it has frequently transmitted to us the form and comeliness of men whose characters, actions, or talents have left an impress on their age. Although the pencil and the chisel were at first rarely dedicated to portraiture, a mode of representation arose in Italy during the fifteenth century which supplied this want with singular success. Reviving classical taste found few more attractive relics than the coins and medals of Greece and her colonies; but their imitators, struck with the inferiority of those under the Roman empire, adopted, and even surpassed, the bold style and high relief of the former. When almost every principality in the Peninsula possessed a mint, and die-cutting was a usual branch of the goldsmith's craft, there were great facilities for the new art. The circulation of precious metals being very limited, trade was then conducted chiefly by barter, or by the transmission of coin in sealed bags, stamped with the value they contained, whilst small transactions were made almost solely in copper money.[203] Heroic medals, which soon became the established meed of egotism and incense of flattery, were at first cast,--and, when machinery became more perfect, were struck,--in an alloy of copper, under the name of bronze. Those of the fifteenth century were of great size, varying from one to four and a half inches in diameter; many bear the names of well-known sculptors and painters as their artists, and exhibit a grandeur of conception unequalled in other numismatic productions.[*204] About three hundred and seventy-five such medals have been published in the Trésor de Numismatique et de Glyptique, and although the _procédé Collas_ there adopted in general fails to preserve the sharpness and finish given to the originals by careful retouching, no work of art is so delightful a companion to Italian mediæval history. Zannetti's elaborate collections on Italian coinages, and the fifth volume of Cicognara's great work upon sculpture, may also be consulted with pleasure and advantage. [Footnote 203: The coinage of Duke Federigo consisted of Bolognini and Piccioli. The former were small thin silver pieces, weighing 19-1/2 grains, of which 3-1/2 were copper alloy, and forty of them made a florin. The florin, a nominal coin, thus contained 634-34/59 grains of pure silver, and 146-1/2 grains of copper; and supposing pure silver worth, as now, 5s. 6d. an ounce, it would be worth 7s. 3-1/4d. sterling, making a bolognini 7-1/3 farthings. The piccioli (3-3/5 to a farthing) were about the size of bolognini (52 or 56 to the ounce); but were of copper alloyed with about three per cent. of silver. All this Duke's coinage seems to have been minted at Gubbio, and it is described at great length by Reposati, in his _Zecca di Gubbio_. See p. 41 above, and Author's Preface.] [Footnote *204: See on this subject the most excellent book by G.F. HILL, _Pisanello_ (London, 1905); a good bibliography is there given.]