Featured My process for quickly attributing Early American Coppers

Someone asked me how I attributed large cents so quickly. I thought I would share my process with everyone to hopefully help those who find it a struggle.

1. (Green) Device styles. The style of the devices can quickly narrow down varieties, such as style 1 and 2 hair, or reverse of 1794/5/7, or stems/stemless, or shapes of the bow, or even the numbers of leaves in the various bunches around the wreath on the reverse.

2. (Orange) Clear die markers. These include die cracks, die chips, cuds, clashes, die sinking, and even die rotation. Such diagnostics can often narrow down possible varieties to 1 or a few more if the die was used on different varieties. Memorizing these will allow you to make attributions far more quickly.

3. (Red) Number/letter styles. This can be useful to determine large/small dates, large/small fractions, narrow down 1798 varieties, or even identify dateless 1793 cents.

4. (Yellow) Letter relationships. The positions of BERT in LIBERTY of the obverse relative to the hair curls are very useful in excluding many varieties. On the reverse, the positions of letters relative to leaf tips is equally useful. Some years in the early dates and most of the late dates had very little variation in letter relationships, so this step is of limited use for them.

5. (Blue) Number relationships. The position of the date can really help narrow down varieties by looking at the curvature of the date, closeness of the numerals, any abnormal skewing, and relation to the bust. On higher-grade specimens, the relation to dentils can be compared as well, though I rarely do this. On the reverse, the fraction is very useful in narrowing down varieties, perhaps even more useful than the date. When looking at the fractions, compare the fraction’s relationship to the ribbons, the height of the numerator relative to the ribbon/fraction bar, the spacing of the denominator, the length/orientation of the fraction bar, and the fraction bar’s position relative to the numerals. Sometimes the fraction is so distinctive that I pursue it first.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

My technique is a bit more haphazard.
If there are only a few varieties (4 or less), then I try to find the variety that it IS.
If there are 5 or more then I try to determine the varieties it CAN'T be. That leaves me with fewer coins that require a deeper investigation.

 

That’s what steps 1-3 do. Limit the number of potential varieties it could be. In many cases, steps 1-3 will limit to well less than 10 potential varieties, and some cases it will be limited to just 1.

Steps 4 and 5 will do both determining what it is and isn’t. When you find a very similar variety, You have make sure it isn’t any of the other varieties that were not excluded by steps 1-3.

 

Can you make your 1st post into a refrigerator magnet?

 

???

 

My technique is based on 50+ years experience with early copper and a wealth of great attribution books and images...

 

Disregard...I printed it out and stuck it in my book.
I'm new at copper so I found that very interesting.