Your Most Interesting Coin

Surfing Cows...

Why? Was this a Race of Intelligent Beings that were worshipped by Early Man? What made them surf the waves on our planet? Did they come from a Water Planet that Intelligent Cows arose?

It is an Interesting Mystery to me.

Or, I have so many coins that I think are very interesting (virtually ALL of them), and have NO WAY that I could just select ONE.


Thrace Byzantion AR Half-Siglos bull-dolphin-incuse 340-320 BCE

 

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Countermarks can be pretty interesting, although many of them are not very well documented, so just why they are interesting is lost to time.

This one has some story still adhering to it, according to David Sear - Gaulish threats and economic crisis!



Byzantion Drachm
CM on Macedonian Kingdom Philip III Arrhidaios drachm
Kolophon? (c. 323-319 B.C.)
Countermark: 280-225 B.C.
Head of Herakles right, wearing lion-skin. / FILIPPOU Zeus seated left, monogram (?) left.
Countermark: ΠU over prow.
SCGV 1585 (countermark)
(4.00 grams / 17 mm)

This BY over prow countermark, along with a nearly identical (one) using an archaic form of B resembling Π, was used at Byzantium.

David Sear notes, "at this time [after c. 280 B.C.], the Byzantines were subject to continual threats by Gaulish invaders, who were bought off by the payment of huge annual tributes. The impoverished city had to resort to countermarking foreign coins in place of a proper currency."
(FORVM note)

 

@Algerandron, feel free to take this as a rhetorical question, but Where do you find these pictures?!!?
The coin is cool too, BTW, along with @Marsyas Mike's equally cool complement.

 

I am always taking pics of interesting life encounters. That is why my coin pics are terrible.

 

I find interest and beauty in most of my coins. Even the good, bad and downright ugly. Sometimes, especially the ugly.

 

@Pishpash, about all you said, it just Gets to be true!

 

Ok not ancient but it is my most interesting coin. You made me open the safe for this one lol... I love the thought that Einstein could have handled this particular dime, but I don't think i would have wanted to keep it in my pocket after it was freshly exposed and yes that is a leaded glass and lead case it's in lol

 

Be careful with those irradiated dimes!

I had one as a kid; put it in a box for 15 years and when I checked on it again, it was a nickel.

 

...Shoot, reminds me of some kind of 'museum' I went to, as a kid (c. late '60's-early '70's), about the Hanford nuclear reactor, where some of the plutonium for the bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki came from. There was a candy machine, where you could get some kind of prototypical 'atomic fireballs.' I distinctly remember that, in the machine, they were all colored red. I kind of said, "Nope, Thanks, but...."

 

Well this is definitely my most interesting coin. I think I posted this twice last year - so just scroll by if you've seen it - sorry! There are quite a few new members here now so I thought I would share it again..

I hope @Ancient Aussie doesn't mind me starting with his excellent coin as an example of how this coin should be look.. I could have just grabbed one off VCoins but I really like @Ancient Aussie 's example here (great details - what a patina!!!):



Below is my much more modest example with an unusual minting error - most probably showing that the legends were cut by a different person than the artist cutting the Temple image:



As you can see the " S C " is reversed and the word "CLVSIT" (meaning closed) is at the 12 o'clock position ... as opposed the the @Ancient Aussie 's coin... with "CLVSIT" at the 6 o'clock position...

Inverting my coin shows the legend in the correct alignment.. and the "SC" makes more sense.. showing that multiple cutters most probably worked on the same die... the wires got crossed in this example..



Nero. A.D. 54-68. Æ as. 9.7 gm. 28 mm. Rome mint. Struck circa A.D. 67. His laureate head right; IMP NERO CAESAR AVG GERM / The Temple of Janus, garland hung across closed doors to left, latticed windows on right; PACE P R VBIQ PARTA IANVM CLVSIT around; S C to either side. Sear 689. The doors of the Temple of Janus were only closed during times of peace throughout the Roman Empire. This was not a frequent occurrence. Nero was the only emperor to depict the temple on coins, and the fact that the doors are shown as closed is most likely a political statement.

I think this one was around $25 on eBay - one of my better buys!

 

A very interesting coin indeed.

Where would we collectors be without dyslexic die engravers!

 

Ah, you mean these?


I have a bag of them in the cupboard. They're super hot cinnamon jaw breakers. They've been around for decades, though I think the quality has declined somewhat nowadays.

 

Funny - and True - if the "S-C" was the only issue with the coin you may have a point... but can't be the case here...

 

I have never understood the resistance to the idea that several workers worked on the same die. I am not a mintmaster but, if I were, I would have (at least) four sets of engravers. One would do letters, a second would be beginners tasked with cutting rough portraits removing large amounts of metal so the third group of more experienced cutters could add the fine details. The last would do reverse scenes. We might add absolute beginners whose work would be polishing and layout lines. Managing the work of a team is always most efficient when individuals are tasked with jobs they can handle and work up to things of greater importance. Wasting the time of a master portrait cutter doing menial tasks just does not make sense.

 

Here's one of my more interesting types from the waning years of the Empire:

Zenonis, wife of Basiliscus (476-477 AD) : 9mm, 0.9gms

The monogram itself is actually quite clear in hand but pretty much no obverse design at all. Not sure quality control was of much importance in that time.

 

That's them, alright. The weird thing was that what was in this candy machine was supposed to have been literally radiated in some way or other. Sorry; forgot that part.

 

So, the half-life is 15 years?

 

Just making a joke The half life of Radium is actually 1600 years

 

Soo hard to choose!
If you made me, I'd probably have to choose this one. This is a hemidrachm from the city of Parion in Mysia. The outstanding variety in this series make it in my opinion quite hard to find an example with good centering and quality dies. I bought this retail about a year ago and I find myself just staring at it sometimes..
Like someone else pointed out earlier in the thread, its astounding they poured so much effort into the art of such a small coin. I love it.

AR Hemidrachm. ca 4th c.BC. Greece Mysia, Parion
Catalog: SNG France 1380; SNG von Aulock 7423.
Material: Silver
Weight: 2.42 g
Diameter: 13.28 mm
Facing gorgoneion / Cow standing left, head reverted; bukranion below. ΠΑ / ΡΙ

From a private Swiss collector. Acquired in march 2006 at the Numismata International coin fair in Munich.

 

Yes, I understand that. I was following up on your Dime going to a Nickel in 15 years... hence, my asking if the half life of an irradiated Dime devolving to a Nickel is 15 years...