Ancient Coin brethren: rejoice with me, for the Day of Liberation draweth nigh...

Indeed, that "second pair of eyes" (and expert eyes at that, to give David Vagi & Co. their due), is one of the tally marks on the "plus" column for slabs.

For me, the pluses and minuses pretty much balanced out for years, and I slabbed my ancients mostly for consistency with the rest of my collection, which is all slabbed or eventually destined to be.

I did always lament not being able to touch and hold my ancient coins directly, but I'm accustomed enough to slabs with my other stuff, and really I view my collection online most of the time, since the coins themselves stay in my safe deposit box.

Only in recent months did my dissatisfaction with NGC slabs grow, and when the numbers of slabbed ancients I owned dwindled down to five, it just made more sense to liberate those five instead of submitting the other five.

Which isn't to say I have (many) grudges against NGC. They're a fine service, but I hate their capsules with the intrusive white prongs (almost everyone knows my pet peeve about that. *grumble * mumble * mutter*) Then I had an issue with them last summer, and also this weird slab bloat problem struck, and that was the final straw. But I still trust their opinion and hope they improve their plastic. Not that I'll be submitting any more ancients.

I certainly hope to have more than ten ancients in my collection in the near future!

PS- thanks as always for the eyecandy post. Your coins are a symphony for the sight.

 

Where's @TIF? I want my confetti and balloons, dangit!

 

PS- when I cracked that L. Furius Brocchus RR denarius yesterday, and held it in hand in the sunlight for the first time since I don't know when, I was awed by the beautiful toning on it, which does not show to full advantage in the photos.

 

Just say no to hammers. Hammers bad. Shoes good.

 

Wow. Just ... wow.