Coin Talk

We were up a 60:30 to this morning to get to the "senior hour" at the food store at 7 am. Friday is steak night for us, and two pounds of tenderloin cost over $30, no, it was not prime beef. A meat packer today said that his business is "the new toilet paper."

Time for another piece from the archives, this one from 2011.


Although the Barber dimes, quarters and half dollars have many fans in the collector community, there are more than few numismatists who find these coins to be dull, bland and uninspiring. Back in 1892 when the U.S. mint introduced the Barber coins many people at the time were less than impressed with their appearance. Almost immediately there were moves afoot to replace them, but since that required an act of Congress, the designs stayed in place.

According to laws that are still in place, the Secretary of the Treasury can approve of a new design for a coin after the current design has been in place for 25 years. Therefore in 1915 Treasury...

William I (c. 1028 – 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman King of England, who ruled England from 1066 until his death in 1087. He was Duke of Normandy and a descendant of the Viking Rollo (who was portrayed as the brother of the legendary Ragnar Lodbrok in the TV series 'The Vikings', although I'm not sure if this is historically accurate).

William was the illegitimate son of the unmarried Robert I, Duke of Normandy and his mistress. His illegitimate status and youth caused some difficulties after he succeeded his father. However, his marriage in the to Matilda of Flanders provided him with a powerful ally.

William I launched the Norman Conquest of England as a contender for the throne of England, upon the death of his first cousin once removed, Edward the Confessor, who died without any issue.

William decisively defeated and...

Justinian I (the Great) had an ambition to restore the Roman Empire to her former greatness. In order to do this he had to first pacify Khusru I, of Persia, with large sums of tribute to stabilize the Eastern front. Next he began a campaign to reconquer the Western Roman Empire. With Belisarius, Narses, and other generals this herculean feat was accomplished, although only short lived. By AD 538 the Mediterranean basin could be called Roman again, and the Eastern empire was enjoying a period of peace and stability. Fighting the Gothic barbarians in Italy endured much longer. The recovery of Italy cost the empire 300,000 pounds of gold. In 538 Justinian could boast 5 years of major achievements, including military victories in the West, administration reorganization throughout the empire, the codification of civilian law, and the rebuilding of Hagia Sophia. So what triggered the Monetary Reform of AD 538 ?
Conquering Carthage from the Vandals brought with it an enormous amount of...

I've taken a week off this week for two reasons,one being asked to by my company in order to keep our sales force working and no one being layed off do to Corvid-19. I have been in those shoes before myself.....and realize we all need to help each other.
Now I have been working in stores, as my title is sort of like a mid fielder in lacrosse, actually you're a defence man who sometimes gets to play offence in a game. So yes I do sell but more so train and do store sets for grand openings etc....
Anyway....
Since I could relax this morning with a coup of coffee and work at my desk a at home.
I pulled out an old purchased an 1876 dime.
There are certain years in numismatics that I trully enjoy to collect.
1876 happens to be one.

The dime in question was a specimen I purchased years ago . Now I know I looked at It at the time of purchase.
However more so for a date set I was working on.
So this morning I pulled out a set of 1876 dimes and mom's.
My eye catches something in the...

Verdigris is the name for that green stuff that gets on improperly stored copper coins.
There are several 'over the counter' remedies you can buy but the best thing is to understand the chemistry of verdigris and how to use chemistry to fix it.

You do NOT need any chemistry knowledge to make the solution and combat this nasty chemical reaction.

Before getting into the weeds on this subject let me qualify my diagnosis and the solution to this problem.
I am a chemist and understand the chemical processes that takes place over time which produces verdigris. I also understand the process to correct it's destructive properties.

I must tell you that this process can take up to several weeks to complete. That should not come as a surprise since it probably took many years for the reaction that produced this nasty green stuff.

First of all you DO NOT need to scrape, brush or otherwise clean the surface of your coins before doing this treatment. If you have nice coins of high value that...

Times like these make you think. Things are happening, the world is changing - hopefully to the better.

How have I spent my limited time on earth?

Did I bury myself in a geek world of Sear books and RIC volumes, shutting myself out and distancing myself from the great variety of impressions and experiences that life has to offer?

Did I spend my resources on something that gave me only an instant rush, a false sense of joy, or as Ebenezer Scrooge would call it "humbug"?

These questions are on my mind these days.

I have come to a conclusion: There is more to life than Roman Imperial Coins.

There are for example Byzantine coins! Here is Romanus IV Diogenes with Eudocia, Michael VII, Constantius and Androcius on a Histamenon Nomisma that was struck in Constantinople sometime between 1068-71:



Around the same time there were things going on up in the Anglo Saxon reign of Britain: The Danes and Norwegians were coming in longboats with shields and...

For my birthday I bought this nice coin. The first Muslims who ruled in Spain were the descendants of the Umayyads who escaped the slaughter of the Umayyad royalty at the hands of the first Abbasid Caliph. The Abbasid founder invited all of the Umayyads he could to a sumptuous feast at which assassins came out and killed them all. In as much as they were royalty they could not be stabbed but were rolled up in rugs and smothered by the assassins who sat on top of the rugs finishing what was said to be a fantastic meal. Those Umayyads who escaped went to North Africa and Spain. The Almohads were a more fundamentalist group of berbers (North African natives such as St. Augustine) who were more strict than the Umayyads. The coin has exactly the inscriptions you would expect to find on a coin by the Almohads and to me is an absolutely quintessential Muslim inscription. Even if you don't read Arabic, see if you can find "Allah." It is the last word of the first line on the obverse (left...

It's time for another long-winded post by TheRed.

With the death of Alexander III the Great in 323 BC, the contest to control the Macedonian Empire saw the rise of some fascinating men and women. While my favorite of the Diadochi is Seleukos I Nikator, one of the most colorful, charismatic, and ultimately tragic people of the period was Demetrius I Poliorketes.

His father was one of Alexander's generals and satraps, Antigonus I Monophthalmus. Demetrius served under his father as a general on both land and sea. Upon capturing Athens, Demetrius had himself declared a divine liberator and reputedly installed his harem in the Acropolis. One of the most famous incidents from his life was the siege he conducted against the city of Rhodes. For a year Demetrius tried to take the city, devising incredible siege engines. One such engine was a massive iron plated siege tower called Helepolis that stood 130 feet tall and mounted numerous catapults. Despite his ingenuity, the city of...

SILVER COMMEMORATIVE MEDAL: MARRIAGE OF PRINCESS MARY OF GREAT BRITAIN TO FRIEDRICH II OF HESSEN-KASSEL


Obv: The couple join hands over a flaming altar / FELICITAS POPULORUM - C.S.

Rev: Linked shields of arms, legend around / DIU EXOPATA CONIUNCTIO, and 8 lines of text below - EK

CHRISTIAN SCHIRMER and JOHAN ENGELHARD KRULL

Depicted on the obverse of this medal is Princess Mary of Great Britain, daughter of King George II of the House of Hanover and Friedrich II, Landgraf of Hessen-Kassel of the House of Hesse. The two are standing facing each other with joined hands over a burning alter. Around the top reads FELICITAS POPULORUM (The Happiness of the People.) Below are the initials C.S. which stand for Christian Schirmer who was warden at Königsberg Prussia and mint master from 1742-1743.

The reverse of the medal depicts the coat of arms of the two royal houses, Great Britain on the left and...

We have finally hit the last day of April, and it's pouring rain rain here in Florida. This has been the longest month of my life. I'm sure that I had known anything about what was going on, my first month of life as an infant would have seemed longer. There is something to the theory that time goes faster as you grow older, but this month ... Don't let the door hit it on the butt as it's leaving.

At any rate, here is another article from the archives.

At the beginning of the American Civil War, each of the southern states as they seceded from the Union seized the properties of the Federal Government that was within their borders. On February 28, 1861 the State of Louisiana took the New Orleans mint "into trust," and began to operate the facility under its authority. In April the Confederate Government took control of the mint from Louisiana and operated it until Confederate authorities decided to close the facility on April 30. During that time the Rebels produced...