Numismatic Museum of Athens

The Numismatic Museum of Athens tells the story of money from the first Lydian electrum coins to the euro changeover, holding roughly 600,000 specimens in one of the world's richest numismatic collections. Since 1998 it has occupied the Iliou Melathron, the neoclassical mansion built in 1881 by Ernst Ziller for Heinrich Schliemann on Panepistimiou Street. Schliemann had the rooms decorated in Pompeian fashion with wall paintings, mosaic floors and friezes echoing his Trojan finds, so the building itself functions as an exhibit. Permanent galleries are arranged thematically, moving from minting techniques through Greek city coinages and Roman aurei to Byzantine hyperpyra and modern drachmas, with a dedicated room on European monetary union. Most visitors pair the tour with a coffee in the quiet courtyard garden run by the museum cafe.