A Note on the Medals of the British Archaeological Association

Abstract

A few years ago Paul Robinson of the Devizes Museum found a uniface medal for sale in a local market. It bears the name of the British Archaeological Association and its foundation date, 1843. Robinson asked this author about where and when it was issued. A search through the Association's Journal revealed several references to the Association having issued medals for some of its early annual meetings. Enquiries to the Department of Coins and Medals, British Museum, and to the Heberden Coin Room, Ashmolean Museum, demonstrated the existence of four medals and another struck by the Association's first President, Lord Albert Conynham. Furthermore, the scrapbooks of Charles Roach Smith, the Association's first Honorary Secretary, in the library of the Society of Antiquaries, contain several documents which elucidate the history of the medals. These medals and that produced for the Reginald Taylor Essay Prize are of sufficient interest to warrant description as an interesting and largely unknown aspect of the Association's history. The Association's first congress, after its foundation in 1843, was held at Canterbury between 9 and 14 September 1844. To commemorate the visit, silver and bronze medals were struck by W. J. Taylor. A newspaper announcement mentions the medal: 'The figures on the obverse allegorically represent the society by a hand pouring oil from a Roman flask into a Roman lamp'.! The reverse is decorated with the arms of Canterbury. A printed announcement stated that 'Mr. W. J. Taylor begs to inform Members of the BRITISH ARCHiEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION, this his Medal, struck to commemorate the FIRST ANNUAL MEETING of the Association, is on sale for a short time, at 6 shillings in bronze and 12 shillings in silver; if sent by post, prepayment, with an additional six pence, will be required. The Medals are only to be obtained of the Artist, and of C. R. SMITH, Esq., Honorary Secretary of the Association, who has kindly permitted a quantity to remain for distribution at his residence, 5, Liverpool Street, Cit. Ear{y application is requested.' The announcement is dated I October 1844, with the address 3 Litchfield Street, Soho.2 Roach Smith's scrapbook for the congress includes manuscript lists of subscribers for the medals, signed by the members, with the note 'The Secretary will receive the Subscriptions and give a Voucher for the delivery of the Medal'; the medals, presumably available for members at the congress, were priced at four shillings, case included. The lists, headed by the President, Lord Albert Conynham, with six medals, have some sixtynine individuals ordering eighty-six medals, only two of them in silver.3 Several complimentary medals were despatched, for the scrapbook contains three letters of thanks: one from the Society of Antiquaries of Newcastle upon Tyne, dated I October 1844, 'for a Bronze medal struck on the anniversary of the meeting of the British Archaeological Society'; one from the Herefordshire Natural History, Philosophical, Antiquarian and Literary Society, dated 4 November 1844; the other from Les