The recent discussions concerning online resources for researching ancient coins attracted thiswriter's attention. Gradually, they made him realize the need for a fuller treatment on this veryimportant topic. Numismatic websites in general help bridge the paper page with its digitalcounterpart, but rarely are these powerful research tools given any attention in either formatother than the occasional short note stating that a particular site exists and offers to make thenumismatic world a better place in one or more ways.

For ancient coin websites, the long-term plan is to go on an online safari of sorts and scour thefour poorly explored corners of the Internet for some big and useful classical numismatic game.This current effort is intended to serve as an eye-opening taste of three websites that have so fareluded the recent discussions. They illustrate what still lies in the digital jungles and why acomprehensive list is badly needed. Let us not forget that websites like the ones underdiscussion were created by everyone from shy, reclusive collectors to famous, scholarlynumismatists and institutions, and contain some very fascinating backstories. This part of our hobby is also apart of our history. If we don't start collecting and preserving it now, we may lose a lot ofresearch gold in the very near future. And this doesn't even take into consideration the databasesthemselves. Just this year, we lost the original ISEGRIM search engine (possibly the oldestdigital ancient coin database in the world) and Asia Minor Coins (which was a great researchstop for many ancient coin attributors like this writer). Thankfully, as already noted, there arealso some new and innovative online works in progress, two of which form a component of thiswriter's Okay, time to open wide...

1. Roman Provincial Coinage Online (RPC Online):https://rpc.ashmus.ox.ac.uk/

This is hands down one of the best designed numismatic websites of any kind on the Internet.Not only is this the opinion of this writer, but also of a collector with savvy web developmentskills. It has been a fixture on the web since October 2006, wrought by a handful of dedicatednumismatists from the University of Oxford who, at the time, were just concerned withcataloging the Roman provincial coins struck during the Antonine Period (A.D. 138-192).Consider, from the pair of enclosed screen shots, how the project morphed, from 8th November 2006 to last Sunday. Now, the whole Roman provincial series(from roughly 44 B.C.-AD 297) is not only slated to be (in ten volumes) but also

For a more thorough understanding on what RPC Online is all about, including what Romanprovincials are and the importance of coin submissions from us collectors, this writer shockinglyhad the foresight to already write an article in support of the hallowed RPC cause, for the August2015 issue of The Numismatist:https://www.academia.edu/15289195/Not_Built_in_a_Day_RPC_Online_

For a bit of interest, attached is one of the Roman provincials from my own collectionthat can be found on RPC Online, a bronze of the city of Tyana (in Cappadocia;17mm, 4.08 g.), struck for Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 161-180). The photos are courtesy ofNumismatik Naumann. See if you, the reader, can find the coin in the database!

Also, for those who relish the latest news, the following projection was personally provided byDr. Andrew Burnett back in November of last year:

"The current plan is to try and get the Asia part of V online (V.2) for the Warsaw conference nextyear; and the rest of VI also sometime in 2022. In terms of printed volumes, next year should seeVII.2 (the rest of VII) and after that IV.4 (which is only Alexandria - enormous enough for avolume on its own). So we're gradually getting there...!"

In a follow-up to this, he added:

"Maybe add that [RPC] VIII in print will be next after the others."

2. & 3. Numismatic Auction Database Explorer + Ancient Greek Coin Provenance Explorer

https://www.rnumis.com/auctions_top.php

https://www.rnumis.com/greek_coins_top.php

From an Internet mainstay such as RPC Online, we now focus our attention on two newlyrealized numismatic ambitions of Dr. Steven Moulding. The projects have been combinedtogether like this since, as the names suggest, they are practically siblings. For this article, Stevewas asked what inspired him to create these extremely handy digital tools, and that was all ittook to open the floodgates of his enthusiasm! As such, this writer is going to sit back now,perhaps open an old auction catalog with ancient coins of religious and mythologicalsignificance that he will never be able to afford, and let Steve do the talking!

So, as one can see, the variety and quality of online research tools for ancient coins (in additionto those that had been detailed earlier) are quite vast and are constantly changing. However,Fukube from the *Hyouka novel/anime mystery series (with his memory) will be thefirst to tell you that databases are only as good as the person using them to solve problems. Forhim, his Holmesian friend Oreki is a constant, if not painful, reminder of this, which raises theneed for yet another article project, this one on the tricks of using databases effectively andflexing our deductive muscles!

*Note: Episode 19 of Hyouka contains one of the most amazing displays of deductive reasoningthat this writer has ever seen in any form of media-and it concerns...well, just watch it(preferably subbed rather than dubbed to get the true flavor)!

To read the earlier E-Sylum articles, see:
ROMAN PROVINCIAL COINAGE ONLINE AT ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM(https://www.coinbooks.org/esylum_v09n47a14.html)
ROMAN PROVINCIAL COINAGE VII.2 NOW ONLINE(https://www.coinbooks.org/v23/esylum_v23n27a09.html)
ONLINE RESOURCES FOR ANCIENT COINS(https://www.coinbooks.org/v24/esylum_v24n48a09.html)