How to handle a gold or silver?

This was a picture i found when goggling something. From what I understand it is on Samos and in a museum in Pythagorion. - This is how they are stabled together:



They are touching each other. - Are the Museum not destroying them? - Is it wisely?



And something else: take a look at this youtuber-guy who drop the solidus on the table intentionally:



Does he destroy them?

Sorry if similiar questions have been raised before. - I haven't seen them.

 

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idk..why wear gloves to handle one and then destroy(melt) it. i don't think that little drop would hurt it, but i wouldn't on purpose.

 

silver and gold are noble metals so the acids from your touch shouldnt hurt the coin. i know copper coins not so much

 

Honestly I don't think there's any trick to handling ancients other than to wash and fully dry your hands first and handle them over a soft surface. Ancients can be fragile for a variety of reasons, so a soft surface is recommended and I found out the hard way by dropping a denarius on a table from a similar height as in the video of the solidus above and having a very small chip come off due to internal crystallization. I have also heard of gold coins, due to how soft the metal is, picking up dings from similar drops.

Otherwise, people have been handling ancients and other coins without gloves, slabs or anything else for years and I really don't feel like they're necessary. I also don't think that leaving the coins sitting like that in the picture above will damage them. Most of these were probably sitting in a hoard somewhere with hundreds of coins piled on top of them. As long as they're sitting still they're probably not going to damage each other.

 

Even if most of these coins have been circulated, why would one drop them on purpose? Just plain stupid in my view. And whereas handling them without gloves wont hurt their values the way it would a modern coin, I certainly would not pile them together for risk of coin to coin contact marks or spotting.

Obviously the museum do not consider their Byzantine hoard to be all that valuable!!!

 

Obviously you haven't read many of the posts outside of the Ancients Forum where people have remarked on the point that even the graders at professional grading services don't wear gloves.

 

I don't have much acid in my touch, but I do have skin oils that will cause deterioration in coins...even gold, and as far as silver is concerned, check out any of the many postings of toned silver coins.

 

Remind me not to shake your hand!! Unless you are some kind of nuclear powered superhero, there is no way oils in your skin can damage gold in any way.

 

Wanna' bet?

 

I've come across toned fingerprints on silver coins before.

You can see faint traces of them on this denarius.



Titus Caesar
AR Denarius, 3.37g
Rome Mint, 76 AD
RIC V863 (R2), BMC V305 var., RSC 106 var.
Obv: T CAESAR IMP VESPASIAN; Head of Titus, laureate, bearded, r.
Rev: IOVIS CVSTOS; Jupiter stg. facing, with patera over altar and sceptre
Ex Berk 159, 3 June 2008, lot 271.

It's not necessary to use cotton gloves, but always handle coins by the edges to prevent the above from happening.

 

I've seen similar "fingerprint" toning marks on silver as well, but never on gold.

Absolutely! If you can demonstrate a gold coin that has been degraded by skin oil it would be fascinating to say the least!

 

Since I don't collect gold, I can't show you one of my examples, but I have seen pictures here. Perhaps another member can help me out.

 

Here's a silver in my collection that might have "fingerprint" toning.

 

Wouldn't it be interesting to know whose fingerprint... BTW, look at this https://www.cointalk.com/threads/coin-cleaning-thread-44266-fingerprint-on-proof-gold-coin.217638/

 

From a purely chemical standpoint, it is not possible for skin oils to react with pure gold. Period.

Gold is inert, and only very, very strong acids (e.g., a mixture of nitric and hydrochloric acid) or high-energy reactions can turn metallic gold into ionic gold, which is necessary for another substance to "react" with gold.

Silver is different, and readily reacts to sulfides in air (H2S) and small amounts of sulfur or acids that may be present on human skin.

If you handled a gold coin that changed its appearance after you handled it, either your hands were dirty or the gold wasn't pure and other metals in the gold alloy were reacting to your touch.

 

Ha! I never thought of it that way! I now suspect I have the actual fingerprints of Vespasian himself!

As far as the gold is concerned, of course you can leave an oily print on it, it just won't at all corrode the coin.

 

So, are you a chemist?

 

Also: https://www.ngccoin.com/news/article/1000/

Any help here, either way @BadThad ?

 

I agree with Ides. Problems are usually due to impurities in the gold. Especially with ancients and the crude refining methods back then. Think about gold jewelry and how well it holds up and it's always exposed to skin.

 

i have this silver coin with what appears to be ancient fingerprints..