Post the first ancient coin you ever purchased

I also love the silver canoe. Got a couple of 'em.

 

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I never purchased it, It was a gift

 

A sensible plan if I ever heard one.

Actually, I think most of us have done that, except for Doug. He's still got a box of worn out Franklins. Evidently it makes a good footstool?

 

Go for it!!!!!

 

How many have handled a genuine Eid Mar? Me....!

 

My first ancient coin. Purchased in 2003 from Henri Delger for $100.


Vespasian
AR Denarius
Rome Mint, 75 AD
RIC 772 (C3), BMC 161, RSC 366
Obv: IMP CAESAR VESPASIANVS AVG; Head of Vespasian, laureate, r.
Rev: PON MAX TR P COS VI; Pax, bare to the waist, seated l., holding branch extended in r. hand, l. hand on lap.

 

AR tetradrachm (17.24 gm). Macedonia (Amphipolis), ca. 334–ca. 323 BC. (possibly 325-323BC) Head of young Heracles right in lion skin headdress / Zeus enthroned left, holding eagle and scepter, stern in left field. Price 5.

F&S Auction for about $425 plus fees about 10 years ago. Sold it cuz I had to. It was a lifetime issue with a great reverse. It amazed me when it arrived. I have been chasing the dragon ever since.

However, as I got deeper into the hobby my taste has changed and I now prefer the style of my current posthumous issue from Mesembria...........although If I could find this one again, I would buy it for sentimental reasons.

 

Not my first by any means, but my longest-ago purchase I have a photo of. $75 from HJB, at a show in Milwaukee in 1984. I remember Harlan had a better one from the same group for $300. I wanted that one, but it was already gone.

Phil Davis

 

My actual "first" ...






... you never forget your first

 

I can't post the first ancient coin I acquired (a denarius of Antoninus Pius with the modius & corn ears reverse, in good VF condition), because I sold it along with about 100 other ancient coins way back in 1976, that included an aureus of Claudius and a solidus of Constantius 11.
The (then) collection also included a type set of 17 Australian gold coins. The money raised was used as part deposit in setting up a mortgage on our first house.

I bought the denarius in 1964, when I was 18 years old.
As a teenager, I always had some money to spend on coins, because I was a process worker in a factory, working for my father. Working never interferred with my secondary or tertiary education, however.

 

You sound like a man after my own heart. I have worked at something my entire life or at least as young as to be able to walk neighbors dogs, shovel snow, mow grass, etc. I delivered Fuller Brush catalogs along side my sister for .5 cents per catalog delivered. Delivered newspapers; worked at a local car wash for $5 per day. This never interfered with all my other pursuits, coins, cars, girls and education. In fact, the money I earned helped with all those pursuits. I do not want to get too political, but it's too bad the modern day generations (generality of course), never learned the benefits of providing for yourself.

 

I only have three coins left from before 1974 when I sold the rest to Joel Malter. I always show 'My Favorite Coin' so here I'll show the worst of the three. Those wont to make fun of it, find me a better one with the cross support under the chair. I got this sometime in high school but details were not recorded. I suspect it came from a dish of cull denarii from a shop in Indianapolis. I have other coins with the obverse die but have not seen the reverse. Martin?

 

Imperial Rome
Caracalla, r. 198-217 A.D. (211 A.D.)
Rome Mint; AR Denarius, 17.5mm x 2.8 grams
Obv.: ANTONINVS PIVS AVG BRIT, Head of Caracalla, laureate, right Rev.: P M TR P XIIII COS III P P; Pax, draped, advancing left, holding branch in right hand and sceptre in left hand

I bought this in 1999 or 2000 - while I kept a record of it, I didn't note the date purchased. My local coin shop had a very nice Caesar Elephant for abou $280-300. I was tempted to buy it, but couldn't justify the expense at the time (I wish I had...). This guy was $40, beautiful, and my interest in British history attracted me to the notion that he was the 'conqueror of Britain.'

While Caracalla was technically my first ancient, my first foray outside of modern was this medieval coin of Richard I in France:

Poitiers, "Angevine Empire"
Richard I, r. 1169-1199
AR Denier, 17mm x 1 grams
Obv.: +RICARDUS REX, a plain cross patée at the ends, annulet in third quarter, within inner circle
Rev.: PIC / TAVIE / NSIS, written in three parallel lines

This was a birthday gift to myself in 1999

 

Augustus, Macedon, Philippi, AE 19mm (Semis). 31 AD, 4.7g, 19mm

OBV: VIC - AVG, Victory standing left on base holding wreath and palm.

REV: COHOR PRAE PHIL, Three standards in honor of the Praetorian Guard's battle between Augustus and Marcus Antonius.

REF: RPC I 1651, SGICV 32, SNG Cop 305, BMC 23, SNG ANS 677

My very first coin that is a gift.

 

July of 1999, my first ancient is quite humble and will remain one of my favorite coins not for what it is but because it was my first. They say, you never love a woman coin quite the same way as the first.

Arcadius AD 383-408
AE 20.9mm x 5.89g
Struck.Between 15 May AD 392 and 17 January AD 395
Alexandira, Egypt; Roman Mint
Obv: rosette diademed, draped & cuirassed bust right-DN ARCADIVS P F AVG
Rev: Emperor standing facing, head right, holding labarum & globe-GLORIA ROMANORVM, ALEA in ex.

 

My first ancient coins, i bought these off eBay last year for about $10 for all 4

 

Most of you guys & gals have seen that many times, but the story is so nice, and the opportunity given, I can't resist....

"My grand father, born 1894, has been lucky enough to be involved in the whole WWI. He eventually found three coins, romans he told me, while digging a trench at Verdun battle (1916). After the end of the war, being in a train, back home with two other "poilus" he decided he whould give one coin to each of them and keep the last one for himself. Here it is, a Commodus sestertius (and quite a scarce one I dicovered later :



Rome mint, AD 192
L AEL AVREL CO---MM AVG P FEL, Laureate head of Commodusright
HERCVLI ROMANO AVG, Hercules facing, head left, holding club and lion's skin, resting on trophy. SC in field
21,01 gr
Ref : RCV #5752, Cohen #203

It is the very first roman coin I have ever possessed, as he gave it to me when I was 18 (ahem, that was in 1978) and the only one in the family to collect coins. It's of course the real start of my addiction for ancient coins"

I can also add this about that coin :

The following commentary is taken from the description of a similar example (in far much better condition) in NAC auction 4, # 477 :

Few Roman coins excite as much commentary as those of Commodus, which show him possessed of Hercules. Not only do they present an extraordinary image, but they offer incontrovertible support to the literary record. The reports of Commodus’ megalomania and infatuation with Hercules are so alarming and fanciful that if the numismatic record was not there to confirm, modern historians would almost certainly regard the literary record as an absurd version of affairs, much in the way reports of Tiberius’ depraved behaviour on Capri are considered to be callous exaggerations. Faced with such rich and diverse evidence, there can be no question that late in his life Commodus believed that Hercules was his divine patron. Indeed, he worshipped the demigod so intensely that he renamed the month of September after him, and he eventually came to believe himself to be an incarnation of the mythological hero. By tradition, Hercules had fashioned his knotted club from a wild olive tree that he tore from the soil of Mount Helicon and subsequently used to kill the lion of Cithaeron when he was only 18 years old. Probably the most familiar account of his bow and arrows was his shooting of the Stymphalian birds while fulfilling his sixth labour. The reverse inscription HERCVLI ROMANO AVG (‘to the August Roman Hercules’) makes the coin all the more interesting, especially when put into context with those of contemporary coins inscribed HERCVLI COMMODO AVG, which amounts to a dedication ‘to Hercules Commodus Augustus’.

Q

 

That one has a particularly nice lion skin but its finest feature is the story of how it came to be yours. Thank you for sharing.

 

I couldn't agree more with Doug's comments.