Filips III van Croy, hertog van Aarschot, prins van Chimay 1567

Curator: So, here we have a coin—Filips III van Croy, hertog van Aarschot, prins van Chimay, dating back to 1567. It’s a metal piece, pretty small, really a tangible link to the past. Editor: My first thought? Humble. In spite of the fancy title, the raw metal with its slightly irregular shape really makes history feel less... polished. More like something you could find in your grandpa’s drawer. Curator: The "portrait" is interesting, right? Considering it’s stamped into metal rather than painted. It reminds us how value and image were intertwined back then. Power, status, quite literally impressed. Editor: Right, and it does look…impressed upon. Like an almost brutal declaration. But I wonder about the wear, and the hole in the middle? Was this just a form of currency, or something more? An amulet? A memento? Curator: A bit of both, I suspect. Money always carries a little extra weight, doesn’t it? Officially, this coin would’ve been used for trade, transactions. But for the individual holding it, it represented a fraction of the Duke’s power, a connection to their world. And damage…well, that's just history leaving its fingerprints, or in this case, thumbprints! Editor: You put it beautifully. Those imperfections make it real. To look at the incised heraldry, consider the economic impact in 1567, and then think about who clutched this coin...it transcends just metal and becomes a narrative. A tiny stage. Curator: Absolutely. It shrinks the distance. When we look closely at a humble coin and wonder what hands it passed through we aren't that separate from history at all. Editor: It becomes a dialogue.