Coming up in an auction in Feb, this coin of Julius Nepos Much as i'd like a tremissis of this guy, something strikes me as not quite right. The elongated neck? The lettering on the obverse - too neat for 475AD perhaps? Or maybe it's all good and I'm imagining things. What do you think?
It's in the Gerhard Hirsh auction coming up. I'm a little wary though - something not quite right about the style. But if CT finds nothing wrong with it, that's good enough for me to bid.
Well, your coin seems to be this type: *not my coin Julius Nepos. 474-475 AD. AV Tremissis, 1.39 g. Milan mint. Pearl-diademed, draped & cuirassed bust right Cross in wreath; mintmark COMOB. Obviously yours is a nicer example...less crude. I don't know enough to know if that's something to worry about or not. Here is a second example to compare to your coin: Notice the wreath is way off in these two authentic examples compared to yours. I don't know why, but yours looks weird there. The long neck not so much because the first one also has a long neck, but that wreath...
I have Lecam's book on late Roman gold "La fin de l'Empire Romaine et le Monnayage or en Italie" and it has 31 examples of this denomination for Julius Nepos. None look much like that one. You were right to note the long neck, which none of his examples have. The coin is of quite small diameter and the genuine examples have lettering much thicker and less delicate. I wonder if Hirsch thought to look in Lecam? In my opinion it is a modern fake.
Thanks Valentinian and Sallent. And I concur with Valentinian. The coin offered just isn't the right style to be a genuine Nepos. The examples Sallent provided are more what I'd expect. "If there's doubt, there's no doubt."
