To clean or not to clean? Silver French 1851 5 Francs Cérès

Hi,

Not going to lie, I'm new to this hobby and I've been given so much contradictory advice from various sources I'm lost.

Apologies in advance, I'm sure you see this sort of question all the time.

One of my more recent acquisitions was this silver 5 Franc coin from 1851 (minted in Paris). It's not a terribly rare coin but not extremely common either. I got it for a good price in light of it's condition.

Actually, a lot of the detail is pretty good for a coin that's 170 years old. It is however tarnished and stained. Now, some people have been telling me to clean it using silver polish or vinegar but I've also been told for donkeys years never to clean coins.

Any opinions or suggestions one way or another would be most welcome.

Regards,

 

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It is perfectly fine as it is. You can attempt to use acetone to see if anything comes off but otherwise it's a waste of money and time. Using vinegar or silver polish is literally the same as bathing yourself in acid.

 

Don't clean it don't do anything to it I like its pinta for being 169 years old the way it looks makes it more authentic.

 

I like the patina; I'd highly advise against cleaning this coin.

 

Your coin is the 2nd common out of the three but still a nice coin in very good condition for its age

 

No, no, no, NO.

That coin is gorgeous as is. Leave it be!

 

I think the strongest reasons to clean a coin would be:
1) It's literally covered with dirt which can be removed with a harmless soak. Or,
2) It's been exposed to something corrosive and you want to prevent further damage.

Most other cases it's better to leave things be. You can't really unclean a coin if you change your mind. It took ~170 years to develop that much of a surface patina, so you have plenty of time if you decide you need to clean it later.

 

Patina is one thing, crud is another. The main admonition in "cleaning" or conserving coins is not to rub or scour on the coin. To err on the side of caution, I would probably soak it a couple of days in acetone (glass container, covered since it is volatile and flammable), if the acetone appears dirty, repeat. put a washcloth in a sink and run water on it till it is as hot as it is going to get. Put the coin so the stream of water hits it and give it a good minute of hot water stream, flip over and do the other side. Pat dry and see how it looks. Shouldn't hurt, might help. Show us what you do.

 

The reverse is very dark toned and would look much better if it was correctly conserved (lightly cleaned). Big difference between lightly cleaned and harshly cleaned.

 

No

 

I'd go along with an acetone soak, but this is the type of "skin" an old circulated silver coin should have. Remove the toning and many collectors will consider it tampered with (yes, we can tell! ) and devalued.
Neat coin.

 

Wonderful original coin put me down as don’t clean

 

If my kids had this "skin", I'd insist they take a shower!

 

Hi,

Thanks for all your replies.

I'm not going to clean the coin. It is a little bit grubby but most of that's concentrated on one side so I'll let it be.

I only asked because a local dealer suggested that I do so as it would have initially been "shiny". As I said, it sounded a bit odd to me. Presumably he polishes all of his coins? I don't know.

So congratulations patina. You get to stay.

 

Hi,

Thanks for that explanation.

A lot of that's just to do with tarnishing. The more than something passes between our fingers the more it rubs and we (oils) rub off on it. I've seen some 150 year old coins that are seemingly brand new and shiny but they've always unsettled me a bit. They look just too perfect. Maybe it's just me.

I do have some coins in my collection which I can only assume have been cleaned (not by me). For instance this Louis-Philippe 5F piece from 1834. It makes for a stark contrast with the 1851 5F and this 1891 Crown.

In terms of patina, I know the history of that particular coin as my great aunt kept it once they stopped being circulated and has kept it in a plastic film case ever since.

My father's in the antiques trade and faces similar issues. He tends to keep patina on things as once it's gone, you can't get it back (short of waiting 200 years) but a lot of his clients now want shiny stuff and demand that these things be cleaned. Although I suppose that they would have been designed to have a certain look to them, notwithstanding patina.

I personally like a little bit of use on these things as it shows the age.

Regarding storage, I've been using a coin book with plastic folders. No glue, no oil, nothing for some years now. I've never seen any ill effects on my coins but perhaps someone might tell me otherwise?

 

At the least, coins should be stabilized. Proper stabilization will allow coins to remain relatively unchanged for long periods of time. However, if a coin has schmutz on the surface, it is doubtful that it can be stabilized without removing the schmutz. Water and acetone should not remove anything that is desirable, but should not adversely affect the coin except to remove something that might be hiding defects. IMHO

 

The Louis Phillipe 5 francs has been ruined by excessive cleaning.

 

I suppose it depends on what you mean by "ruined". It could definitely have been done more sympathetically and my best guess is that they used some sort of polish but then I got it at a very reasonable price and with that taken into account it didn't particularly bother me as a collector. Asides the loss of patina, it's still one of my favorites to be honest.

I agree.

Although there might also be something to do with national preferences. Curiously, I was looking at my French silver coins and it suddenly occurred to me that those that I had bought from French dealers all appeared very shiny and had clearly been polished (even my Louis XVI 4 sols from the 17th century). Whereas al of those I had bought from private individuals or sellers from other countries appeared to have at least some patina left.

I know from the antiques trade that French people often like "shiny" things (I don't mean that in a derogatory sense, it's just their own aesthetics) so it might be that many French dealers carry that over to their coins. Just a hypothesis.