Taking into account the cost of inflation, it was probably this one, purchased some decades ago. It actually looks quite a bit better in hand:
My most expensive Roman to date: My most expensive Roman when I completed the Twelve Caesars (not all in silver- hats off to those of you who accomplish that): My most expensive Roman still in my present possession: My most expensive coin ever- and the only one for which I ever paid a four-figure price: That US coin with the expensive little Dahlonega, Georgia mintmark cost nearly 4x what the Hadrian sestertius did. While it was an appealing coin and historically interesting in its own right, it wasnt half as interesting to me as the ancients. Sold it last year to buy something more important.
This guy is my priciest, but there are a few that are pretty close: Even now when I take him out I’m surprised I own him.
WOW. Contrast and compare with the one from my old 12C set... (Which I was happy to squeak by with, just barely under my $500 budgetary ceiling)
Awesome Caligula AR coin @Marsman ! My top coin in cash paid was this Caligula As.. Germanicus. Æ Dupondius Struck under Gaius (Caligula), AD 37-41. O: GERMANICVS/CAESAR in two lines above, Germanicus standing right in chariot, R: SIGNIS RECEPT/DEVICTIS GERM/S C in three lines across field, Germanicus, bareheaded, wearing cuirass and short tunic, holding aquila in left hand. RIC I 57 (Gaius); BMCRE 93-100 (Caligula); BN 140-51 (Caligula). Rome mint. 28 mm. 12.2gm.
A: The request is for Roman coins alone. So that's whatcha get. 2: Having a low class,=asking how much something you cannot have costs, stranger calling me a rank Hypocrite, Scares me enough that I feel I must divulge the exact price of all these coins (that's right. I can't post just 1 as I'm such a rank hypocrite I don't even keep perfect records of all amounts paid for purchases). First off, the man who could've, and tried to, usher in reforms that would have avoided much of the damage done by Commodus: Pertinax Denarius. IMP CAES P HELV PERTIN AVG, laureate head right / VOT DECEN TR P COS II, emperor sacrificing left, with patera held over tripod altar. RSC 56RIC 13a, RSC 56, BMC 24 Price: the same amount as certain people who add no value to threads Edited: Not necessary Next up the wife off the man who paid to follow Pertinax and come to a similar fate. Famous for marrying a guy so rich that he bought the purple Edited: Not necessary MANLIA SCANTILLAwife of DidiusJulianus. Augusta, 193 AD. Æ Sestertius (24.70 gm). Draped bust right / Juno standing left, holding patera and sceptre; to left, peacock standing left, head right. RIC III 18a smallish squared flan,dark green patina, sl grainy, obvportrait is clear!Former FRC Edited: Not necessary And lastly,Edited: Not necessary OTHO Den, SECVRITAS PR, Securitas stg l; F/AVG, part of obvlgndwk/off,scant rev lgnd, good metal with just smooth wear, lt tone, minor scr on rev. Portrait quite bold & nice. Former FRC Edited: Not necessary Please stop with your Fascination of Mothers and daughters, as that was not the intent of the thread. Thank you, Jim
Nice Princess Bride meme. Inigo Montoya and Mr. Miyagi. My favorite movie characters of all time. But I digress. Greatly. Resume topic
Perhaps you'd accept a qualifier for relative price. For example, the most expensive banknote I own cost me around $53. This is not a lot. However, probably 90% of my collection cost me $10 or less so in this relative instance, the $50 note is expensive, in relation to the rest of the collection. If I regularly dropped thousands on banknotes or coins, then a $800 pickup might be chump change for me - but in terms of absolute price definitely pretty high I do fear this could become a contest between people trying to one-up with expensive coins. "Your coin cost $3K? Ha, well MINE cost $8K!"
Dang there are some awesome coins inhabiting this thread! My most expensive Roman coin (only ~75) was this nice Anonymous C. 214-212 BC semuncia with bold reverse which got lost in the mail (along with a nice Tetras from Kamarina). The high demand for Roman coins makes them a bit more expensive than I think they should be so Greeks get most of my love. Roman military artifacts are a different story though: Got a few shiny shekels tied up in these later Imperial Plumbatae (have 2 more now ) and javelin. According to the calculations of a delightfully autistic researcher on a different forum who's been cataloging Plumbatae in museums/archaeological publications and examples sold over the past 15+ years there are less than 300 documented. Surely many more are sitting in the accumulations of detectorists and collectors in the Balkans so my evil plan to acquire >10% of the global supply and plaster my wall with them will take some more time.
I accidentally posted this in the wrong thread: My two most expensive coins: CALIGULA AR Denarius OBVERSE: C CAESAR AVG GERM P M TR POT, bare head right REVERSE: DIVVS AVG PATER PATRIAE, radiate head of Divus Augustus right Struck at Lugdunum, 37/8AD 3.5g, 18mm RIC I 10 MARCUS ANTONIUS AR Denarius OBVERSE: ANT AVG III VIR R P C, Praetorian galley, thyrsos behind prow REVERSE: CHORTIVM PRAETORIARVM, aquila right between two signa Patrae 32-31 BC 3.58g, 18.mm Crawford 544/8; CRI 385; Sydenham 1213; RSC 7 ex. Roma Numismatics
Sorry I did not see this thread before it went ugly. Maybe we should stop discussing prices since there is no real help knowing what another coin brought on another day. My most expensive coin was sold for exactly what I paid for it so I could downgrade to a cheaper coin I liked better (it was an interesting technical coin in lower grade from wear). Who else would downgrade on purpose? I believe my most expensive coin was bought as part of a lot. When you buy ten coins for $100, it does not follow that you paid $10 for each coin. I recall three times in my collecting life that I bought groups to get just one or a few coins. I might be able to figure out how much I paid if I sold the rest and subtracted but in each case I kept several coins that I would not have purchased separately. Here is an opinion you can take or leave as you wish. After you buy a coin it makes no difference what you paid unless and until you sell it. I still have three coins that I bought over fifty years ago and know we have a few members that makes that small in comparison. I do sell off coins I no longer want (often upgrades or deciding I really did not need every flyspeck variation) but statistics like what you paid is for investors rather than collectors. It has been a while since I read Dante but did he include a special Circle in Hell for people like me who are required to watch the sale of our collections and see just how little of the money we spent on our hobby gets recouped by our heirs and, worse, what they do with it? You can't take it with you but you could always bury them in the back yard just to mess with the minds of archaeologists in another 2000 years.
Although most of my collection consists of US and modern world coins, the most I have ever paid for a coin was for this:
My most expensive coin by a fair distance. JULIUS CAESAR AR Denarius. 3.77g, 19mm. Rome mint, struck by L. Aemilius Buca, February - March 44 BC. Crawford 480/8; Sydenham 1061; RCV 1411. O: CAESAR DICT PERPETVO , wreathed head of Caesar facing right. R: L BVCA , Venus standing left, holding Victory and a sceptre. Ex David Sellwood Collection; ex Seaby Coin & Medal Bulletin (1 Oct 1977) Lot 793
Interesting how the moderator edited a post but didn’t bother taking care of the troll that’s clearly trying to disrupt the thread.
This moderator edited one word out of one post in this thread, which was mildly afoul of our language rules, since it was possible to remove that word without changing the gist of the author's post at all, or even breaking his sentence structure. As to the troll, there are plenty of reports, and the admins and/or more senior mods are aware (or will be, soon enough), but for reasons of my own I am deferring action on that to the more senior staff.
Thanks lordmarcovan. Sorry if I sounded rude; I just hate to see Marsman’s thread get disrupted by a couple of trolls while he only wanted to share his new coin with everyone.