The most beautiful denarius I’ve ever seen.

I like slabbed coins because at least it means NGC experts have given it a look and they think it’s real. They may not “guarantee” it but 97% is close enough for me.

If I bought unslabbed coins I’d probably end up with a collection full of Chinese fakes.

 

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That statement is honestly insulting to the majority of us here who buy unslabbed coins. There are numerous auction houses who stake their reputations on selling genuine coins. They have experts equal to NGC. Sure, with several thousand coins in an auction, a handful do get through (which are often detected by those watching the auction and withdrawn).

If NGC disagrees with their assessment, any reputable auction house will take the coin back for a full refund.

In fact, given the fact that NGC is not infallible, you're statistically less likely to buy a fake if you purchase unslabbed from a reputable auction house, then have it slabbed by NGC.

 

Here are two of my denarii, both of which I have shared previously. The first is one of the left-facing, anepigraphic types you referred to. The second depicts the curia julia (senate house) on its reverse.

To get a better sense of cost, you should go through archives such as coinarchives, acsearch...etc. or even those of the various auction houses (CNG, NAC...etc.). I would also add that you should adjust your budget depending your desired grade/type. In most cases, you will find that $1000 is insufficient for an EF range denarius of Octavian/Augustus. Most of my denarii of Octavian/Augustus were in the $2000-$3000 range. However, I've noticed that many have fetched $5000+ in recent auctions.

 

Why is it insulting?

I wasn’t saying that everyone else would end up buying fakes.

I said that I would probably end up buying fakes. That is a common of my own lack of experience and difficulty distinguishing between real and fake.

It wasn’t a comment about anyone else.

 

100% of your coins are from Europe

 

No. I misspoke

Some are probably from Asia or Africa. None from America tho.

 

He he he. But if we're being exact:
- I have two ancient coins from Africa (Ptolemy I and Ptolemy II)
- My area of specialization is the era of the diadochi, and the majority of those coins come from Asia (a lot from Asia minor)
- I also have 4 ancient Chinese coins
- Since you didn't discern which coins, I also pick up change as I travel, then put them in an album. Since I've been to six continents, that album also contains coins from South America, North America, and Australia.

Sorry...couldn't resist.

 

Fair enough, but you can place a high degree of trust in the top auction houses. It's in their best interest to only sell genuine coins, and when someone here points out a fake it reflects poorly on them.

The strong preference is to trust the seller and know the coin. If you're planning to spend $1k or more on any coin, you should do your best to learn the type to both spot fakes and be assured you're not paying too much.

For my day job, I need to pay attention to security. One of the basic tenets of security is "defense in depth." At each level you assume the level below you will be compromised, so you defend against it.

Personally, I've always felt that NGC is a gaping security hole. All one needs to do is convince them that a coin is genuine, and then no one will ever question it again. Most sellers will do only a cursory examination of a slabbed coin because it can't be accessed. This contrasts with an unslabbed coin, which is re-examined before each sale.

 

We might even make a point that the 'finest' coins to be collected already are in collections and may currently be half a world away from where they were made. It would make no difference were it not for what I consider the racist and self serving political entities have injected into the coin market. Do Greeks who still live in Greece have 'rights' over people of Greek heritage who live in Australia? Do purebred descendants of the people who issued coins have 'rights' over the people who conquered that region a thousand years later or is it the other way around? Should the British Museum be required to return the things they bought/stole/were given by whoever it was that was in charge 'there and then'?

To me, the least enjoyable part of this hobby is having to consider questions like these. I am a mutt with traceable ancestors to a dozen different places. I might see it differently if I really believed that the guy I see in the mirror was Caesar Augustus or Socrates but I don't. As it is, I strongly prefer buying coins from old collections hoping the people who control the hobby remain satisfied making it hard on people interested in the coins to get new finds and don't come after the ones I have been gathering over the last 55 years. I slowed down buying from Europe after three bad experiences in 2016. You are welcomed to chase the ones politicians allow you to have. I'd rather have the ones that already made the trip. I guess this is like a new collector preferring a coin already in a slab over having to decide which dealers are trustworthy before sending it of to NGC for an opinion. We do what returns the most joy for the effort/trouble/risk involved. I plan to buy no slabbed coins and have removed all I have ever had except one (not NGC!!!) that was misidentified by the 'expert' someone trusted in error. My hobby is quite different from that of the person who started this thread and 99% of those who read here. That is OK.

My favorite Augustus coins:
Best type (sorry about that nail):


Best style and a perfect example of a fourree with clear seam and just enough core to prove the point:


I wish you well in finding a coin you like as much for whatever reasons you consider important.

 

After reading a tremendous amount about ancient Roman history, and spurred on by my interest in ancestry, I've often wondered who my ancestors were during this period of history.

Further, from what research I've done so far on my ancestors, it seems extremely likely that Rome would have deemed them "barbarians", and that - from both sides of my family - I'm likely a pure blood barbarian.

This is evidenced by me on this forum, interrupting a peaceable discussion about a coin from the highest of the Romans with my barbarian values of security and cost savings...

 

Octavian Ar Denarius Military mint in Illyricum? 35-34 BC Obv Head of Octavian bare Rv Round shield decorated with three concentric circles of dots. RIC 543b CRI 393. 3.98 grams 18 mm Photo by W. Hansen With this series Octavian embarked on a radical shift in how he wanted his image to be portrayed. Prior to this most of his coin images are rather simply and harshly engraved and they emphasize both his youth and his devotion to his "father" Julius Caesar. With this image he is moving closer to the classic image that we normally see as the image of Augustus. Here he is seen as youthful but with a calm serenity that belie his youth. As interesting to us as numismatists, the scholarship on this coin has a rather chequered history. Foe decades this coin was thought to have been minted at a Spanish mint likely minted sometime before 27 BC. This attribution faced more or less continual challenge and now it is thought it was minted in Illyria.

 

I think it took some years to figure out how to portray Augustus on the coins and which titles to use - he was portrayed as something of a god on some issues. By the later coins, the format used until the present day had been established - head of ruler with titles around on the obverse.

E.g. this RIC 220 of Augustus could pass as a Tiberius Tribute Penny at first glance.




ATB,
Aidan.