My new denarius of Caracalla and Geta

Those are two really nice examples. Enjoy them and don't worry about overpaying - you did OK!

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Hi Gogi, in order to see if you overpaid, use Research function here:

https://cngcoins.com/Coins_sold.aspx

or here:

https://www.vcoins.com/en/Default.aspx

Note: divide Vcoins prices roughly by 2, to get true market value...

hope this helps

 

I am by the standards of you rich people "certifiably loony". I choose to have two nice coins that have interest over one coin that has nothing going for it other than it looking like it did the day it was struck. Certainly I would like an EF if everything else were equal but that very rarely comes up in my 'style' collecting. There are too many variables for everything to be equal. Being gold does not make a coin better, it makes it gold. Being perfect does not make a coin interesting. I'd rather have two that were presentable but today it is more like five presentable coins for the money of one perfect. So far this year I have bought several coins that simply do not come in a higher grade than the one I bought. That makes the coins fit my collection better than they would people who see them as defective. I posted a page showing my 100 favorite coins but they were not my 100 most expensive coins (although a couple were 'expensive' by my standards). Neither were they my 100 prettiest, least worn or market-popular coins. They were the coins that I, and perhaps only I, found thrilling when they came to stay with me for a while. That is life here in the loony bin.

A few hundred years ago, the nobility bought entire intact collections and valued having huge numbers not high grades. Read Numismatics, An Ancient Science
https://www.amazon.com/Numismatics-...r=8-1&keywords=numismatics+an+ancient+science

See how often the quality of coins is mentioned as opposed to numbers.

Almost 200 years ago, Akerman wrote his Roman Coins cataloging not all the coins he knew but only the rare ones making special note which of the types were most rare and next most rare. Nothing was mentioned about grades.

A hundred years ago collectors like Dattari assembled huge groups so they could pick out the different types. Yes, they kept the best ones where there were duplicates (actually they seem to have kept them all) but the important feature was having types not known before to every collector.

The concept of micro grading in US produced a generation ashamed to own a MS60. When these people moved to ancients we see the situation mentioned by TIF that slabbed coins not MS 5/5 are seen as defective and can be bought at discount. Who wants a VF with 2/5 surfaces? Loonies like me, that's who, since it makes it possible for me to own the coin I otherwise would not.

I had forgotten this post but the answer is whichever letter gives me the coins I want. Not every $1000 coin is more desirable to Loonies just because there is a line of people waving cash at it. Coins dealers pray someone will take off their hands need love, too.

Just my $1 Canadian worth.

 

I'm puzzled why you quoted my comment completely out of context. Reread my post and you'll note that I wrote "...you'd be certifiably loony to choose the VF (all other aspects being equal)..." which is the essence of my reply.

Clearly, for many ancient coins, all other aspects are rarely equal, but when they are roughly equal, it makes no logical sense to choose a poorer condition coin. That's my point. Period.

To you, maybe not, but I'm pretty certain you didn't mean to impose your own viewpoint on all other collectors of ancient coins. In fact, it might make an insightful poll here to see if most collectors would view an FDC ancient coin as intrinsically interesting regardless of its other features.

I'm far from being one of "...you rich people..." and I would simply respond that, exactly like you, I collect what appeals to me about a particular coin or group of coins, when the coin is within my budget. We're exactly alike in that respect. Our criteria for evaluating coins might overlap only about 50%, but de gustibus non est disputandum.

 

Very nice!

 

Great comment IOM. I came late to this thread; I was about to ask the same question about the out of context quote. Glad I kept reading! You made all my points admirably. It would be different if those of us to whom obtaining the best possible quality is a paramount consideration looked down our noses at those who collect differently... but we don't.