show us your unusual coins.

Wouldn't "Plate" money be considered more or less "Bullion" and "Ring" money be considered as a "Token" payment rather than "Circulating" coinage?

 

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I have been to China as well sir and have seen "bridge money", "bell money", and many other things in their coin display cases. I do not accept that those items were true items only made for mediums as exchange either. Also, many museums are very ill equipped to deal with coins, and simply copy what others say, so I would not trust most museums to be very authoritative versus published numismatists. Very few do any type of research whatsoever.

Its a continuum sir, and I simply believe these are too close to functional use to be classified as solely for medium of exchange. Like I said, anything metal was valued in antiquity and could be traded, but why would these rings be made for their "money" when SO MANY bronze celtic coins have been found? It sure does not appear that they made these rings as their predominant bronze coinage, and that they knew HOW to make proper coinage and did so extensively.

Given these facts, I am simply unable to accept these things were made for coinage purposes. After they were made for other reasons, they may have traded as small change, but so would any other type of bronze.

Like I said, we can agree to disagree. My main problem is all of these "celtic ring money" coins on Ebay I truly believe to mostly horse bridal remnants coming out of eastern europe, with no way to possibly date them.

Just my opinion.

Chris

 

40 BC chines coins when the circuler coin was introdused it was revolutionary

 

New to the forums, but I thought I'd add my unusual coin (though it's not really a coin but a jeton).

 

Didn't I just see this in another thread? =)

 

the use of ring money predates the use of actual coins in celtic britain/gaul/belgium celtic coinage was first struck as copies of roman and other established currencies, and when the moneyers had prfected the method of making dies and in turn striking the actual coins then ring money ceased to be used. as a collector of celtic coinage i have researched my hobby quite deeply and i also subscribe to chris rudd's (arguably the worlds foremost authority on celtic coinage) celtic newsletter and low and behold ring money is mentioned quite regularly as a definitive celtic coinage.

 

If it is coins from a documented source that had proof that it was Celtic, then I don't have a problem calling them celtic "money". Whatever we want to collect is our own business anyway. Like I said, my main problem is those items on Ebay, and I simply wished others to be aware that without a provenance I would not think generic small bronze rings can be proven to have anything to do with any Celts whatsoever.

I don't think we disagree as much as you think. I have an odd and curious money collection as well, so I collect the entire continuum. When something on its surface is not provable what it is, provenance becomes everything.

Btw, do you own the new ABC book? I was thinking of getting it. I have Van Arsdell and Celtic coins in the BM, as well as a few other Celtic references.

Chris

Edit: Further thinking on it Moneyer I believer are main diagreement is over the word "coin". Coin has a number of criteria to be met, almost none of which "ring money" meets. It does not have mark of value, it does not have issuing authority, I am not sure if there is a guarantee of weight, etc. Money, maybe, trade item, definitely, coin, no.

 

some odd canadain

 

i am sure i called it ring money?? shall we come to a gentlemans agreement on this subject?? most of the books i have are by chris rudd, i know chris quite well and have bought many coins from him in the past.............and ring money lol.

 

I am not going to venture into that ring stuff, I don't even own any, nor do I care.

Unfortunately for 17th and 18th century Swedes, plate money was created to be a circulating medium - a plentiful substitute for silver that the latter of was in rather shorter supply. Plate money, much like modern presidential/Sacagawea/SBA, were created by the crown that more or less could careless about semantics like convenience, portability etc. Just like now with those dollar coins in the USA, banks were stuffed with the stuff and they rarely actually saw commerce. As a result, they were finally discontinued in 1776, and what could be gathered for scrap value was sold and loaded onto a Dutch ship that was SE Asia bound when it broke up off of South Africa in 1781. Therefore most of the pieces available on the market came from that shipwreck in the late 1980's.

So they were created with the intent of a circulating medium, but failed to perform that purpose because of the inconvenience.



Do imagine trapsing off to the village market with this piece in the pursuit of foodstuffs for the evening meal.

 

These got to the point of being obscene to having to use. Frankly this plate has many other seemingly useful traits, ie weapon, shield, decour etc. This piece measures an impressive 237 x 241 millimetres and weighs 2946 grammes or 6.5 lbs. As with the others on this page, it is a very challenging piece in an original not shipwreck effected condition. Generally there is not a whole lot to see on the reverse of plate money - usually devoid of stamps etc. But this particular piece is a bit different in that in a couple of the corners there are traces of stamps that were subsequently rolled over again with the large metal roller they used to roll out the copper for these.

 

I am sure you did and it was my fault for misreading your posts sir.

Btw, do you have Chris Rudd's new ABC book? I would like to know if its definitely worth getting.

Chris

 

Yes, its quite an impressive specimen not being sea salvaged. Most of these you will find were from a shipwreck find, and nice pristine ones like this are very rare indeed.

Wonderful piece!

 

Yeah, I just re-read that thread....and I'm wondering if it was a good idea signing up over here if that's the way discussions go down here. I was hoping for a more civil atmosphere.

 

Well I hope so as well sir. I am not a mod, but I don't think most people on CT wish an uncivil atmosphere. I am sorry you saw such a thing, but do not think you made a mistake signing up here.

 

So long as the discussions stay on topic (i.e. about coins, exonumia, etc) they go down just fine. When someone goes off on a silly tangent you really can't expect too many serious responses. =)

 

Sorry, but you come on with one topic and an agenda that is not amenable to listening to other people, you have to expect that courtesy gives out when exasperation takes over.

 

I didn't mean to sidetrack this thread, sorry. But I remember reading that "ufo" thread as it stood a couple of years ago, and I enjoyed seeing those jetons and reading people's opinions about them. In any case, it made me aware of them, and when I first saw the example I posted earlier I knew that I wanted to buy it. I bought it because of the controversy, or more specifically the discussion that comes with showing it to people.



I guess I shouldn't post by "bigfoot" jeton then? lol!

 

Please do! =)

The issue with that thread is that it started out being coin related, but someone resurrected it as a discussion that had nothing to do with the original jetons in the thread nor anything else coin related.