I picked up this cache of 194 late roman bronze pieces for $375 last year. Curious to get an opinion from the forum members if this was worthwhile or not. The seller actually cleaned the coins prior to selling them as an example of how uncleaned coins represent a great opportunity to acquire some interesting coins if you are willing to spend some time (and elbow grease) to clean them. Didn't come from ebay but actually an outlet in the U.K. that specialized in selling "complete hoards with nothing picked out." I haven't really attributed them yet but I can see a lot of Constantine and sons, Arcadius, Valentinian, Theodosius, and other LRB types. So, without further adieu, here's the photo. Plus, as you can see, they came in a nice velvet drawstring bag resembling a coin purse. If you would like to share experiences buying uncleaned hoards I'm all ears. These days I am just buying individual coins.
I think the natural conclusion is that these all have the same recurring types over and over.... I would not be surprised if nothing was picked out, but I would think they were looked through and if something interesting was there it would be taken out. I think most would prefer to spend $400 on 1 or a few select coins.
I doubt that these coins were all from one hoard. You don't usually find the mix of emperors that you have. Some of the patinas even look different in the photo. These look like the typical coins that have been looked through many times by many people. I also would call many of the coins I can see culls. I would feel guilty for selling the ones I can see for more than around 50 cents. I have a large jar full of coins like this...I call it the slug jar. below is the jar of coins...I don't even sell these, I give them away.
A big problem with uncleaned coins is that they stop being uncleaned when you clean them. They stop being unsearched when you look them over hoping to find something interesting. What was once a group filled with hope became a pile of losing lottery tickets. Were they once worth $2 a coin in a group that size? Possibly, but that matters not anymore. Would you rather have these chipped 'factory seconds' or 20-40 of the least expensive coins sold by John Anthony here on his Coin Talk sales? My opinion on that question is meaningless. Yours counts.
Whilst wandering through e-bay, I still stop to ruminate over uncleaned ancients, but I stifle myself.
I am working on some 'uncleaned' coins that @Victor_Clark sent to me recently to see what I can do with them. I have almost finished the first pass over each of them. There are a couple of quite interesting coins (something I have not seen before would probably not cause you guys to take a second look!). And soon - maybe around the holidays when there is no 'real' work coming in at all, I'll post what I have been doing with them.
$2 for a coin that's between 1,600 and 1,800 years old? Of course it's worth it! Plus the fun you have picking through them and trying to ID them? A no-brainer, as far as I'm concerned. No, of course you won't have anything spectacular to add to your collection. That's not why you bought these. That's like saying you wasted your money buying that new bicycle because it doesn't have air conditioning. Maybe you'll end up keeping one or two. What about the rest? Give them to trick-or-treaters next Halloween. Many of them will be thrilled when you assure them that they are real. And it's a lot better than poisoning their young bodies with sugar.
I've actually mailed some free uncleaned coins to folks on the Forum who PM'd me about them, so I'm already giving some of them away, and I like the idea of handing them out to trick-or-treaters. When I was a kid there was an old lady on our street that handed out pennies to the kids.
You reminded me, @ancient coin hunter, that I need to take the boy and his buddy upstairs some treats - I thought about world coins and wheat cents but had not considered ancients. I think they are old enough to appreciate them - if I include a note explaining what they are. I'll get that done!
There were 36 Fel Temp Reparatio coins out of 194, I counted them today after spending some time attributing the coins this morning. So, pretty cool. The mint workers under Constantius II certainly were busy churning out these coins!
Please do not take this as insulting or mean, but that has to rank with the geekiest things I have ever heard of...don't get me wrong, I love it, I just doubt the response.
