Cellini e il Perseo: le monete come veicolo tra fama e memoria

In 1889, during maintenance work on Cellini's statue of Perseus, located in Piazza della Signoria in Florence (1554), several coins and account tokens from different mints and periods, ranging from the 16^th to the late 18^th century, were discovered in its marble base. This paper presents this find and the different numismatic specimens (coins and account tokens) related to the discovery, outlining their types and discussing the possible reasons and occasions of their presence in the statue’s base. These include foundation deposits and other forms of voluntary depositions, all connected to ‘non-economic motives’, which are discussed with reference to a wide range of sources and comparisons.