Availability of Spink Numismatic Circulars from 1980s?

I bought a couple of Roman Republican coins at the Dix Noonan Webb auction today, both from more than 70 years later than @Michael Stolt's beautiful new coin. I already paid, but haven't written either of them up yet and, in any event, don't want to jinx things by posting them before they arrive!

Both have stated provenances to old issues of the Spink Numismatics Circular (a fixed-price list) from the 1980s:

1. SNC [Spink Numismatic Circular] May 1984 (2625)

2. SNC [Spink Numismatic Circular] Dec. 1985 (8404)

I'd be curious to see copies of the listings, but the only issues I have from that long ago are from 1986, and the publication doesn't seem to be available on the Newman Numismatic Portal or on Rnumis. Spink's own online sales archive doesn't go back nearly that far. Does anyone happen to have them (no harm in asking, as unlikely as it is!) or know where they can be found, hopefully online?

 

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Thank you Donna!

Looking forward to see what you won.

I will hijack the post a little and ask if anyone also has a copy of:

Spink Numismatic Circular - September 1983 (5441).

 

A kludgy way of seeing them is that at least some of them are on Google Books.

I found the 1985 editions and was able to search for item 8404:

https://books.google.ie/books?id=BF...Circular+1984&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=8404



This is 1983, but the snippet view doesn't quite cover 5441:

https://books.google.ie/books?lr=&id=MFRmAAAAMAAJ&focus=searchwithinvolume&q=5441




I didn't find 1984

Some years ago, a great secondhand bookshop in Dublin sold off a big stack of the Seaby Coin & Medal Bulletin from the 1970s and 1980s, so I picked up some of them. I'm sorry now I didn't buy them all - it's interesting to look at the prices back then and occasionally coins from them turn up. Not everything was cheaper! The bookshop itself closed down in Jaunary when the owners retired. The "Irish Numismatics" magazine I actually bought in the late 1970s as a very young collector. It went out of print sometime in the 1970s and is now sought-after - a few people have a full set, which I've seen sell for€500-€600.



ATB,
Aidan.

 

Wow, thank you! That's amazing that you found that. I hate the snippet view on Google Books, but once in a great while it's actually useful! And although the photo is blurry, the irregular shape of the flan makes it very clear that it's the same coin I just bought.

 

Thanks to you, I was able to find the May 1984 issue and the rest of that year's volume together with 1983, with a snippet view showing No. 2625:





Although the photo is even blurrier than the one you found, I'm pretty sure from the flan shape that it's also the same coin as the example I bought. Hopefully this comparison won't jinx things by posting the photo before the coin's arrival:



The match is clearer with the other one, from December 1985:





The prices went up a bit from 85 and 60 GBP, but not as much as one might expect. I'm content!

Write-ups to come.

Again, thanks!

 

That's great! It's interesting to see which coins have gone up a lot and which by not so much.

Great coins too.

ATB,
Aidan.

 

Here's the bottom half of the 5441 listing from Sep 1983 for @Michael Stolt; I found it by combining a search for Dioscuri and dolphin within that volume:



I wonder if all the old ex-Spink Numismatic Circular coins in today's auction came from the same consignor.

 

Photos taken from the relevant Circular's for 2625 and 8404, hopefully better resolution than Google Books:

 

Image attached:

 

I used to see groups spink NumCirc and Seaby CMB offered quite regularly back in the 90’s. Not so much anymore. I used to have complete runs of both back into the 60’s that I sold in 2015. Both were great publications that I wish someone would put online.

Barry Murphy

 

A run of the Seaby Coin and Medal Bulletin is online in the Newman Portal. Here's a link
https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/searchwithterms?searchterm=Seaby's Bulletin

 

These are the kinds of threads I treasure.
You get drawn in, learn something new, and then watch as the story unravels.
Admittedly, when I read, "Spink" and "circular" my first thought was of the wonderful coin puzzles they used to give away if you bought their catalog:

 

Wow, @Kiaora, thank you so much! There's no doubt now that these are the same coins I bought.

I am amazed that you turned out to have all three issues that @Michael Stolt and I were collectively seeking. I can't imagine that they were your only three; that would be too much of a coincidence! But do you have a long run for a number of years, or just a handful?

I could have sworn that I had some old issues of the Spink Numismatic Circular myself from as far back as 1986, when I thought I bought a few at a coin store when I was in London that summer. But I can't find them, so maybe I'm wrong, because usually I keep that kind of thing in a particular box. I did find 14 issues from 1999-2001, when I was a subscriber for a while (for their listings of and articles about British coins). I would be happy to consult them for anyone who needs to see if a reference to a coin supposedly listed in them is accurate. I have the following issues:

1999 (10 issues published per year): May, September, October, November, December.

2000 (6 issues published per year): February, April, June, August, October, December.

2001 (6 issues published per year): February, April, June.

I also still have a stack of Spink auction catalogs from the same period that Spink sent to me in the mail. I don't know which ones are online.

As for the Seaby Coin and Medal Bulletin, here's a direct link to the list of issues online: https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/publisherdetail/528776. The ones online go up only to 1988. I have only one issue myself, from March/April 2000.

Regarding the Spink Numismatic Circular, I was entertained by this advertisement that appears on the back cover of every issue I have beginning in April 2000:




I don't think Spink had online auctions already that far back, just online retail sales. I specifically recall that when I bought my "Surrender of Napoleon" silver medal (Mudie No. 37, Spink Auction 136, Oct. 7, 1999, Lot 992), which I've posted on Coin Talk a number of times -- including in the current "Titanic" anniversary thread -- I sent in my bid by mail.

I do know that for a while around that time Sothebys was doing both online coin auctions and retail sales through Amazon; see https://press.aboutamazon.com/news-...-sothebysamazoncom-will-combine-create-single. I know I bought some British coins and medals that way.

 

You’re welcome Donna

I have a near complete set from 1893, missing only a couple of the rare WW2 volumes, and (frustratingly) quite a few of the individual issues from the late 90s and the 2000s

Allan

 

Again, wow!

 

I wonder if the Newman Numismatic Portal or RNumis or anyone else would be willing to bear the cost of placing your run of Spink Numismatic Circulars online, to the extent they're in the public domain and/or that Spink would permit it.

 

One thing to note from a provenance confirmation perspective Donna is that there are no illustrations of the coins for sale until the mid 1960s, and then only a selected few until the late 70s / early 80s when illustrations become more extensive

 

Thanks. I had wondered about that. It's always frustrating when old catalogs, whether fixed price lists or for auctions, are either completely unillustrated or only selectively illustrated. Sometimes for ancient coins you can make an educated guess about there being a match even without an illustration, such as when there's a matching control mark on a Republican coin with large numbers of different marks. Especially when the weight matches exactly. But one can never be sure, and even weights aren't always given in old catalogs.

 

DonnaM,

how do you have a Seaby CMB from 2000? CNG bought Seaby in 1991. If I recall, we incorporated the CMB into the Classical Numismatic Review for a few years, but not all the way to 2000. It’s been so long since I’ve looked at an old CNR that we did, I don’t recall the exact dates and issues.

Barry Murphy

 

My mistake and my apologies, @Barry Murphy. All I can say is that the lighting isn't good on that shelf, and I looked at the publication much too quickly. What I thought I saw as Seaby's Coin & Medal Bulletin (probably because that was the name I had in my head as I was going through old catalogs) was actually something called "S & B's Coin & Medal Bulletin," No. 53 for March/April 2000, published by Simon Monks and Brian Reeds of Grass Walk, Wood Lane, South Heath, Great Missenden, Bucks. I have to wonder if the similarity in names was intentional!