SCWC 17th Century 3rd Edition

The new 3rd edition of Standard Catalog of World Coins 17th Century
(1601-1700) has been published. It has 1366 pages (the 2nd edition has
1272) and has a cover price of $65.00, the same as the 2nd edition.
According to Clifford Mishler's introductory comments, major re-organization
has occurred in the listings for German States, Austria-Hungary, and
Bohemia, as well as Scandinavia, Islamic countries, China, and India.
Mishler also indicates that "significant value revisions" have been made in
the listings for Swiss Cantons, Spain, and Great Britain. A quick skim
through the 2 3/4" thick volume confirms those observations. I noted that
the listings for the German States alone occupy close to 40% of the pages,
and contain listings of many more minor coins than did the previous edition.
I am pleased to see that under Austria all the 3-kreuzer coins, for example,
are grouped together, instead of being scattered through several separate
sections by mint name. I appreciate that Mishler has kept before us the
notion that, while the Krause series of catalogs represent the current
state-of-the-art in the cataloguing of four centuries of world coinage, they
are a work in progress, dependent, at least in part, upon the users to point
out errors and omissions and make suggestions for improvement.

On Mon, 15 Dec 2003 20:08:31 -0600, "James Higby"
jaggers[at]grics[dot]net wrote:

The new 3rd edition of Standard Catalog of World Coins 17th Century
(1601-1700) has been published. It has 1366 pages (the 2nd edition has
1272) and has a cover price of $65.00, the same as the 2nd edition.
According to Clifford Mishler's introductory comments, major re-organization
has occurred in the listings for German States, Austria-Hungary, and
Bohemia, as well as Scandinavia, Islamic countries, China, and India.
Mishler also indicates that "significant value revisions" have been made in
the listings for Swiss Cantons, Spain, and Great Britain. A quick skim
through the 2 3/4" thick volume confirms those observations. I noted that
the listings for the German States alone occupy close to 40% of the pages,
and contain listings of many more minor coins than did the previous edition.
I am pleased to see that under Austria all the 3-kreuzer coins, for example,
are grouped together, instead of being scattered through several separate
sections by mint name. I appreciate that Mishler has kept before us the
notion that, while the Krause series of catalogs represent the current
state-of-the-art in the cataloguing of four centuries of world coinage, they
are a work in progress, dependent, at least in part, upon the users to point
out errors and omissions and make suggestions for improvement.

My understanding is that this catalog is in the "new"
format.

This puts everything by date and scrambles the position
of the KM numbers. I found this useless in the other KM
volumes and will not buy this one, if that is what they
did.

For example, in KM 18th Century 3rd edition Afghanistan
you can find the following sequence of numbers:
KM 293, KM 593, KM 353, KM 123, KM 433.2, KM 433.3,
KM 393a, KM B293, KM 774, KM 653, KM 273, KM 743
These are all on page 10 in catalog order. If you
only have a Country and a KM number, it makes it
very difficult to locate a coin listing.

I note that error rates have been going up in all of
the KM World Coin catalogs. Wrong or swapped photos,
mint names incorrectly identified, paragraphs of
introduction to countries describing coins not in the
listed century, inconsistent format for listing of dual
dated coins, so the listing is not clear when the
second date listed is a conversion of the date on the
coin or a 2nd date in the AD (CE) calendar appears on
the coin.

It also appears that some of the Islamic listings have
been trimmed in other volumes. Coins that used to be
listed are sometimes not there. Some of these are at
transitions between columns where it looks like sloppy
editing. I expect some listings to be dropped, when
they are wrong, or the coins can be shown to be bogus.

A also find the quality of the binding to be lacking.
If you work with these catalogs for a while, it is very
common to get loose pages. Part of the problem is that
they have gotten too large. Sheer weight will cause the
binding to break. Perhaps there is a better way of
breaking up the listing to get more, but smaller
volumes. Hardback volumes would be nice, but I suspect
most collectors would not like the price.

I is interesting that KM has created an opening for
someone else to take over their market for world
catalogs. KM was not always the standard of world
catalogs. Earlier world catalogs were mostly by type
rather that by date. Perhaps someone would want to
start an e-version of a world catalog. One that could
be used as a checklist without entering all the data
into a computer, just the info on what is in your
collection.

I collect Islamic and Indian coins and in this area
the coverage of the previous version of this catalog
has been poor. I find it better to work with the
specialized catalogs and checklists like those of
Steve Album or ANS.

Bob Null

I is interesting that KM has created an opening for
someone else to take over their market for world
catalogs.


Are they saying they want to get out
of the World catalog business (i.e. sell
it to someone else?).

Maybe its just too big for them to deal
with anymore. Krause publishes a huge
number of reference catalogs in various
collecting areas. I don't know what the
sales figures are for the SCWC in the
various volumes but it might not be as
profitable for them anymore.

On 16 Dec 2003 22:45:12 GMT, (JSTONE9352) wrote:

I is interesting that KM has created an opening for
someone else to take over their market for world
catalogs.


Are they saying they want to get out
of the World catalog business (i.e. sell
it to someone else?).

That could be done, but I would expect someone to
start a new publication, perhaps competing only on
the latest issues at first. KM is at least the 3rd
generation of World Coin Catalogs. I see no reason
why someone might want to start a 4th generation.

Maybe its just too big for them to deal
with anymore. Krause publishes a huge
number of reference catalogs in various
collecting areas. I don't know what the
sales figures are for the SCWC in the
various volumes but it might not be as
profitable for them anymore.

Most of the work on the catalogs is done by
volunteers. I did some of it myself a couple of
decades ago. With unpaid writing, it should be
easier to make a buck.

Many of the problems with the errors in the
catalogs seem to be in production errors,
rather than errors by the volunteers.
The editorial decision on how to arrange the
catalog, however, has made a mess of them in
the areas I collect. I would be interested in the
opinion of collectors of other areas like Europe
Latin America or the far East as to whether the
new format of SCWC has made it more difficult for
them.

I am starting to see a number of web sites on
specialized collecting areas. They are not quite
catalogs yet, but this type of web publication
might replace the traditional catalogs. A few
examples:

Anatolian Coins by Mehmet Eti
http://mehmeteti.150m.com/index.htm

Early Islamic Coins by James N. Roberts
http://users.rcn.com/j-roberts/

the coins and history of asia by T. K. Mallon-McCorgray
http://www.grifterrec.com/coins/coins.html

A lot of this is pre 17th century, so it would not be
covered by the SCWC.

Bob Null