Hi, I recently won this beautiful Ptolemy bronze on eBay: It was listed as AE27 Ptolemy V Epiphanes, year 3 (SNG 533). After doing some further research I found few examples on acsearch.info: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=3321124 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=1575846 Both have the K behind the head left ΩΣ, to right LΓ. The first one is attributed to Kleopatra III & Ptolemy IX Soter II (Lathyros). The second one is attributed to Ptolemy V Epiphanes (as in SNG 533). More recent opinion tend to attribute this one to Ptolemy IX. What is your opinion? And of course, what do you think about the authenticity of this one based on these photos? Thanks in advance
@Hookman I'm no expert with these coins, but it seems the majority of the Ptolemaic bronzes have these round depressions in the middle - possibly for centering or to keep the die from shifting?
I'm no expert, either, but it looks like a repaired hole to me. If it's for keeping the coin centered, it doesn't do a very good job, does it? There are many members on Coin Talk !! who know much, much more about ancient coins than I do.
According to the Ptolemy coin project its Ptolemy IX & Cleopatra III - L gamma year 3 - catalog Svoronos 1193 Almost all Ptolemy bronze coins have depressions on obverse and reverse from the lathe machine. here's an exception:
http://ptolemybronze.com/ptolemy_series.html If we had a nickel for every time this website has been recommended here on CT, we could buy a fake EID MAR denarius. I agree with CNG. Use the information found on the Ptolemaic Bronze project and ignore sellers who don't (possibly owning an old book?). The coin in question is listed 3/4 way down the page at the far right of the Ptolemy IX et al listings. Yours is by far the prettiest I have seen to the point I worry about it being too good to be true on eBay. Who sold it on eBay? Later coins tend to be less well made. I see the head as Zeus not Heracles but I am no expert. 19.6-21.2mm - 9.2gm - 12h Bearded Heracles obverse with K behind head, possibly off flan here Omega/Sigma at left, L/Gamma at right - Year 3, 114BC Sv 1191 Ptolemy IX & Cleopatra III Sometimes it seems we are just wasting our time here. The Ptolemy Bronze site is huge and more detailed than interests me. Read it anyway. http://ptolemybronze.com/ The link I gave first in this reply is the first on the home page. There are twenty pages linked below it. Consider looking at them, too.
Thanks for the info, according to this website your description is accurate... it's a pretty coin, I'm glad to have it. Have a nice weekend.
The coin Doug shows is an obol (9,3 gram) = Svoronos 1191 with a mix of Zeus-Heracles lion scalp. Your coin is a diobol (17,8 gram = Svoronos 1193 with Zeus Ammon (ram horns) and yes your coin is authentic
The ptolemybronze.com site specifically because the attribution of those types of coins is difficult. It has become the 'first stop' for identifying them by beginners and experts, too. There has also been a software program that automates the process that's been available for almost 10 years now. These tools save having to wade through giant reference books (you think that web site is complex? - try attributing a coin using the 'online' partially translated Svoronos reference book . Fortunately, for at least Ptolemy 1 - 4 there are new books by Catharine Lorber with nice color plates, which are much better than Svoronos and are also easily available by an experienced writer in excellent English. The ptolemybronze site is so widely used that folks often post its (clearly posted) copyrighted pictures and descriptions here without even crediting the site and at least one participant even lifted one of the photos for their identification image. The site is maintained and updated and you can use it FREE so obviously your support and crediting it when you use it are appreciated by its author. There is also a facebook page for the site with over 1300 followers from dozens of countries around the globe. There are no 'centration' dimples, rather the dimples have nothing to do with 'centration' (centration of what?) and they're seldom in the center (nor even in the same place on both sides). Sometimes there are more than one. They're caused by mechanical devices used to prepare crudely cast metal disks (flans, planchets) for striking - a technology introduced about 265BC, later seen used on some Seleukid and other coins. This is not news and has been discussed many times in online forums. The obsession with 'which ptolemy made this coin' has been mentioned earlier and may be essentially meaningless for these most of these Ptolemaic bronze coinages. Some can be associated with a single ruler but many others can't - think of them as the 'Lincoln cents' of their time, without dates We have zero evidence that any of these types started production the day after a particular Ptolemy took the throne and ceased the day the next one did. The 'ruler envy' obsession misses the point of the functions of these coins in the context of their time. There are indeed two denominations of the coins with the LG an LD dates on the right side of the eagle. The larger one has Zeus (original post in this thread), usually with a K behind the head. The smaller one has Heracles in lionskin headdress. The reason recent 'opinion' favors Ptolemy IX is because there is actual evidence from coin finds of these bronzes with tetradrachms of Ptolemy IX. The discovery wasn't known to Svoronos who included them among coins of Ptolemy V. Fortunately numismatics can adapt to improve the coin attributions when new evidence comes to light. Always a bit mysterious why folks keep secret the basic info about a coin they want identified, regardless of the type, but these types almost always *REQUIRE* knowing the size and weight *and* seeing the pictures of both sides. Pictures alone can result in comments and such but seldom will permit identification of the coin. There *are* fakes and fantasy tokens that look like Ptolemaic coins. For those who want to take things to the next level there is a rich (mostly) freely available modern literature on Ptolemaic bronze coins with papers published in the ANS journal, Numismatic Chronicle, Israel Numismatic Research and other peer-reviewed journals. You can find a lot of these texts on the pages of their authors on academia.edu It's pretty easy to search around there using related words like 'Ptolemy' . PtolemAE
