My new denarius of Caracalla and Geta

Yesterday, I bought these two denarius of Caracalla and Geta for 300 eur. What you think? Did not I may have overpaid.


Geta has weaker revers.

 

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The coins are exceptional. They are well-centered, with full legends. The Caracalla is well-struck, even on the reverse (look at the detail on Venus' face). They are examples you can be proud of.

 

Well done gogili1977, beautiful coins and especially the Caracalla in virtually mint condition.

 

Art dealer Joseph Duveen used to say "When you pay high for the priceless, you're getting it cheap". These don't seem cheap to me, but the quality is outsanding and hard to replicate. You'll never want to upgrade these or regret having them. My big regrets are buying mediocre coins that seemed 'bargains' at the time, rather than paying full prices for great coins.

 

Nice coins and the price for such coins seems about right.

 

Lovely coins! As others have said, I think the price is about right

 

great coins, and nice buy

time should learn iff i did it good

 

You get what you pay for unless you have 40 hours a week to shop.

 

Very pretty coins!

 

Wonderful examples and IMHO, well worth what you paid !!! Everyone seems to agree you did quite well----CONGRATS!!!

 

Nice coins. I think the coins with a young Geta are some of the best of the Roman Imperial series.

 

Very nice, congrats!!! Great eye appeal and detail!

 

A young caracalla

 

they are nice looking coins. if your are satisfied with the price, then there's no room for debate.

 

During collection of Roman coins, the dilemma is whether to buy one extremely fine quality denarius or more lower quality with different reverses.

 

One of our most esteemed posters here once posed a question. If you were to be given $1000 to buy coins, what would you?
A. Buy one $1000 coin
B. Buy 10 $100 coins
C. Buy 20 $50 coins
D. Buy 100 $10 coins

I suppose all this depends on how tight one wants to hold on to the money, how frugal one's nature is, or one's collecting stategy.

 

The point is that very slightly lesser grade coins would have cost half as much so you can decide whether you subscribe to the current obsession with having no coin less than perfect. Two hundred years ago, the obsession was having rare coins no one else had and collections of ten thousand coins were 'better' than smaller groups of what we now call better coins. It is your choice. They are nice coins and you could find places charging more for less. I doubt you will regret the purchase as long as you own the coins but I would not try to resell them tomorrow in hopes of a quick profit.

These two 'bargain' coins totaled about 1/3rd what you paid a few years ago so might serve to illustrate the 'half' option today. There is no right and wrong unless you are reselling. I hope you enjoy the coins many times as much as you would holding on to those 300 euros.

 

C'mon... really, Doug?

In what alternate universe is there evidence that current collectors of ancient coins are more obsessed with perfection than collectors from a decade ago, or a century ago?

For that matter, in what alternate universe are there ancient coins that are "perfect?" Has the universe of perfect ancient coins increased suddenly so that this obsession can be fed?

If you're given a free choice between an EF or a VF of the same type, you'd be certifiably loony to choose the VF (all other aspects being equal). So it stands to reason that if you can afford both an EF and a VF within your budget, you'll choose the EF over the VF.

Exactly what is your point here? Forgive the apparent belligerence of my post, but there is no context within which I can make sense of the above quote.

 

Those are 2 great coins. I don't think you over paid.

 

I understood the post to be about the basis between rare and fine. The difference in price between a rare and common coin versus a VF and EF coin might change over time. All things being equal finer quality and greater rarity will alway enhance value. But do collectors overall prefer to spend money on rarer coins average condition or finer examples of commoner coins? And has that relative preference changed over time? My perception is that the pernicious influence of slabbing has encouraged more valorisation of very fine coins, but I lack the expertise or experience to answer with any confidnece.