Coin Talk
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Prices in Seleucid Babylon
As collectors of ancient coins I feel that we sometimes forget that the little discs of metal we collect were used in day to day financial transactions. Certainly when I look at a tetradrachm to buy on VCoins or at an auction, I don't stop and think "How many liters of dates or pounds of bronze could my coin buy in 261 BCE?"
As general rule of thumb in the ancient world, and indeed until the time of industrialized farming, most of a person's salary would have been spent on food. While manufactured goods would have been very expensive due to the fact that they all had to be made by hand. In addition prices generally fluctuated from region to region and depended on the quality of local harvests.
Luckily we have a decent picture of what prices were in the Roman Republic/Empire due to the large amount of surviving source material. Unfortunately the early to mid Hellenistic age is not as lucky, as very few documents survive intact from the period. One of the few surviving... -
Doppelter Hochzeitstaler – Double Wedding Thaler
Gaedechens 1600; KM 147 (3 Thaler)
Struck ca. 1650
Obverse: A elegantly dressed bride and groom shake hands; hovering above it in a glory is the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove and the name Jehovah. Transcription; QUOS DEUS CONIUNXIT HOMO NON SEPARET. Man should not divide what God put together.
Reverse: The wedding to Cana, in a smaller format, just like on No. 3, only with the difference that the groom wears a feather hat here. Transcription: JESUS CHRIST. MAKE WATER WINE IN CANA. GAL. 10. 11. The Munzmeister mark with the two cross-shaped zain hooks.
Diameter: 60mm
Weight: 57.42 g
12h
Here is another one of those items that I didn’t know I wanted until I saw one. For multiple Thalers, you could almost call this common. Of course, none of these are.
The Marriage at Cana:
The transformation of water into wine at the Marriage at Cana or Wedding at Cana is the first miracle attributed to Jesus in the Gospel of John. In... -
Standing Liberty Quarters
The Standing Liberty Quarter was first produced in 1916 and the last year of issue was 1930. This design was by Herman A. MacNeil. It was produced at three Mints, Philadelphia, Denver and San Francisco.
There are two varieties, the first has no stars below the eagle on the reverse and the second variety has stars below the eagle. Variety 1, is no stars below the eagle and they were all produced in 1916 and 1917. In 1916 just the Philadelphia Mint was used but in 1917 all three mints made them.
The original designed exposed Lady Liberty's breast. The public did not like having her breast exposed so in 1917 the coin was re-designed to cover her breast. The redesign became known as Variety 2, which the public excepted.
On both designs the left arm of Liberty is upraised, uncovering a shield for protection. Liberty's right hand holds an olive branch for peace. The designers initial, an M appears to the right of the date.
On Variety 2 the stars were redesigned and the eagle is... -
An Introduction to the U.S. Large Cent, Part 1
United States large cents have been prime collectors’ items for more than 150 years. Ironically the coins were not popular when they were issued for general circulation. Many people found them to be too heavy and cumbersome, but when the mint announced that they would be replaced by the smaller copper-nickel cents in 1857, collector interest bloomed. Since then large cents have been called “the bellwethers of the numismatics,” which has encouraged many collectors and numismatists to write a number of significant books and countless articles about the “big pennies.”
The authorization for the large cent was part of the Coinage Act of 1792 which many collectors call “Act One.” In that legislation the large cent was defined as a pure copper coin that weighed 11 pennyweights that was worth 1/100 of a dollar. Preparations for opening the first mint, which was to be located in the national capital, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, began in the late summer of 1792. In the fall the mint... -
Constans braves winter seas and quells an uprising in Britain A.D. 342- 343
to complement the recent post of jamesicus on Romans who campaigned in Britain, some info about what might otherwise seem to be a series of common and uninteresting coinage.
There is a fairly common coin from the FEL TEMP series with a galley reverse. RIC VIII mentions that this type might allude to a visit that Constans made to Britain. RIC gives the Konrad Kraft article "Die Taten der Kaiser Constans und Constantius II" as a reference. Though RIC usually gives the date of issue as A.D. 348- 350, Kraft argues for an earlier issue probably around 344; which would be closer to the expedition.
The reason that this issue seems to allude to a visit to Britain is because there are several ancient sources that reference this trip to Britain. The real significance though, according to the sources, was that it was made in the winter...a very dangerous time to make this crossing. Libanius has more about the weather which I did not include (I got tired of... -
Caecilius Servilianus and his many name legends
Dear Friends of Nikopolis ad Istrum!
Today I have won on Ebay a coin from Nikopolis with a new legend of Caecilius Servilianus. This is the occasion for this article
Nikopolis ad Istrum is special for several reasons. Firstly, it is the provincial mint in the Roman Empire with the most issued types. Why this is so is still unanswered today. In our monograph Hristova/Hoeft/Jekov, The Coinage of Nicopolis ad Istrum, 2020, there are already 2676 different types, but this list will certainly have to be extended further.
And then in Nikopolis was the governor Caecilius Servilianus, for whom I have found up to now (2020) 42(!) different name legends. Such a large number of name legends do not exist anywhere else in the Roman Empire. Unfortunately I cannot give a reason for this. The longest name form found so far is KAIKIΛEI CEPBIΛEIANOV, the shortest KAI CEPBIΛ and KAIK CEPBI! Here is the coin with the longest name legend::
The Coin::
Commodus, AD 177-192
AE 29, 11.97g,... -
I, Claudius, bringing a project to completion and an identification to confusion, then; dies.
This is a rather long-winded article about buying a new coin. Hopefully it will be worth both writing and reading it. It is about:
I, as in me, a coin collecting nuffsaid from Norway.
Claudius, Emperor of Rome 41-54 AD.
A collection of silver coins from the first 12 Caesars, which this coin from Claudius completes.
Confusion over identifying the correct place where this coin was minted, and an examination of dies.
This is the coin in question:
The very reputable auction house described it as follows:
Denarius 44, AR 19 mm, 3.74 g. [TI] CLAVD CAESAR AVG P M TR P [IIII] Laureate head r. Rev. PACI – [AVGVST]AE Pax-Nemesis, winged, advancing r., holding with l. hand winged caduceus pointing down at snake and holding out fold of drapery below chin with r. C 56. BMC 27. RIC 28. CBN 42.
Old cabinet tone, a small scratch on obverse field, otherwise very fine
Ex Künker 35, 1997, 296 and Hirsch Nachf. 197, 1997,... -
Mithrdates, He Died Old
If one were to ask the average person to name a dangerous enemy of Rome, the most dangerous enemy Rome ever had, the answer might be in the form of a people or a nation, the Gauls, the Carthaginians, the Parthians or most likely, the Germanic barbarians. Perhaps the name of an individual might be offered, Brennus, Pyrrhus, certainly Hannibal, Arminius, any of several Sappors of Persia, maybe Attila. I would offer this person though, a king difficult to describe or fathom, but one who in his day must have been terrifying to Romans who found themselves in his clutches, namely Mithradates (sometimes spelled with an "I" as Mithridates) Eupator or Mithradates VI, King of Pontus, and for while a lot more than that.
Mithradates Vi was born ca, 132 BC, the son of a Pontic monarch who had any number of children not born of his wife. As such, the young Mithradates had plenty of competition for the throne which meant a good deal of avoiding his murderous relatives (including his mother)... -
Coins of Occupation
The past year or so I've had a special interest in coinage surrounding the Punic wars. And with war comes coins that were struck while a foreign power conquered and occupied their enemies' cities and lands. I thought it would be interesting (I've been wanting to do this thread since early April) to walk through some of the coin examples I have when an invading force (in my case, Punic or Roman) overtakes a city and sets up a mint and begins striking and circulating coins.
In 237 BC, in the wake of the 1st Punic War, Hamilcar Barca sought to expand his family's fortune and expand control in the name of Carthage by traveling with his army to the Iberian peninsula, set up base in Gades, and began overtaking Iberian tribes working northward. Hamilcar's son, Hannibal, at just 9 or 10 years old begged to join his father on this campaign. Story has it that before allowing young Hannibal to join him, Hamilcar held his son over a sacrificial chamber with fire burning beneath... -
Renewal of restrictions on coins from Italy - CPAC Meeting
Back in 2010, Italy the State Department to restrict importation of ancient coins from Italy. It's time to renew the agreement with Italy. It's time to make your opinions heard. The last agreement didn't cover Roman Republican and Imperial coins. What Italy wants this time is secret.
The Cultural Property Advisory Committee meets in July. You have a chance to submit comments to the Committee via regulations.gov. The deadline for comments is July 8.
Further information about the July 22, 2020 Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC) meeting and how to comment before the July 8, 2020 deadline can be found here: https://www.federalregister.gov/doc...property-advisory-committee-notice-of-meeting The Federal Register notice also has a green "submit a formal comment button" which should allow you to comment directly.
The cumulative impact of import restrictions has been very problematical for collectors since outside of some...
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