An obviously bad fake to one person is not so obvious to another...it's all relative. The second example posted in this thread was obviously bad to me...to others, not so much.
Sadly, Savoca is selling the forgery again, on 25 Nov. https://www.biddr.ch/auctions/savoca/browse?a=400&l=390812
That is unconscionable. I will be contacting them about this, you can be sure. Absolutely unacceptable!! If they don't pull the coin I will never bid in a Savoca auction ever again and I hope others will join me.
We need to know one thing before being too hard on this forger. Is this fake his PhD thesis or his homework in kindergarten? OK, the snake did not need doors and the star could have been better but does he have others that make this one look sad? I would love to own the coin especially since you can ID the original type. Not for $294 but certainly for $2.94. Hand cut makeovers are an art, however evil, I suspect this is not the last or best coin from the hand. I still like my Zenobia toolie. She was $12 or so.
Please share the outcome after you've contacted them. It was heartbreaking the 1st time to read it was a fake and they put it back for sale after that!?I purchase from them now and again...maybe not anymore.
Before we go out with our pitchforks....I have re-read the thread carefully. There was nothing in there about @Severus Alexander 's example being sold by anyone the first time around. Just that he bought it, he didn't say where it came from. As such we need to be a bit easy on Savoca as we dont know anything about the circumstances of the coin coming to their auction. It may be that they were simply fooled like most others. Who knows? They may disagree and believe it is genuine. There are many things to consider especially as we really dont know (essentially) any details. I think it is harsh to condemn them at this point (and no, I have no affiliation with them, nor have I ever consigned anything to them). They are my competitors in this business but we all make mistakes and I would prefer they be given the benefit of doubt. Give them a chance to make it good, that's all I say.
I agree with Ryro, Severus. Please share the outcome, and I will join you in the action you take. Hopefully it's just an honest mistake.
@Ken Dorney, you're right, this wasn't clear from the earlier discussion. I originally bought it from Savoca, and pointed them to this very thread containing Victor Clark's expert opinion. I had a discussion with them about what might be done to prevent the coin from coming back on the market. They said there wasn't anything they could do, as they had to send it back to the consignor undamaged. At no point did they suggest the coin might be genuine, but seemed to fully accept that it was a fake. Maybe they were just following the policy that the customer is always right, and have some really good reason for supposing that Victor is wrong. Or maybe the coin came back through their system from the same consignor and it wasn't picked up that it was the same coin. In other words, I still think we should give them the benefit of the doubt... but I must say that the possible scenarios in which this turns out to be good judgement or an honest mistake are dwindling.
What happens when the consigning customer and the purchasing customer disagree? An auction house is dependent of a steady flow of material to sell. Some of them have professional staffs; some of them have phone answerers and lot packagers. I suspect most of the long term and fully professional houses have a drawer of things they ended up buying themselves when it turned out they made a mistake. We all make mistakes. Those who make the same mistake repeatedly bring into question the level of professional judgement we all have the right to demand for the additional price we pay for their services. Lately we have seen reputable old names fall from grace under new managements. A couple fell from 'always trust' to 'never touch' in short order. Keeping up with such things makes it easier to limit the sources from which you buy.
I wrote them about it, linked to this thread, and they wrote back that they agreed it was fake and had withdrawn it. That's good.
Dear colleagues and collectors, we relisted the coin as our numismatics were sure our coin (not the one from 2015 as it seems to be a copy with a different corrosion and a cast bubble next to the chi-rho) was genuine. After a long research we came to the same conclusion that you did. The coin is fake. We want to apologize that we put the coin in our auction again. We are very focused in not selling any fakes and it was a big discussion in our office today. We try always our best to detect fakes and we are sorry for the mistake we did. Thank you all, especially Mr. Clark and Severus Alexander, for helping. The coin stays withdrawn and we will also not return it to the consignor, so we make sure the coin will not appear anymore at the market. If you have further questions feel free to contact us. We wish you all a nice weekend. Best regards, Savoca Coins
Savoca wrote to me saying the same thing. @Savoca: thank you for doing the right thing!! I am especially pleased that you are retaining the coin for your "black cabinet," as a service to the hobby. Well done.