Note 13 — GUIDE TO ENGLISH MEDALS EXHIBITED.

The head of the Roettier family "the family of Medallists" was one John Roettier a native of Antwerp and a goldsmith by profession, who had three sons, John, Joseph, and Philip. During the residence of Charles II. in Holland, John the eldest brother was presented to him as an eminent medallist, and upon his coming to England soon after the Restoration he was appointed one of the engravers to the Mint having Thomas Simon as his colleague, who retired from his post in 1664. John Roettier then became one of the Chief Engravers to the Mint, and with him was associated his brother Joseph, and somewhat later his younger brother Philip, as in 1669 we find that by letters patent July 3rd, 1669, John, Joseph, and Philip Roettier were appointed His Majesty's Engravers at the Mint with a yearly allowance of £450 during their natural lives. In 1672, through the death of Varin, Joseph Roettier by Colbert's influence, obtained the appointment of Chief Engraver at the Mint at Paris, and in 1678 Philip Roettier quitted England and went to reside in Flanders, the coinage of that country during that period showing many traces of his work, which is inferior in style to that of his elder brothers. In 1690 upon the death of G. Bower, James, the eldest son of John Roettier, was associated with his father at the Mint; but in 1694 having played tricks with a portrait of William III., which he was executing for a new copper coinage, he was dismissed, and going to France found employment at the Paris Mint. Norbert his brother, who does not appear to have been regularly employed at the London Mint, having abstracted some of the dies for fraudulent purposes, fled in the following year also to France, and like his brother obtained an appointment at the Paris Mint. He also executed a large number of medals for the Stuart family (v. Stuart Medals, p. 60). The inquiry which followed this scandal resulted in the dismissal of John Roettier, who died in 1703, and was buried in the Tower.