As some of you know, I purged my collection of Greco-Romano ancients because something happened and then I hated them all. I kept collecting Chinese stuff, so I dropped off the board since that stuff bores most people here. I thought about putting together a top 10 for 2021, but I stopped after realizing 9 out of the 10 were Chinese washers. Well, of the 7 coin buys I have made this year, 2 of them happened to be Greco-Romano ancients. Am I making a comeback to this area of numismatics? Maybe. I am toying with the idea of a tightly-defined scope so my ancients collection doesn’t wander like it did. It makes staying in budget a lot easier. Anyway, enough groveling. Here are the two coins I bought: 1. A finely styled Roman Provincial AE33 of Severus Alexander struck in Antioch. When I first saw this coin, I thought it was a medal. I was blown away by how finely the dies were made and well-struck onto a large flan. Looking up similar examples in auction records showed nothing even close to this coin. One of my core collecting values is to buy a coin when I instantly recognize it is something special, even if it isn’t something I collect. So I bought it at the FUN show from one of my friends. 2. Nero sestertius. I had a couple hours to kill on a business trip between checking out of the hotel and going to the airport, so I decided to check out a local hole-in-the-wall coin store. Turns out they were very friendly and had a ton of mid-level stuff to browse. They had a box of ancients and presumed fakes they wanted me to look at and opine on authenticity. This coin was in their fake box because NGC had given it “no decision”. I believed it was genuine. Since I had been wanting a decent Nero sestertius for a while (and never found one at the right quality-to-price ratio), I threw out an offer and it was accepted. So now I have a Nero sestertius. So, what’s next? No clue. I’m toying with the idea of one coin from each of the 76 “official” Roman emperors and coins representing famous historical figures and events outside of that set (so I can capture the interest of non collectors), as well as the occasional “special” coin as I see them. I’ve nearly bought all of the Chinese issues on my want list, so I am thinking about potential future collecting avenues when I consider myself largely done buying Chinese coins.
@TypeCoin971793 I've always enjoyed reading your posts, with ancient and medieval Chinese coins. The area of ancient and medieval Chinese coins, is one of the areas that I collect. I would be very interested, to see your top 10 purchases for 2021. There are a few CoinTalkers, not many I guess, but a few, who post on the Ancients forum, who collect ancient and medieval Chinese coins. You probably already know, that the Ancients forum seems to be for both ancient and medieval coins, because there is no medieval forum. However, I imagine, that a lot of ancient and medieval Chinese coins, and medieval coins in general, also get posted to the World Coins forum, but I've hardly ever looked at that forum (maybe I will, in the future).
Wow! That Severus Alexander provincial IS something special! The Nero spooks me. The "flan crack" at 2:30 on the obverse, 3:30 on the reverse looks like it doesn't really go through the thickness of the flan, suggesting a cast copy.
The depth of the crack is more apparent in hand. It goes through the edge and is filled with azurite.
