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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;nerosmyfavorite68, post: 24892719, member: 134416&quot;]Welcome to the Ancients side! It&#039;s actually cheaper than collecting Americans, generally speaking.</p><p><br /></p><p>It&#039;s very difficult to find true uncleaneds nowadays.&nbsp; Dirtyoldcoins only has a few categories which could be considered actually uncleaned.&nbsp; Around 2004, they really were uncleaned.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;d recommend getting the final product from a dealer, but if uncleaned is what you want, then there are various how-to videos on youtube (I&#039;d recommend the gentler methods).&nbsp; I was always dreadful at cleaning coins, so I&#039;m not really good at more specific tips about that.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Knowing the history helps.&nbsp; I&#039;d recommend listening to the Totalus Rankium podcasts.&nbsp; They rate all the Roman and Byzantine emperors. Justinian II won the distinction of most interesting Roman emperor, by the way.&nbsp; Podcasts are how I got back into collecting Byzantines.&nbsp; There are more scholarly podcasts out there but Totalus gives a pretty good overview of the reign in a fun way.</p><p><br /></p><p>There are many good dealers out there.&nbsp; I got really great service from Victor Clark, by the way.&nbsp; I really like Savoca, David Connors, Tom Vossen, Aegean Numismatics, Forum, and others.&nbsp; Honorable mentions would be Incitatus Coins and Marc Breitsprecher.&nbsp; All of the above are quite nice and have lots of budget coins. I love the selection at London Ancient Coins and most of their transactions are problem-free, but I had a recent problem with less than stellar packaging and their customer service has never been that great.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Once you find your interest, buy the book.&nbsp; Pdf copies are available from Spink of most of David Sear&#039;s Roman Coins and their Values volumes.&nbsp; David Van Meter&#039;s book is also a good overview, available for around $35 if Forum still has it.&nbsp; If someone can dig up the link to the free version of ERIC, there&#039;s also that.</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/sitelinks.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/sitelinks.html" rel="nofollow">http://augustuscoins.com/ed/sitelinks.html</a></p><p><br /></p><p>Valentinian has a nice site for beginners.&nbsp; It probably has a link to Doug Smith&#039;s old pages (which are very helpful) in there as well.&nbsp; Doug Smith&#039;s pages are hosted on Forum&#039;s site, unless something&#039;s changed.</p><p><br /></p><p>Oh yeah, on youtube there&#039;s also Classical Numismatics.&nbsp; I&#039;d recommend that channel. There&#039;s also Aaron Berk&#039;s podcasts.&nbsp; Half the podcast is generally an educational segment.&nbsp; His are also on youtube.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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