Coin #1 - Guess the CTer 2021

Welcome to Round 1 of Guess the CTer 2021. For the latest updates on the game and to review the clues to the possible prizes please check out the master thread.

[Ancients] Guess the Cointalker 2021 (Master Thread)

Coin #1

Prolemaic Kings of Egypt
Ptolemy II Philadelphos
AE Obol, Alexandria mint, struck ca. 260s-246 BC
Dia.: 24 mm
Wt.: 10.43 g

Why I Added the Coin to my Collection
I don't often add greek coins to my collection, appart from the occasionnal bronze and the very rare silver, but when I saw this portrait of Alexander III wearing elephant skin, I immediately knew I had to have it. It's not a thoughtful purchase, i.e. the coin that would be part of a project, but really a kind of "that coin talks to me, listen !" buy.

Even though I had to throw in much more than the average coin of this type would cost, I think it's worth every penny, due to the exquisite engraving, preservation and patina. A real gem in hand.

How the Game Works
I have enlisted the participation of four well known CoinTalk members (plus myself). Each of us has submitted a photo of a coin that we have never posted to the forum along with a brief description of why we included the coin in our collections. See below for the list of members who have agreed to participate.

@Parthicus
@Curtisimo
@Cucumbor
@bcuda
@Theodosius

The goal of the game will be for members to try and match each coin with its owner (one of the 5 members listed above). There will be a separate thread for each coin posted every 3 days and each thread will produce a winner. The winner’s name will be chosen at random from the participants in the thread but you can earn multiple chances to win based on the following rules.

1. Guess who the owner of the coin is and give a reason why you think that. (Ex.: I believe that this coin belongs to Curtisimo because he once gave himself a concussion trying to skateboard down a half pipe without ever practicing.) This is the minimum requirement for entry into the drawing. You must post a comment for your guess to be counted. Please include a reason with your guess.
2. Anyone who posts a photo of an ancient coin along with their guess (related or not) will receive an extra chance to win.
3. Anyone who gives a particularly well thought out or amusing reason why you guessed a certain person will receive an extra chance to win.
4. Anyone who guesses correctly will receive an extra chance to win.
5. Anyone who is a young numismatist (age 18 or younger) will receive an extra chance to win. If you are a YN please say so in your entry post.

In total there can be up to 5 chances to win for each member in each thread!

A Note to the Volunteers
If you would like to follow along with the results of the poll feel free to vote for yourself or at random.

A Note to Poll Voters
The poll option is intended just for fun. To have your guess counted you MUST comment in the thread.

 

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I think this is @Cucumbor because the image quality is the exact same as the coins in his 2020 coins post also the spacing between the outsides and between the coin is near enough the same.

Heres a coin of crispus i picked up recently for £4

 

Oof,
Here goes nothing......literally since I have no solid thoughts on whose coin this may be.


That being said, I will go out on a limb and make a guess as to who owns this beautiful masterpiece. That guess goes to.....@Parthicus.

Reason? Because I said so. Also, I know that he happens to deal almost exclusively with Persian, Indo Greek, and other coins of the Near East.

I did some post sleuthing and went back through almost 6 whole pages (before something shiny caught my eye) of his posts and saw nary a post of anything Greek.

Since he is clearly a man of exquisite taste, I can't see him passing up such a beautiful coin. Also, since Egypt was controlled by the Persians several different types in the BCs, I can see him making an exception for this coin.

There you have it folks. The mystery is solved.



For a coin, I present to you this little Alexander III that FFIVN and I bought at a local show. Poor guy is not nearly as handsome as OP coin. He seems to have come down with a bit of flesh eating zombification disease. Either way, he still holds a place of honor in our collection.



Alexander III
AE 17
325-310 AD
Macedonian mint
Obverse: Head of Herakles right, wearing lionskin
reverse: Club above bowcase. BA in centre with thunderbolt between the letters.

 

Excellent. Thank you for being the first to post @Yorkshire !

For the benefit of all guessers on this and future rounds I will confess that I re-mounted all of the coins on a plain black background to make sure the background of the photos wasn’t a dead give away.

 

I believe this is Theodosius, because of the remark about rarely buying Greek coins. As for taste for coins, all of them have it and it could be any of the above.

I’ll take the opportunity to post new pics of my Syracuse tet, which I’m increasingly fond of.

 

Even though @furryfrog02 makes a compelling argument as to the ownership of this particular coin, I believe that this coin belongs to @Theodosius. Why do I believe this coin belongs to him? I have a 20% percent chance of guessing correctly, and I figured that I'd have a better chance of guessing correctly than winning a $1 on a cheap lotto scratcher.

Anyway, here's the obligatory ancient coin, and it's the first Alexandrian Tetradrachm that I've ever bought. However, due to inclement weather and icy roads, I doubt that I'll receive it this week.


Probus
Potin Tetradrachm of Alexandria.
Year 7=281/282 AD.
Obverse: A K M AVΡ ΠΡOBOC CEB, laureate cuirassed bust right
Reverse: L-Z, eagle standing left, head right with wreath in its beak.
Dattari 5555, Emmett 3984.

 

I am honoured Sir, to be the first person you think about when seeing this beautiful coin, thank you !

Q

 

I feel like this is a great idea for a contest and I really enjoy being able to participate, I think this guessing game will be very fun! So, after saying that I qualify as a YN, I'd like to go forth and attribute this coin to @Cucumbor; firstly, because Greek coins are a bit out of his collecting area, though my main reason for this choice, albeit a bit of a silly one, is that the description of the coin uses the word "appart" instead of "apart", and, out of the five volunteers who took part in the contest, he is the only one to have used it in his posts, and multiple times as well.

I don't have any coin with an eagle, but I can add this one which also features an animal:

Gallienus (253-268), Antoninianus, Rome mint.
Obverse: GALLIENVS AVG, radiate head right;
Reverse: LIBERO P CONS AVG, panther walking left. B in exergue;
RIC 230

 

Seeing that Curtis recently posted a handsome Greco-Egyptian Tet & is using it as his CT ID, I'll guess this handsome bronze is his coin . Posted below is my favorite RR denarius .


Q. Antonius Balbus, 83-82 BC, Rome Mint, AR denarius: 19 mm, 4.07 gm, 5 h.

 

A massive exit-wound might be a more apt description, at least in my opinion

 

Pretty obvs what's going on here; Curtisimo the Great(ish) saw my version of this coin and just had to have it!
Unable to find one in minty green, he opted for chocolate (always about food with this one):


I'd love to say that I am shocked, but come on, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.
And, no, no. This isn't due to that skateboarding accident he had as a lad, this is just my good taste rubbing off on a CT fan...I mean pal
Also, despite being Greek (ish), it is rare for him to post many Greek coins. So frustrating! I had a buddy growing up, half Greek half Italian, with the last name of Lampropolous. He used to hate it and get embarrassed. I always said, "Man, you have the coolest last name since Barca!" (means lightning bolt)
Anyways, here is a conversation he and I had the other day that shows I have solved his riddle:

Curtisimo as The Man in Black: You're trying to trick me into giving away something — it won't work.
Ryro as Vizzini: It has worked! You've given everything away!

Did you really think you could pull this one over on me?

 

What do you mean I’m all about food? Oh wait... you might be on to something...


https://www.cointalk.com/threads/tr...y-of-the-river-god.318843/page-2#post-3118142




https://www.cointalk.com/threads/ancients-curtisimo’s-epic-holiday-giveaway-game-2017.306505/#post-2933110

 

I was going to say Zumbly before I saw who the celebrity guests were.

This coin is also from Alexandria:

 

Dammit, I'm getting hungry now ! It's dinner time here in Churchville, NY .

 

My guess is that this wonderful coin belongs to @Curtisimo; the style and font of the description is the one that he usually uses, as well as the black background

Ptolemaic Kingdom. Ptolemy I Soter, as satrap struck in the name of Alexander III of Macedon.

Alexandria, ca. 310-305 BC
Svoronos no. 146, pl. 5a, 7; SNG Copenhagen 18;

Ob.: Head of the deified Alexander to right, wearing diadem and elephant skin headdress, scaly aegis around neck, and horn of Ammon on his forehead; tiny ∆ before elephant's ear. Dotted border
Rev.: AΛΕΞΑΝΔΡ[ΟΥ] Athena Alkidemos advancing r., hurling spear with her r. hand and with shield over her extended l. arm; to right, monogram ΑI and monogram ΔΟΦ above eagle with closed wings standing on thunderbolt. ΠA monogram in left field. Dotted border

​

 

@Cucumbor seldom goes Greek, but when he does, he'd knock it out of the park with just such a beauty. He does the same with all the coins he collects. The man just has infuriatingly good taste.

Here's a much later Alexandrian.


CLAUDIUS II GOTHICUS
Potin Tetradrachm. 9.24g, 22.7mm. EGYPT, Alexandria, RY 2 (AD 269/270). Emmett 3881; Dattari 5388. O: Laureate, draped and cuirassed bust right. R: Elpis standing left, holding flower and raising skirt; L-B in field.
Ex E.E. Clain-Stefanelli Collection

 

I'm flattered... and would be more than happy to receive that coin into my collection once its owner is done using it for this contest.

 

I believe this coin was purchased by @Cucumbor . It is a wonderful coin, and though it may be out of his collection focus, he has put thought into bringing it into his pecuniary entourage.

I am posting as a YN... although the Avatar shows 61, I am dyslexic and it is actually 16.

I posted this GREEN coin in honor of the Mars projects at the planet now. Even though Mars is the RED planet, I grew up thinking there were little GREEN men living there.

The Roman Republic Litra has a little Green Man called MARS.


Roman Republic
Anonymous Moneyer
AE Litra
241-235 BCE
Mars Beardless
Horse Head
GREEN
Crawford 25-3, Sear 594

 

Last year when I was a volunteer, I went to a lot of trouble rephotographing my entry so it would not look like I shot the photo. This year, I'm not a volunteer and have no idea what coin I could be sure I have not used in the last ten years. If I were a volunteer, I'd be tempted to cheat since the last coin I bought about two months ago no longer belongs to me. Going back earlier in the history of my collecting for the bonus qualifying coin I will post the coin holding my catalog number 0001. It was not my first coin but it was the first in the Greek first sequence of the coin I had back in 1987 when I did my first computer catalog requiring I number the coins then in my collection. I bought this one sometime before that (but not long before that) at a coin show in New Carrolton MD which is a place I doubt I could find anymore but then had some really nice local coin shows. It is an AR hemidrachm from Elis and part of the Achaean League series (my few Greeks were alphabetical in 1987).


I'll bet you thought I was going to forget to enter by saying whose coin this is. You almost were right. I guess #1 belongs to Cucumbor because it is a nice coin and he is a fine gentleman of excellent taste. Note how I dissed the four other volunteers. Sorry, guys. You might be fine gentlemen, too, but for the purpose of this guess, I am giving this honor to Q. The coin does not fit my idea of what Q collects so that suggests he might be quite likely the guilty party. My only decision now is whether I should select Q for the next four as well guaranteeing a 20% score.

I just thought: May I claim the YN bonus if I show a coin I bought when I was a YN? I still own three I had before I was graduated from high school in 1964. This Julia Domna is one. Can't blame a guy for trying???

 

@Cucumbor because it's a fantastic coin (merveilleux, formidable!) with a superb portrait, he mostly focuses on Roman (and Dombes of course!), and I will add to @Claudius_Gothicus's excellent point about spelling that the same thing applies to "occasionnal" and is exactly how a Frenchman would spell it.

Here's a Ptolemy VI bronze featuring (his mother as?) Isis: