#Exhibit of the Month

The hoard was found in 1957 during the agricultural works near the village. At first, the hoard was in the collection of the National Museum of Ethnography and Natural History and later was transferred to the National Museum of History (Accession: FB: 12 576 - 12650; N: 12 658 - 12 732). It consists of 75 silver coins from the thaler category issued by the Kingdom of Poland, the United Provinces and the Holy Roman Empire in 1612-1648.

THE KINGDOM OF POLAND
Sigismund II Vasa (1586-1632)
Crown, thaler: 1628 (1).
Gdańsk, orts: 1612 (1), 1613 (1*), 1614 (1), 1615 (7), 1616 (8), 1617 (16), 1618 (4), 1619 (2), 161 (1), 1620 (2), 1621 (8).

THE UNITED PROVINCES OF THE NETHERLANDS
Lion thalers (leeuwendaalder)
Gelderland: 1641 (1), 1647 (2), 1649 (1).
West Frisia: 1648 (1).
Utrecht: 1643 (1), 1646 (1), 1647 (2), 1648 (1).

THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE
Kampen: halve leeuwendaalder 1646 (1), 1647 (1); leeuwendaalder 1647 (3), 1649 (1).
Zwolle: leeuwendaalder 1633 (1), 1637 (3), 1644 (1), 1646 (2), 1648 (1).

This hoard by its composition confirms the presence of silver coins from the thaler category in the Principality of Moldavia monetary circulation.

Thalers were first minted in 1486 in Sankt-Joachimsthal, today the Czech Republic, "thaler" being an abbreviation of "Joachimsthaler", meaning coin issued in Sankt-Joachimsthal. In the 16th and 17th centuries, thalers were issued in very large quantities, especially by state entities that were part of the Holy Roman Empire and the Habsburg Empire. Thus, thalers can be considered a quintessentially popular coin; there are thalers of several types, such as Austrian thalers, Polish thalers, Russian thalers, Turkish thalers, Venetian thalers, also called scuzi, "reichsthalers", also called imperials, löwenthalers or lion thalers, and Spanish thalers, also called piastre. In the Romanian principalities, thalers spread widely towards the end of the 16th century, and in the following centuries their circulation became very abundant, the thaler being in circulation until the second half of the 19th century. This money was a huge success, so it is also called: daalder / daler in the Netherlands, talar in Poland, dahlar in Scandinavia, tallaro / tallero in Italy, talari in Ethiopia, dollar in America. A special category is the Dutch thaler, leeuwendaalder, löwenthaler, which means "lion thaler", also called "lion" due to the coat of arms on the reverse, which is a shield with a crown, with a lion inside; it is a silver coin minted in Netherlands, where in 1575 it was decided to mint a new coin based on the scuzi. In the Romanian principalities the lion thaler appears in the last quarter of the 16th century. These lion thaler gave the name to the currency of Romania, the Republic of Moldova (leu), and Bulgaria (leva).

Orts are also silver coins from the thaler category, equal to 1/4 thaler. A quarter thaler was originally called "ortstaler", a name that was later reduced to the form "ort" (in Old German "ort" means "a quarter"). The coin circulated in Europe in the Middle Ages, including the Romanian principalities, being met in the 18th century as Polish, Turkish and German orts. The term "ort" is preserved in the Romanian expression "to give an ort to a priest" (which means "to die"), which dates back to the ancient pagan custom of placing a coin on the little finger of the deceased's right hand so that he could pay for the passage to the afterlife; With the same coin, the priest was paid for the funeral service: the family of the deceased "gave an ort to the priest" to observe church traditions.

National Museum of History of Moldova

Exhibitions

„A look from the sky: Teodor Macari - a jeweler of Romanian painting”

In memory of Teodor Macari. 60 years since the artist's birth

March 13 - 22, 2020

A long reflection on the immensity of heavens, the beauty of the landscapes and the melancholy of flowers. An experiment on the skies without boundaries in all colors and in all splendor. Color, space, light and darkness. These are just some of the symbols that you will find reflected in the works of the watercolorist painter Teodor Macari.

Born on March 13, 1960 in the village of Mîndreşti, Telenesti district, Republic of Moldova, Teodor Macari started his studies at the "Igor Vieru" high school of art in Chişinău and then attended the Institute of Fine Arts in Tallinn, Estonia. He was a doctoral student at Babeș-Bolyai University in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, and from 1989 he began his career as a professor of painting and composition at the Faculty of Fine Arts and Design at "Ion Creangă" Pedagogical State University in Chişinău. In 2005 he became a member of the Union of Plastic Artists, Chișinău and member of the Union of Plastic Artists from Romania.

He has made personal and group exhibitions, participated in creative camps in Tallinn, Campina, Bucharest, Ploieşti, Buşteni as well as at the "Brâncuşi" Exhibition Center in Chişinău. His works are part of the collections of the Art Museum in Ploieşti, Romania, the National Museum of Arts of Moldova, but also in private collections in the Republic of Moldova, Romania, Germany, USA, Macedonia, Lithuania, Poland, France, Switzerland, Australia and other countries.

In his works, 19 of which are displayed in the exhibition, the watercolorist paid close attention to the sky. The artist said that he felt closer to the sky by painting it. "This is how I build my way to heaven. My heavens are not real; they are those of my imagination".

On 4.11.2018, Teodor Macari's heart went beating in the heavens he loved so much and knew how to paint them so beautifully in our hearts.

Curator of the exhibition: Liuba Prîngache, painter, MNIM.