There has been some discussion as to whether Ancient coins are real or fakes (re-strikes = Copy). My contention is that some Ancient coins look to good to be real, so most probably are not. How can a coin lasting century's look practically new unless found in a urn in a recovery site ? Even the so called Fisher coins that were recovered from a spanish gallion are suspect because Mr. Fisher could only claim a portion of the treasure and I am pretty sure he didn't want to sell to the general public the Fisher Spanish Reals that are so prevalent on E-Bay. In any case here are a couple of Ancient coins of mine, for you to evaluate. If you deem them real I will be thrilled, but if not, need I say more ? Dave
Top one looks fine & is a City of Constantinople Commemorative, around 332 - 333 A.D. give or take. Bottom one I cant tell because the photos are bad.
Well from photos I am always leery of saying something is good or bad, especially fuzzy ones. Of the two, the top one looks fine, 4th century Roman city commemorative. Its worth about $10 in today's market probably. The second is supposed to be a Bactrian, but I am nervous about it. The face looks too fat, and just the overall feel of the coin is a bit odd. The second one I would like crisper photos of, and then look at it against good examples in references. I am not a specialist in these, just have seen a few along the way. Fuzzy photos of coins with that black toning background simply makes me extremely nervous overall, and with an unusual face I would not guess either way on that one. Chris
We need a better photo of the Constantinopolis also. At first look I believed it was good but am having trouble with the style compared to the mintmark unless I'm reading it wrong due to the poor photo. Is it branch PLC? Each of the mints that produced these coins had its own unique style so it is important for the style to match the lettering. Does anyone have a Lyon Constantinopolis or am I misreading this one? I see little doubt that the Demetrius is a fake. This type has been faked a lot lately. Neither of these coins are particularly high grade. If you think these are bad just because they look good, you will really doubt really nice coins. Compare a Demetrius that $3k would but in 2007: http://www.acsearch.info/record.html?id=82179
I agree, I just posted the same on the other thread where Dave posted this. After seeing clearer pics I see 4-5 things wrong with it. I hate to declare a coin good or bad just from pics, but right now I would judge it a cast fake. Chris
OK, we alll agree that these ancient's of mine are fakes. So how do we determine what's real or not ? After all, we don't handle ancient's in everyday exchange like American coins that we pretty much can tell the difference of. What exactly do we look for ? Some pointers please. Dave
All I can say is education. Same as with telling a fake US coin, a fake Mexican 8 Pesos, and the like. Its a matter of handling hundred or thousands of coins, getting to know them. You can spot Chinese fakes of US coins, right? The same way we can spot the easier fake ancients easily, and the better fakes we ferret out over time. Chris
The Constantinopolis is indeed from Lugdunum and the style looks fine. I don't see anything to indicate fake. A little harshly cleaned though. I have only handled a few dozen of them but could see it was Lugdunum from the bust style alone. Martin
There is a similar one in the Forum Fake reports but it is a lost/stolen coin report where people are allowed to identify coins that are missing. The others of the type in the reports are from Trier and are not in god style from modern dies. Martin
