I don't know much about this and was hoping for some opinions (thanks in advance). Sicily, Akragas (480-470 BC) AR Didrachm 20.17 mm, 8.80 g Westermark, Coinage, Group IV; HGC 2, 97.
Laminations are not raised on the coin. Die breaks are. I'm going to suggest that both are present but I would not call it a lamination. More like a defective planchet or a chunk of extra silver placed on a planchet to bring up its weight into tolerance. Then struck with a broken die.
Looks like an edge chip that probably occurred during the strike. The lines on the obverse do look superficial, therefore a flan lamination.
The excess metal is from a broken die. Here is another from the same broken die. The deep lines that look like scratches are traces of an overstrike
Wow, thanks for finding this! A couple of questions: When you say die break, do you mean die "crack"? And I'm confused about your use of the word overstrike. Are you saying it was struck over another coin? Thanks.
pprp, posted: "The excess metal is from a broken die. Here is another from the same broken die. The deep lines that look like scratches are traces of an overstrike." The raised line of metal resulted when planchet metal squashed into a crack in the die. The die was broken forming a die crack on the coin. I disagree about the overstrike. I cannot think of any design that would be like that and in that position on a coin.
Yes a crack in the concave die means that there will be some excess metal on the imprint it leaves. Overstruck means they used a coin of similar weight and not a blank flan. Here are a couple of overstruck examples from akragas. And one overstruck coin from my collection
pprp, posted: "...Overstruck means they used a coin of similar weight and not a blank flan. Here are a couple of overstruck examples..." View attachment 1146567 View attachment 1146568 These two are nice examples of overstruck coins.
