Would you buy these 'ancient' coins?

The photo shows 12 coins that 'claim' to be 'ancient Roman coins'. Some are modern fakes, some are ancient in date but less than fully official products of the official mint system. One may even offend some people by being included in this group and would be sold gladly by any dealer in ancient coins but would have been found offensive by the Roman Emperor in power the year it was made. Which are 'collectable'; which are 'questionable' and which are absolutly worthless having no place in a collection?

This is not a quiz asking you to say 'bad' or 'good' but asking you to say why the items are included in this group and what makes them worth adding to your collection or makes them absolute junk. If you want to play, pick a letter and say what makes the item welcome in your collection or not. All will not agree.

 

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I think they all would have a place in my collection, even the modern ones (provided they were cheap). I'd pick the contemporary counterfeits or a Barbarous Imitative over a modern one of course. I think I'd go with J maybe, if only one can be chosen. I like the way it looks, its ancient ( i think), looks like it circulated a bit adding more appeal IMO (though coins with little wear are veyr nice too), and it would make a good space filler.

 

Randy;
J is a classic example of a plated fourree of Nero. The style is very good for these making one wonder if the counterfeiter might have had experience in the real mint. It is definitely ancient and probably circulated along with good coins until the wear started to reveal the copper core. Of my plated denarii, this has the best diagnostic details including a complete circular seam on the reverse where the silver foil overlapped and wear on some of the letters showing core on the high points. Most collectors avoid ancient counterfeits but they definitely were part of the monetary history of their day and, I believe, very collectible.

 

I admit to being a newb to ancients and only own 5 but I do read up on the emperor thats on a coin I am interested in & look for good strikes and such.

As for this "game", I would probably select F & K as what Randy said in his, both look to have a circulated/old look to them whereas the others look to "nice" looking.

But remember I am a newb but the two I selected I would accept into my collection.

 

I'm still a newb too

 

I would pick "E" as for some reason it speaks to me. I know that sounds hokey, but as I gazed over the coins, this one, even though it appears unc. or near, and maybe likely to be a counterfeit, said take me

That is why when I buy such coins I use well known dealers that I depend on.

Jim

 

I like the look of A, not meaning it was a real Roman coin, but it looks like a very intriquing imitation. I like the Celtic imitations of Greek coinage, as I think the Celts added something special to the coins. I get the same sort of feeling with A.

Do you know which ones are modern? E stands out as a modern one, and probably C and L.

 

Compared to me, nah uh ;p

 

My complete inabilities to communicate have been shown in this thread. It was posted to see if folks could separate various degrees and types of unofficial coins. It turned into a popularity contest. I was hoping that someone would recognize F and K as barbarous but ancient copies but they were selected because of their "poor" condition. F is what is known as a 'barbarous radiate' copying coins of the later 3rd century Gallo-Roman empire. This Tetricus I/Spes is high grade for these. K is a beautiful copy of the Constantinian Urbs Roma commemorative that I would not have suspected as barbarous except that both Roma and the wolf face left on the real ones.

Coin E, on the other hand, is such a pretty, high grade denarius made in Bulgaria c.2000 AD with style that should fool no one who has experience with denarii of Augustus. E also carries a flag since it is a very popular type commemorating the retrieval of the Roman standards lost by Varus. I do not have one but these are being beat up and sold since the good looking ones are more suspicious to many people.

During the Renaissance, there was demand for medallions of the Romans hard to come by then in genuine. Some were produced by famous artists of the day either copying rare coins or inventing completely new items. The Septimius is a 'later' cast of one of the original 'Paduans' while the Pertinax is not known from the records of the series. Both are probably 100-200 years old and have some value in the history of coin collecting even though neither is 'ancient'.

I believe this catches my up with what has been mentioned so far.

 

D is a cool one. The quality is nice and its in good condition. Asside from that, the silver looks really thin, even more so maybe than this silvered coin. Whch is kinda cool.

 

Thanks for the info. I know to trust the seller on coins I am not very familiar. I am always falling for things outside of US coins that whisper sweet nothings into my ear Still think it is such a nice "coin" for being maybe 10 years old

 

I thought that was where you were going Doug, that is why I mentioned the three offhand I would not buy as ancient just on the face of it. Most of the others looked "unofficial" or barbarous radiates, with one or two I would have to research if I saw them. I saw the Urbs Roma, and besides the direction, the lettering was off, as well as star placement, but its a cool coin.

I like all of these, besides the three I mentioned. I especially like barbarous radiate coins, as they would have an even more interesting story to tell, unfortunately we will never know very much about them.

 

D is a mystery to me. It copies a coin of Trajan Decius. The silver is very thin and the coin is definitely struck not cast. The style is different than normal but in many ways better than some of the official coins making me wonder who cut those dies. There are late fourrees like this but by this time the profit making them was a lot less than a few decades before and most are really crude compared to this. I would really like to know more about this coin.

I see someone commented on A: This is a barbarous copy of a Falling Horseman with most legends replaced with IIIII. The coin is AE2 size suggesting it was made to circulate with the original FTR coins of the late 340's but no one would be fooled by the style so it must have been made for use in a remot region rather than for deception. Most interesting, coins of this nature are pretty common so I suspect they were used a lot (probably on the borders just beyond the reach of normal coins).

 

So A is an AE2? That makes it even more interesting. I think my mind assumed the size since I have seen these many times as 3's or smaller. Its pretty rare, (in my experience but maybe not in yours), for a larger one. Like I said, those Limes coins, (meaning limits of empire, beyond the normal mint boundaries), are usually more interesting than Roman products to me.

I love the topic and thank you very much for posting these interesting coins.

 

what about Pertinax, L? its the only one I don't feel comforatable commenting on.

 

L is some coin. It is such a great coin that there was demand for them as far back as the Renaissance when great artists like Giovanni Cavino in Padua, Italy, made copies of them to meet the need. His normal profession was the making of medals and originals of his work are worth money. In the late 1800's a catalog of his works was released based on the dies that still existed. This coin is not one of them (but coin C is!). The status of coins like L is not certain. The style is wrong to be ancient and the workmanship is closer to the 'Paduan' than other known counterfeits. It is unlikely that Cavino was the only 1500's Italian artist meeting the demand for such items or that others did not continue producing such items in later centuries. Most seen are casts rather than struck and the current sale value of such items depends on how obviously the coin is a cast made later. Coin C is a low grade product; L is better. I found great interest in the following entry on acsearch:
http://www.acsearch.info/record.html?id=126749
This item sold for $5750 on an estimate of $750. The important line in the description is: " Although this coin has an extensive pedigree, our opinion is that this is a Renaissance era copy, not an ancient sestertius." It would appear that two bidders disagreed with CNG and backed up their opinion with $5000. My coin L is not in any way questionably ancient (and I agree with CNG that the one they sold was Renaissance). The question here is whether there is a value to fake ancient coins based on their being 100 to 500 years old? Cavino and other artists of the period made their copies not to deceive but to meet the demand for those who appreciated antiquity. They did them in the then current style and sold them openly as replicas (as today do some copiests like Slavei [coin E] and Antiquanova). Somewhere along the way, some of these works have crossed the line and been sold as 'real' ancients. Do they belong in your collection? That is the question this post asked in the first place. At least don't pay $5750 until you think you know enough to back that move.

 

Great topic Doug. I think it really shows people the various degrees of imitations. "How do you know its not a fake?" is the number one question I am always asked, and this helps bring many people up to speed that many times its ok its a fake.

Personally my dividing line has been time, anything made in ancient times, from an official mint or not, to me can be in my collection. Paduans, etc, while I somewhat like them, I do not collect. Modern copies I never have unless in a group of other stuff or I get deceived. That is just me though, and others have large collections of such pieces.

I think this exercise is pretty good since it shows collectors who have been around ancients a while CAN pick out the forgeries pretty quickly with just looks, even without resorting to guides. Not that there are not more convincing fakes out there.

 

I am a little surprised that no one commented on a few of these that I thought would bring early comment. The best and the worst have not been mentioned yet.

 

So what about the other ones Doug? I do not collect Romans, so I admit I am a little out of my league. G is the other one that would look fishy to me, I would want a definite RIC match on it if I saw it for sale. The others look at first glance to be ancient, hard to tell at first if they are Imperial or not without getting the RIC out. Is there a good fake in there?

 

Is some of the legend (the “D”s)backwards on H?