Hello all, I am just starting to dive into the world of Ancients, and absolutely love the history behind them. I recently purchased a few Ancients, and was wondering if you could give me any information on them. Any knowledge, history, or opinions on the coin would be awesome. I did not pay a lot of money for these coins, and do not plan on selling them. The first one is a Judean Coin? It is supposedly from a Jewish Revolt, and is suppose to be very old. I love the look on the obverse, and I paid about 40 dollars for it. (Actually the 2nd coin) The second I have no idea about, but it looks really old, and I love the eye appeal. It just screams ancient to me. I really like the lamp on the reverse. (Coin on the bottom) The final coin, I haven’t actually bought yet, but was really thinking about taking the dive. I really enjoy the way it looks, and at 27 CM, it appears to be a larger “Roman Coin.” (Top Coin) Thank You All, ~ Jason
Well in order of photos listed, the second coin is the Judean one. I do believe it was from the second revolt. Its actually a vase on the front/leaf on the reverse. If authentic $40 is not a bad price. Where did you buy it from? Ancient Jewish coins may be the most faked of all of them, so you always have to be careful. Your first coin is of Diocletian, nice coin except for the marks on the face/neck. The third one I would not buy if that is the one you haven't bought yet. Its a common coin/emperor and you can buy nearly perfect examples for not very much. Hope that didn't sound negative, but ancients can be found in high grade, so throw out the whole "its in good shape considering its very old" notion. We actually grade stricter than US collectors, and there are exceptional quality coins being sold every day in the ancient field. If you are new I would suggest asking questions, and looking around more before you spend any serious money. Welcome to the field Jason. Please know we are always here to help. Chris
Thanks for the response Chris. I bought all 3 of these on ebay. The one on the bottom was about 6 dollars, and the others were 40 and 32. Love the coins, but I'll do my research in the future before impulse buying.
Like I said, the only one I would be concerned about would be the Judean, but it looks fine to me from the photo. The Diocletian would be an exceptional coin but the marks, but still attractive. I do not think you did horribly. I would look around and see what area you are most interested in. Ancients are an abnormally large field, so concentrating on one area starting out really helps. If you do decide in a narrower range, I can help you with book recommendations that will really help you both gain better knowledge of the coins, as well as gain more appreciation of your purchases. Chris
Well I can give you a little more context on the Diocletian coin here. In case you don't already know, the third century AD was a rough time for the Roman Empire. There were plagues, barbarian incursions, political instability, parts of the empire breaking away, and most importantly for coin collectors, massive inflation and debasement. Things started recovering a little towards the end of the third century, particularly under Aurelian, who reconquered lost territory and slightly increased the size and silver content of the antoninianus in an effort to restore the currency. The biggest reformer was the man on the coin in the top picture, Diocletian. He set up a political system called the tetrarchy, where the empire was ruled by two Augusti (Diocletian and Maximianus), who each had a Caesar (Galerius and Constantius I) under them, and when the Augusti would die or retire, the Caesars would become Augusti themselves, and they'd appoint new Caesars. Each of these four ran a portion of the empire, with Diocletian basically having authority over the other three emperors, even though Maximianus should theoretically have been equal. This system worked fairly well while Diocletian was in power, but it fell apart soon afterwards, and the short version is that Constantine eventually took over the entire empire. In any case, among other reforms, Diocletian completely reworked the coinage system. What you have there is the largest coin he introduced, called either a follis or nummus (we're unsure of the official original name, though it seems to have sometimes been referred to as the latter, though that word just means "coin"). It was composed of around 1 part silver to 20 parts base metal, and originally it had a thin coating of silver on the surface, though that doesn't survive on the majority of these coins. The value of this coin actually changed over time as an attempt to combat the inflation that this coinage reform was unable to stop. We can confirm that at the end of the tetrarchic period, these were worth 25 denarii. The document that tells us this was actually an edict doubling the value, so this means that it probably had the rather odd value of 12.5 denari at one point(though I've seen arguments that it was 12 and that he "doubling" was a bit rough). A lot of sources also think that it had an even lower value at the beginning, with Kenneth W. Harl putting it at 5 denarii, though we can't confirm that on the level as the other prices. If you want a rather rough idea of what this coin could buy, check out The Edict on Maximum Prices: http://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=Edict of Diocletian Edict on Prices. Basically, during the period when this coin was worth 25 denarii, Diocletan imposed price ceilings to try to fight inflation, though it was rather unsuccessful. This is the closest thing we have to market prices for most of these things, as flawed as it is. Regarding the imagery, one interesting thing about tetrarchic coinage is that the bust represents the idea of "emperor" rather than any emperor's actual face. This means that all four emperors are depicted identically. Regarding the mint, normally there's a mint mark in the reverse exergue during this period, but this is one of the few types that doesn't (you can see the reverse in the original auction), but the field marks indicate that it was minted in Siscia.
You are living in good times. There are more and more good sites on the net that deal with Ancient coins. People like Ancient Doug have been generous with their insights on the Internet for more than a decade. Here are some of those sites dealing with biblical coins collected at the non-numismatic site UNRV: http://www.unrv.com/forum/topic/10580-judaean-biblical-coins/ g.
What a work of art, and a piece of history. This is so amazing when I actually take a minute and soak it all in. The historical value is priceless. Thank you for your wonderful insight. ~Jason
