Over the weekend I attended a coin show. It was held in the basement of a hotel by the airport and wifi was terrible. I found a nice little Titus quinarius but I knew the attribution was off. Even though some are rated as "Common" they don't come up often and there are subtle differences in the legends. Unfortunately, I couldn't access any research references on my phone. Web pages were taking forever to load. I managed to get in touch with @David Atherton to help and after agreeing on the attribution I made an offer and ended up buying the tiny quinarius. I was happy until I got home... Upon further research I found that both myself and David were wrong! It was actually much better than we thought! A rare (R3) undated quinarius struck in 75 CE. It's also double die matched to the Harry Sneh coin! If it is undated how do we get to 75? From RIC: "Assigned to this year because there are no dated quinarii of 75, and the appearance of either AVGVST or AVGVSTI on the reverse suggests transition between the earlier series, up to 74 (with AVGVSTI) and later series, 76 onwards (with AVGVST)." So, all in all I can say it was a great show! https://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=174814 T CAESAR IMP VESPASIAN Laureate head right VICTORIA AVGVST Victory seated left with wreath and palm Rome, 75 CE 1.47g RIC 809 (R3) die matched to the Sneh coin Legends begin from high left. Ex-ANE But wait! There's More! I also bought this wonderful French medallion of Domitian based on a rare sestertius. Limited to 500 pieces. This thing is huge! https://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=174816 IMP CAES DOMIT AVG GERM COS XVII CENS PER PP Laureate head right SC Triumphal arch, showing two archways surmounted by two elephant quadrigae French medallion based on RIC 796 1968; No 192/500 Massive 69mm! 226g And finally, a coin from my friend and fellow Flavian collector @Orfew arrived today. It came in a very circuitous way to me. We don't live very far from each other and yet this coin went to CNG, then to Aegean and finally back home. A rare early undated Titus denarius with a wonderful portrait of the new Emperor. I'm happy to have another ex-orfew coin in my collection. https://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/displayimage.php?pid=174871 IMP T CAESAR VESPASIANVS AVG Laureate head right CERES AVGVST Ceres standing left with corn ears, poppy and sceptre Rome June 24, 79- July 1, 79 CE 3.26g RIC 3 (R) These early undated types are attributed to the few days after Vespasian's death on June 23, 79 CE Ex-Aegean; Ex-CNG; Ex-Andrew Short collection; Ex-Akropolis coins #289, Jan 30 2020. Feel free to post an Imperial quinarius, Huge medallions or a coin from a friend...
Really nice acquisitions Jay. I am thrilled that you are the new owner of that Titus. I know it has a good home.
Does anything in my new Titus group look familiar to anyone (beside @Orfew who's already aware that I got these!)? Illustrated below with many of the collector tags and notes which came along with them. (For auction photos click thumbnails underneath.) CNG Triton XXV (Online Session 6, 11 Jan 2022), 6953 (ACSearch record) When I saw the auction photo I knew exactly what these coins were – one of them especially so: the denarius from the Jyrki Muona Collection (M40) that was cut for Butcher & Ponting’s major study on early Roman Imperial Silver coins (it was published in their 2014 book, Metallurgy of Roman Silver Coinage, from the Reform of Nero to the Reforms of Trajan). The coin also appears in their database housed at the UK Archaeology Data Service website, including the metallurgical summary and “before” photo (same for the Otho [M16] below). "Titus M40 After": "Titus M40 Before": Cross-sections published in Butcher & Ponting: I knew of it because I already own another cut coin from that study – an Otho denarius (M16) also from Muona’s collection. "Otho M16 After": For the three others, CNG provided zero provenance but I knew orfew had posted them to CT (some of them also other places, including his blog and academia.edu page), so I was able to read a great deal of his research and others’ comments about the coins, and track the provenance at least to where he bought them (sometimes further from from the previous sellers' catalogs). I also much enjoyed finding that another was a “plate coin” (Figure 3) in his essay and posts about “Flyspecking the denarii of Domitian's first year as Augustus,” available on his Academia page, a blog entry, and another cointalk thread (20 Jan 2019, which also includes an excellent set of photos of @randygeki 's Antioch Fallen Horsemen!). I was also thrilled about the “two-captives and trophy” denarius since, as I’ve posted here before (CT 374729 “Captives & Trophy … from Julius Caesar to Constantine” [Feb 3 2021]), Roman captives & barbarians coinage is one of my favorite collecting areas (alongside the “modern history of ancient coins”). It has particularly detailed captives and trophy elements, which may help to answer the old question of whether it was a Judaea Capta issue. The previous owner, Israeli antiquities collector Shlomo Moussaief, thought so, though others have claimed otherwise. Oh, and, of course, the left facing Titus with his elephant celebrating the Colosseum / Games! (With the original CGB photo.) (A) RIC 116 = Elephant, ex-CGB brm_631939 (purchased 10 Feb 2021). Cointalk 375002: "A Placeholder Coin" (8 Feb 2021). (B) RIC 103 = Judaea Capta (?) Captives/Trophy = Ex Sammlung Shlomo Moussaieff (1925-2015; purchased London 1948-2000), Gorny und Mosch Auction 263 (7 March 2019), Lot 3615. Cointalk 334573 "Rare Titus Denarius" (7 Mar 2019). (C) RIC 108: Ex HJB 212 Lot 511 (part), Ex Marc Breitsprecher May 2021, Jyrki Muona Collection, Butcher & Ponting p. 356 (M40). Cointalk 381233 "Interesting Published Coin" (26 May 2021). (D): RIC 124A = ex Jean Elsen List 288 Lot No. 149 (purchased 18 April 2019). Figure 3 in Andrew Short’s essay, “Flyspecking the denarii of Domitian's first year as Augustus” (see also Note 8). Paper also on blog. See also coin's blog entry. Cointalk 337327 "An Interesting Titus - Time to Count Palmettes" (19 April 2019).
Congrats Curtis, that was a great lot. Not sure why the provenance wasn't retained but fortunately, we know where they're from! Aegean didn't even mention or send the CNG flip or Andrew's...
Oh, that's rather frustrating. (Did they mention CNG or "A. Short Collection" in their listing?) EDIT: Oops asked & answered! I figure the most common reason for provenance getting "lost" is probably the perfectly understandable one from a commercial standpoint: Sometimes a seller doesn't want buyers to know where or how recently they got a coin or what they paid; best to say nothing at all pretend it was immaculately conceived into the inventory or auction catalog. But certainly frustrating from the perspective of a collector! Even more frustrating to buy coins one knows to have recently been accompanied by great collector tags/labels/envelopes that were simply discarded. I always try to photograph / scan tags on coins I buy just in case they get lost somewhere down the line, at least a photocopy can be recovered (I'd settle for copies for my all my lost BCD tags or all my Phil Peck envelopes that were discarded along the way, etc.). Edit: By the way, I see at least two more on VCoins now that do mention the "A. Short Collection" provenance in their listing. P.s. this was my first ex-Orfew coin from way back in Ancient & Medieval Coins Canada Auction 2 which also had a CT thread and previously came from the collection of the great E.E. Clain-Stefanelli: By now I have a pretty good number of Ex-CoinTalk member coins (more than attachments allowed in one post I suspect) -- I'm actually working on a post to show a bunch of them (that idea has probably been had in the past as well).
I knew Andrew consigned them to CNG (which noted the A. Short collection) but I didn't want the whole lot. Aegean bought it and divided it up. Of course you're right, dealers don't want to give away how much they paid for them. Still, the tags could have been sent after purchase.
The title reminds me of the old, Two Fisted comics, by the same folks that brought us, Tales From the Crypt et al. Here's a quiny:
OK, I can understand dealers not caring about whether or not a coin came from Joe Smith's collection, but not to include the CNG provenance is baffling.
Sorry, I couldn't tell from your cell phone image whether or not the reverse was AVGVST or AVGVSTI and erred on the side of the most common of the two choices. Glad I was wrong!
That is a very nice hunk of metal Jay! Here are my medallions of Claudius and Agrippina. They are the size of medium pizzas!
