Ebook Coin Hoards

The tumuli of the Maya and Aztec civilizations of Central America will some day yield rich returns to the investigator, but the material heretofore secured is archaeological or ethnological, and, like that of Peru, has included little of a numismatic nature. In both cases, the finds are more closely analogous to those of ancient Egypt where the accounts often prove more thrilling than fiction. It stimulates the imagination to read of unrifled tombs where lie haughty princesses of long ago. Their jewels and the implements of their daily life were placed near at hand in readiness for the after-world, but food and drink were considered more necessary than gold. Only with the burials of the later and least interesting period does numismatic material occur. This is owing to the fact that the early money of the Egyptians consisted of bullion in an unminted form whose exchange value was determined by weight.