I was thinking of picking this Constantinople coin. Seller said it was from AD196 but I am not sure this is correct. The writing for the coin says" Roman city commemorative, Constantinopoli Nicomedia RIC Vll 196 AD D AE Follis 17mm. Thanks for the guidance.
It's from Heraclea and the mintmark is •SMHΔ• (RIC VII Heraclea 125) and it was struck A.D. 330-333. I would value this coin around $20 on a good day.
That is from 330-335 AD. RIC VII 125. There are many on VCoins in much better condition, between 60-80 Euros, fixed price. EDIT DIdn't see the simultaneous post above.
If you're in the US, I think you should buy from Victors store on Vcoins when looking for coins from this era. Fairly priced, and a very competent dealer of LRBs.
196 is its referance number in RIC VII (I didn't 2X chk if that's correct & posts above say it isn't, I just mean that's what the seller is trying to say. It's not meant to be the year minted). If you like the look of that particular coin, & they're not charging more than a couple bucks & S&H isn't much, then go for it. Otherwise, hold out; you can find the same in better condition for peanuts. In fact, if you wanted a really nice example, this is a type that you could find cheap (<$20) in a high grade with a nice patina. P.S. This is a type that it's real easy to find yourself with a very wrong impression of what one should cost if you simply look at what examples currently for sale in all the regular places cost. This is a very common type that most collectors have extras of, so they don't really sell. So there's a bunch out there & the overpriced ones just sit forever. So if you look too see what they cost, you'll see a lot of rediculously priced examples that'll never sell. Horseman FTRs & 2-Solders with stdrd/s GLOR. EXs are the same way; I imagine there's more examples as well.