Hey everyone I lurk here all the time but I never bring myself to post. I really enjoy this forum and have learned a ton. I just got a new coin that I’m suspicious of and was hoping you could help me out. I just received the Trajan denarius in the first image. The second image is a coin I found in a previous auction on Bertolami. I don’t think they are the same exact coin but now I’m suspicious that they are fakes. Am I correct to be suspicious? Thanks everyone.
The cuts being in the same position, the same edge beads being worn away on both coins and the same wear on the “C” in COS on the reverse. I’m by no means an expert so I could be way off on this.
The edge actually looks good to me and I don’t see any casting bubbles so by itself, I wouldn’t necessarily suspect anything.
The one from the Bertolami auction has an extra piece coming off the edge at about 4 o’clock on the obverse that doesn’t exist on my coin.
I was hoping the edge lump was taken off the photo of your coin suggesting they are the same coin. Unless there is evidence on your coin that a lump was removed there, I fear both are fake.
I don’t see any evidence on the edge that a lump was removed. I tried to look for that because that was my hope as well. It’s too bad because I was pretty excited about this coin. Hopefully the seller is willing to work with me when I show him this evidence.
Here’s another sale with same or nearly same coin: 95 euro (not including fees) in the Savoca 23rd Silver Auction 535 27.06.2018. Description Roman Imperial Trajan AD 98-117. Rome Denarius AR 18mm., 2,79g. IMP CAES NERVA TRAIAN AVG GERM, laureate head right / P M TR P COS II P P, Victory seated holding patera and palm. nearly extremely fine RIC 10. I’d be curious to check the weight on your coin.
Thanks guys. Sulla, good find. I believe that one is my coin as that is the exact weight I get as well - 2.79g.
I hope you bought yours from a reputable dealer. If so, you should have no difficulty returning it for a refund. Good luck, and let us know how things turn out.
The seller is someone I trust. I talked to them last night and they are going to make it right. They are also going to go back to the auction house that they purchased the coin from to try to get them to make it right.
Thank you for posting this. I find these kinds of posts to be very instructive, although I am sorry this turned out to be a fake. I am rather puzzled why a denarius of Trajan would be the object of such energetic fakery - it seems to be a fairly common type? RIC 10? Welcome to Coin Talk!
I agree that it seems odd that such effort was put into faking a pretty common denarius. I wish I was better at spotting fakes. There is no way I could have identified this as fake without finding a copy of it.
It looks to me like the Savoka and your coin are casts of the Bertolami original. In both of the former, at least from the pictures, it looks like the flan crack doesn't go through the entire coin, yet the Bertolami one does. They are excellent fakes though, I would certainly be fooled without comparing them.
