Featured Aegina stater

Sure, here is a picture of both the obverse and reverse.

 

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oooow, nice reverse



... thanks

 

I have serious doubts as to the authenticity of @Skakke 's coin. I'll wait for other opinions as I am cetainly not an expert in these.

@AncientJoe , your coin is beautiful!

 

I am frankly amazed with the beauty of Ancient Joes's coin.
I know very little about ancient greek coinage, but not so little that I cannot appreciate the skill and technique necessary to strike such a coin. For someone used to the relatively flat strikes of roman coinage, that relief is absolutely amazing. It almost looks as if the turtle will walk off any minute!

 

What makes you think this is a fake? The coin is from a very renowned dealer.

 

I'm absolutely stunned by the exquisite beauty of that stater @AncientJoe !!!

And the high relief is beyond belief!!!

 

I have been learning by observation. Since I started dabbling in ancient Greek coins, I have noticed that fakes often have a similar fabric: sharp strike and well-detailed, perfect flan, washed-out colored silver, tarnish in the protected areas to bring out details, and an overall look of total perfection. I see all of these things on your coin, which makes me instantly suspicious. I could be wrong, but I'm just being cautious at the moment.

AncientJoe's coin isn't perfect as there is obvious wear, though not much of it.

 

Well if you are correct, then I'm out of a very substantial amount of money, and will have to call Künker in Germany immediately. This coin was purchased from their previous auction, and I know some very serious people in the coin world have handled it, so I thought it was good. It makes me very upset if this really is a fake, as I saved up for a long time prior to the auction in order to obtain it. I will make some further research. Thanks for your input

 

I hope it all turns out well and that coin is genuine. I just returned a Nero denarius that I had some doubts about but the reasons were far more clear-cut in my case.

I think 'Type' raises some interesting points and I often get leery when I see a coin that looks a little too good but often that is just because it is that good and the style is far different than I have seen before.....

 

I don't see any problems with your coin. But knowing you spent serious money on it, you should send it off for authentication to be certain.

 

Thank you all for your input. I have collected ancient coins since the early 1990's and as far as my knowledge goes, the coin feels correct, but I'm always open for opinions.

 

I've only been collecting for a few months, while you have a couple decades, and you have it in hand. I would defer to your judgement.

 

And, I would also add that it is very difficult to judge a coin based on photos alone, unless you are dealing with a blatant and poorly made fake.
This is clearly not the case here. One needs to be quite careful when emitting judgement based on cursory information.

 

I would be very surprised if this coin turned out to be a fake. I think it is a perfectly fine example. BTW there is some obvious wear on the coin.

 

I agree with Eduard => I am always "very" careful before pulling the fire-alarm and yelling "fake"

=> it should be a pre-requisite that somebody challenging a coin's authenticity should have back-up proof, one way or the other ... otherwise it is merely "damaging" (I have spent a whole lotta money proving blokes wrong ... but I'd rather not have spent the money)

 

I'll rephrase my authenticity concerns from now on.

 

Absolutely amazing Tortoise Stater Ancientjoe!!!

 

@TypeCoin971793 has given some tried & true observations about counterfeits. I believe members have made him aware of "pulling-the-trigger" too fast in the future, and I agree with the post above.

IMHO, the photo of the turtle in question is too small to tell anything unless it was made from a known counterfeit die. When I suspect something is amiss, I ask for more magnified photos of the surface. Often, even that does not help.

One last observation. We don't know the credentials of most of the CT members. I have learned very quickly who to rely on. This is my point:

A majority of counterfeits are made in a similar fashion using a few standard methods. There are certain universal characteristics seen on fakes of all types. Because of this, a long-time, very experienced, authentication "expert" of European coins, will have a better chance of detecting a fake american coin than most american coin dealers.

This works for Ancients too; but the folks I talk with in authentication seminars say it is a little different.

 

Speaking of which, I was following along with this auction, and thought the hammer price was a little low. Awesome to see it was acquired by a CT member. One of the few to rival the quality of @AncientJoe 's stater. Congratulations.

For anyone that would like to see the coin in different lighting. Here's the auction photo:


-Michael

 

What else can any mortal say. Simply superb. I want one too!