Joachim Lelewel’s Humor

Today, I was researching the early medieval coins known variously as Sachsenpfennige, Wendenpfennige, Randpfennige, Hochrandpfennige, Denary krzyzowe, or cross denarii. As part of this research, I have been consulting the works of the earliest writers to discuss these coins, including Evers, Mader, and Lelewel. When consulting Lelewel’s Numismatique du Moyen-âge, considérée sous le rapport du type (Paris, 1835), I was absolutely thrilled with Lelewel’s sense of humor and writing style. In truth, I had a hardy chuckle when I read the section of his work which led up to his discussion of the types which are the subject of my research.

My free translation of the text that gave rise to my pleasure follows. It discusses the mutilated inscriptions, inscription fragments, or random letters, which Lelewel noted as appearing on some early medieval German coins.

The coinage of Germany offers more examples of deformity than any other; it has sometimes enigmatically imitated Anglo-Saxon coins, most often only having the remains of an inscription and thus becoming infinitely obscure. I believe there are pieces that have the letters mixed up aimlessly, without reason or symmetry. Anglo-Saxon riddles are more inventive and complete and hold more to a complicated and organized method. German riddles are rather more puzzling with their raw obscurity, outdoing all the others. Letters are mixed aimlessly, without reason, without symmetry. The captions are truncated and mutilated, and the small number of letters that are preserved are not spared harm, to such an extent that all traces to be deciphered disappear. It is not the incapacity of the artist that breaks the necks of legends and letters but his whim, or his willful inattention, or his inadvertence. You see the letters reversed ass-over-head. Sometimes they lie on their backs, sometimes crawl belly to the ground; some walk with firm feet, others turned with their legs upside down. In their continual somersaults, they appear lame and bent, their limbs are dislocated, shattered, or scattered.

Part III, p . 155 ff.

Lelewel is not wrong. He expresses his indignation with an exasperated eloquence that I have rarely encountered but which I greatly appreciate!