How many coins are found vs. recirculated from old collections?

I have a question. I'm wondering if anyone knows whether coins currently on the market are actually still being dug up in any quantity or whether most coins were formerly in other (older) collections? It seems that as time passes it would get harder and harder to find fresh coins from hoards and other sources, e.g. guys/gals with metal detectors and whatnot, whereas presumably dealers are getting most of their coins from collectors who have died or otherwise have liquidated their coins.

 

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Good question! Many countries have strict cultural property laws so nothing legally comes to market from new finds. But obviously plenty come from illegal sources. The best data source is the UK, where finds must be reported, but they remain the property of the finder. If a museum wants the find, it must pay market value. So it's reasonable to assume that most finds are reported. The Celtic Coin Index records all Celtic finds. From 1961-1991 12,000 coins were added. 1991-2001 20,000 were added. No doubt a lot of the increase was down to better reporting, made easier in the Internet age, but it gives you a sense of just how many are still being found. Better metal detectors are probably part of the story here, and also deeper ploughing in recent years.

 

I think most coins comes out old collections/

 

Here is a good article..

http://savingantiquities.org/why-co...ient-coins-in-the-north-american-marketplace/

 

Perhaps



But we don't know what is in some collections.

Me last week at the Vatican......

 

Your 'good' article is heavily biased toward the interests of those who want to make coin collecting illegal. One tool they want to use to destroy the hobby is establishing the expectation that coins should carry a provenance proving they are not recent. This may be fine for expensive items that were recorded and photographed in the pre digital era but the coins I collect are rarely accompanied by such a paper trail simply because they are worth less than the paper would cost. For example, I bought the coin below in the early 1960's probably for $2 because that was the price I usually had to pay for junk denarii from a dish on the counter of a walk up coin shop in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana. I do not know the date, name of the shop or the old man who ran it. He had hundreds of coins (maybe thousands) including many that were, like this, not identified other than a tag in the dish that said $2 each. Now, I am expected to be able to prove where it came from? Coins like this allowed high school kids like me to collect genuine Roman coins for less than the price of a tank of gasoline (about a quarter per gallon then but tanks were bigger) or all the White Castle hamburgers I could down. Today, gas is more, burgers are more and coins are more but it still costs time/money to record every sale to the level that those who would destroy the hobby expect. It costs the same to do the paperwork on a $50 coin as on a $5000 coin. If the minimum price of all coins is inflated by ridiculous tracking requirements, there will be no kids getting interested in a hobby where the papers cost more than the coins.


I bought this one instead of the other hundred odd coins in the pickout pot so it is the one that got photographed first in 1963. The others are now to be considered 'new finds' because they were bought by other kids who don't even remember the little I do about the provenance. Yes, I did buy this one because it was an overstrike. I was just as weird in the 60's as I am today. I do not have a receipt stating I bought a Domna over Commodus from XYZ Coin in 1960 for $2. I never thought to ask whether this or other coins in that pot came from an old collection or fresh from the dirt. At that time, 'Politically Correct' was more a matter of whether you thought Nixon should have given back his dog Checkers. Coins were not on the radar.

 

A couple of years ago I was working with a metal detecting club in the UK to help identify their finds. Based on that work, it appears to me that more and more coins, including hoards, are found every year by amateurs. And with many more detectorists clubs working worldwide, I doubt we've seen the last of new finds.

 

An interesting thread. This topic, and others related to it, are being debated right now by many dealers. We will never know the answers to the question of hoards (at least not to everyones satisfaction).

Yes, hoards are still coming to market but at a hugely and significantly decreased number. One can easily mistake old collections (or inventories) as a 'new' hoard. I know many collectors and dealers who have been sitting on vast numbers of coins. To what end, I dont know. Some dont care, some dont wish to sell for various reasons, some are waiting for their 'right time' to sell. Many never will, and their heirs will be the ones to handle that issue.

This lack of hoards and fresh material is what it making many dealers very nervous at the moment. Many will not survive these new changes in the market. The majority of material is being consigned by collectors to dealers and auction houses big and small. Sales via fixed prices are rapidly becoming a thing of the past (though they are still a great resource for those willing to spend the time looking).

Each dealer is now competing for the same fewer and fewer coins and consignors.

As for that article quoted above, I agree with Doug. It is quite biased and ignores the fact that nearly all of the knowledge we currently have about numismatics was gained by collectors and dealers. Archaeologists primarily use coins as a dating tool and have always been largely ignored (at least in the past).