedding light on the short-lived colony of Aitna and the symbols its inhabitants held dear.”
Papers by Haim Gitler
The first coins were produced from white gold, an alloy also called
electrum. Though they are small and irregular in shape, they bear a vast
range of powerful visual images, executed in startling detail and with
impressive plasticity.
The two centuries of Achaemenid dominion in the Near East, from 538 until 332 BCE, constitute a crucial period in the history of the southern part of the Fifth Persian Satrapy, also known as “Beyond the River” (‘Abar Naharâ). This period is marked by a profound transformation in the economic, political and cultural life of the region. From the mid-fifth century BCE we witness a transition in the means of payment from the use of weighed metal (mostly silver) to that of foreign coinage, and, subsequently, to local issues. The issuing of local coins by civic minting authorities should be seen as a part of a longer process of monetization by which the use of precious metals in various shapes for economic transactions was transformed into the use of coins for such transactions in the southern Levant.
The current volume, covers the Persian and Early Hellenistic Coinage, i.e. from the Persian (Achaemenid) and early Hellenistic (Ptolemaic and Seleucid) periods, roughly 450 to 250 BCE, as well as three Hacksilber and jewelry hoards and varia. This includes the coinage of Philistia, Samaria, Judah and possibly Dor and Edom.
The iconography of the coin types is examined in depth, with comparisons to motifs in Greek, Persian, and ancient Near Eastern art, including other local coinages and sources in Judahite material culture. The monograph also analyzes data relating to the metrology, metal content, and circulation of the coinage. Overall, the study attempts to place the Yehud coinage in its historical context and to define its role in the economy of the ancient province of Judah.
Pamphylien bis Mauretanien, Nachträge, Erwerbungen 1970-1976 und Incerta, ausgewählte Erwerbungen bis 2005
at the Israel Museum displays 75 coins that Jackie Adda Coen donated and as a tribute to a great collector and connoisseur, Victor A. Adda. These 75 eye-catching golden coins from Adda’s collection have never before been displayed to the public. Bearing the portraits of Roman emperors and their family members, these coins offer a rare glimpse into the world of the rulers of the Roman Empire, as well as revealing the great artistic skill involved in their creation and the use of the human face to reflect a person’s character, mostly as a means of propaganda. The exhibition follows the development of portraits on coinage over a period of almost 350 years, and relates to the slogans on the coins –– the majority of which include words relating to victory, security and peace –– displaying how little propaganda has changed over thousands of years.
In conjunction with the exhibition we published a book with the same name as that of the exhibition. The content of this book is a result of numerous discussions I had with Jackie and our mutual interest in bringing together a group of specialists on Roman numismatics to contribute from their knowledge in order to produce an extensive work that covers the periods to which the 75 gold coins date. This publication is a result of the work of 17 devoted scholars who are first of all my friends. I would like to express my deepest gratitude to each one of them.
The book begins with a personal touch, the life story of Victor A. Adda in Jackie’s own words. This lovely text takes us back to Alexandria at the turn of the twentieth century.
Arturo Russo, to whom we are ever indebted for funding and publishing this volume, describes the Adda collection in context, as one of the century’s major collections of Roman gold coins. The collection consists of just over 1,000 coins, of which the main nucleus is Roman: 761 aurei and solidi covering a period from Julius Caesar to Romulus Augustulus, from the last years of the republic to the end of the empire. Side by side with Roman coins, the Adda collection also included 38 Byzantine gold coins; 65 Bosporus staters; 28 Greek pieces and the 11 issues (+ one small cake ingot) of the renowned Delta hoard.
The attractive selection of 106 Egyptian coins begins with a beautiful Nectenebo II stater depicting a bridled horse and two hieroglyphs: collar with six beads (nwb = gold), heart and windpipe (nfr = good). It is followed by an impressive selection of Ptolemaic gold and silver issues, which culminated with Cleopatra at Ascalon. Catharine Lorber, a leading expert on Ptolemaic coins and one of my dearest friends, commented the following on this section of the collection: “The greatest rarity that should be pointed out, even more than the wonderful Cleopatra tetradrachm of Ascalon, is a unique mnaieion depicting the radiate Ptolemy V (without the spear), dated to year 6. Also important and worth mentioning are two extremely rare portrait mnaieia of Arsinoe III, one from Alexandria and the other from a Syro-Phoenician mint, and a tetradrachm and didrachm of Paphos depicting Ptolemy VIII with a radiate diadem and wearing the aegis like a chlamys. These varieties are the only coin portraits of Arsinoe III and Ptolemy VIII and accordingly the only reliable evidence we have for their appearance. Overall, I would observe that the Ptolemaic collection favors gold over silver and is especially strong in third-century issues, no doubt reflecting Victor A. Adda’s ability to acquire coins from the Benha hoard of 1936 (IGCH 1694). Adda made a point of collecting unpublished varieties, especially of mnaieia in the name of Arsinoe Philadelphus, and very rare small denominations like the half mnaieion depicting the radiate Ptolemy III and the quarter mnaieion of the K-series Arsinoes. One can observe that he was interested in style, favoring coins of beautiful style but also ensuring that his collection included a range of attractive or interesting styles, especially in the portraiture of Arsinoe Philadelphus. It’s obvious that Victor A. Adda was extremely knowledgeable about Ptolemaic gold coinage, and that he possessed exquisite taste”.
A selection of 16 pages of Victor’s Adda’s handwritten French catalogue are illustrated along with scannings of the plates of the entire Victor A. Adda collection, which appeared in a private catalogue produced by Christie’s in 1986 for the family (part of the Victor A. Adda collection was sold in two Christie’s auctions in 1984 and 1985).
A brief introduction about the aureus as the premier coin in the Roman monetary economy is followed by papers written by 14 scholars, covering a period of more than 300 years, from the end of the republic (first century BCE) to the beginning of the fourth century CE (Richard Abdy, Michel Amandry, Roger Bland, Andrew Burnett, Aleksander Bursche, Gil Gambash, Cristian Gazdac, Haim Gitler, Achim Lichtenberger, Jerome Mairat, Rodolfo Martini, Markus Peter, Johan van Heesch, Bernhard E. Woytek). These papers focus on crucial developments during the Golden Age of the Roman Empire as reflected by the Adda coins.
In a comprehensive overview of this volume, Matti Fischer outlines a framework for analysis of the Roman emperors’ portraits themselves. This includes the use of art-historical methods such as analysis of the frame, composition, the physiognomy, the iconography of the bust and face and meanings inherent in the use of style, and the special type of production and distribution unique to coins. He provides insights into the meaning of identity and value while projecting new concepts relevant to research both of ancient coins and of modern uses of the face.
Yaniv Schauer, co-curator of the exhibition, prepared with the help of Jonathan Grimaldi from NAC an extensive catalogue of 611 of 1,012 coins from the original collection that are dated to the period under discussion. This catalogue includes valuable information on the provenance of those specimens that Victor Adda purchased on the antiquities market.
I would like to thank my dear friend Gil Gambash for co-editing this volume and for his most productive insights during our dialogues about the exhibition.
Curator: Dr. Haim Gitler
White Gold: Revealing the World's Earliest Coins is the first public display of an outstanding group of five hundred miniature masterpieces from two important collections of electrum coins (http://www.imj.org.il/exhibition/WhiteGold.html). The exhibition provides an intimate glimpse into the dawn of coinage, shedding light on the story of one of the most important innovations in human history. Electrum coins are not only historically significant, but also astonishingly beautiful. Reflecting a rich diversity of subjects, they trace the evolution of Greek art from the seventh through the fourth century BC and draw us magnetically into a vibrant and fascinating iconographic world (http://www.imj.org.il/exhibitions/2012/WhiteGold/GalleryView.html).
The present work includes issues from the most important public and private collections, as well as coins retrieved from archaeological excavations in Israel and neighboring countries. It aims to compile all the published material and the numerous previously unrecorded coin-types catalogued according to the minting authorities, and according to their iconography.
Since its first appearance in numismatic literature in 1867, this exceptional coin has acquired a remarkable reputation and is considered among the most splendid achievements of Greek classical art. “The Aitna Tetradrachm, a coin of particular beauty, is rich in historical and iconographic significance, shedding light on the short-lived colony of Aitna and the symbols its inhabitants held dear.”
five indigenous southern Palestinian issues came to an end after the conquest of Alexander the Great in 332 BCE Evidence from four hoards recovered in our region from archaeological excavations and the antiquities market shows a different reality.
Type 5, 16, 24, and 31 series are made of high-purity silver with a small percentage of copper. Based on these results, it is suggested that each series was manufactured using a controlled composition of silver–copper alloy. The findings present novel information about the material culture of the southern
Levant during the Late Persian period and Macedonian period, as expressed through the production and use of these silver coins.
earlier ‘lyre player’ m‘h, sheds light on both coin types and the denominational series to which they belonged. The study provides an important chronological anchor regarding the relative chronologies of these types and may offer clues regarding the formative phase of Samaria’s minting authority
Faces of Power - Roman Gold Coins from the Victor Adda Collection
http://www.noasarai.com/IMJ/coins/
everything is clickable on the walls!
http://mailchi.mp/e871b0e87e5b/whats-new-at-shanna-schmidt-numismatics-inc-259145?e=d5a90bd946
See:
http://www.coinsweekly.com/en/News/Faces-of-Power--Exhibition-in-Jerusalem/4?&id=4848
http://mailchi.mp/e871b0e87e5b/whats-new-at-shanna-schmidt-numismatics-inc-259145?e=d5a90bd946
Gold from the Sea - Newfound Treasure from Caesarea
In February 2015, divers off the coast of Caesarea spotted by chance a group of gold coins lying on the seabed. They immediately alerted marine archaeologists of the Israel Antiquities Authority, who conducted a salvage excavation at the site and recovered more than 2,580 coins of pure (24 karat) gold weighing a total of 7.5 kg.
The coins date from the mid-9th to the early 11th century CE. They were minted by the Fatimid caliphs of Egypt, who ruled over a vast empire stretching from North Africa in the west to Syria and Yemen in the east.
The treasure contains two types of coins: gold dinars weighing around 4 g each and gold quarter-dinars weighing 1 g. These were the most common coins of the period, as silver coins were rare and bronze coins were not used at all. The treasure might have been tax-money collected by a government official returning to Cairo, the capital of the Caliphate, when his ship was wrecked. Alternately, it could have been payment, perhaps meant for soldiers stationed in the Fatimid garrison of Caesarea, that was sent out from the capital but which never reached its destination.
Eleventh-century documents from the Cairo Genizah indicate that the salary of a craftsman at that time was approximately two gold dinars per month. Based on the number of coins found so far, the treasure would have been the equivalent of 1,200 months' salary – a century of wages – or five and a half million shekels based on the minimum wage in Israel today.
Sadly, Yankele died in 2004 and is sorely missed.