In the sixteenth century coins were considered part of any well furnished library. Andrew Perne, Vice-Chancellor and Master of Peterhouse, bequeathed part of his coin collection to the University in 1589, along with his manuscripts. Later bequests included those of Owen Mayfield, Mayor of Cambridge (1686) and Roger Gale (1743).

Some attempts were made to care for the coins—a cabinet was commissioned in 1659–60 and Mayfield had instructed his executors to buy a silver box to house his collection (shown here). When Ralph Thoresby visited in 1695, however, he saw ‘an imperfect collection of Greek and Roman coins … all hand-over-head’. Mayfield’s silver box is still in the Library today, although his coins and others in the Library were transferred to the Fitzwilliam Museum in 1856 and are now known as the ‘old University coin collection’.