Nuper enim jacturam, an lucrum in Thesauro meo Numario expertus sim plane nescio. Parisijs enim discedens Petrus Fittonus omnium, ni fallor, mortalium veteris monetae Romanae verae, a novitijs et adulterinis, secernendae callentissimus, Londinum appulsus me invisit, et aliquot nostrorum numorum centena lustravit, sententiijsque concordibus viginti circiter aurea, et pauca aenea, tabulis nostris expulsimus.
Aurei mihi antea uno aut altero excepto, ita erant suspecti ut illis locum dumtaxat eousque permiserim, quousqe ipsius vel Gulielmi Moravij Scoti eadem peritia Fittono vix inferioris calculum explorassem. Inter aureos pergrandis ille cum SEX PIET in aversa parte, quem te olim ad Sextum Pompeium pertinere monuimus, exsulabat; maximum autem inter aureos etsi numero paucos passus sum dispondium; vero enim Claudio Messalinae caput in postica parte cum lemmate VALERIA MESSALINA AVG a nupero plano superintenditur. Julij Caesaris aeneus pergrandis ex ipsius in adverso fili a genuinis discrepantia mihi prius erat conclamatus, etsi quantivis fuisset pretij indubius, cum BRITANNIA S C inversus exhibebat Numus. In unico autem Pompeij Magni aeneo, caput cum lemmate CN POMPEIVS MAGNVS noviter adumbratum in vetustissimo alicuijus olim Imperatoris numismate certo affirmabat, quae fraus omnium nequissima nec ab ullis nisi in re nummaria vexsatissimum deprehendi possit.
Imo unicum nostrum Othonis aeneum cum Italiae globo insidentis in reversa parte typo, ita pertinaciter ceu adulterinum improbaverit, ut etsi mihi non omnino persuaserit eundem penitus rejicere, loco tamen suo pulsus, nisi Gulielmi Moravij a Fittone discrepet sententia, restituendus non sit. Ipse autem cui unica chara est veritas, mallem nulla quam larvata me penes esse vetustatis monumenta.'
(BL MS Harley 377, ff. 191r-192r; Burnett 2020b, pp. 542, 1191)
[Recently I don’t really know if I have suffered a loss or a gain in my Coin Treasury. Peter Fitton came from Paris, he of all men who is, unless I am mistaken, the most skilled in telling apart genuine Roman coinage from ones that have been made recently and are fake. He came to London and visited me, and went through some hundreds of my coins, and by common agreement we removed some 20 gold and a few bronze from my trays.
With one or two exceptions the gold ones had been so suspected previously by me that I had allowed them a place there meanwhile, only until I would have been able to seek his judgment or that of the Scot William Murray who is hardly less skilled than Fitton. Among the very large gold coins he banished the one with SEX PIET on the reverse which I had once suggested to you was related to Sextus Pompey; I suffered the greatest despair among my gold coins even though they were few in number; and on a real Claudius the head of Messalina on the reverse with the inscription VALERIA MESSALINA AVG could be seen to be on a recent surface. The very large bronze coin of Julius Caesar had been previously decried by me from the difference of its wreath on the obverse from genuine coins, although it had been held to be undoubted and of enormous value since, when turned over, the coin depicted BRITANNIA S C. On the unique bronze coin of Pompey he said that the head with the inscription CN POMPEIVS MAGNVS had been recently drawn out on a genuine and very ancient coin of some other early Emperor, which crime was the worst of all and could be regarded by everyone as the most aggravating in numismatics.
Further he rejected my unique bronze Otho with the type of Italia sitting on a globe on its reverse so definitely as a fake that, although he did not completely persuade me to reject it altogether, it was nevertheless removed from its place, and, unless William Murray dissented from the opinion of Fitton, would not be restored. I myself, for whom truth is the only true pleasure, would prefer that no testaments at all of antiquity are in my collection than phantom ones.' (translation from Burnett 2020b, p. 542)]
