A Sharp Aurelian

Bit of a ragged flan and some cut-off legends, but I was attracted to this piece for the equally strong EF details on both sides. Looks like a die chip in exergue.

 

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Hmm, hope I dont sound like a jerk but he's one of those emperors that you can buy nice coins at an affordable price. Its full silvering that makes his go fairly high. Your example is OK but I would have held out for a better one if he was high on your want list just so it would have full legends and no ragged flans.

Mine was $23 little over 2 years ago.


Aurelian (270 - 275 A.D.)
Æ Antoninianus
O: IMP C AVRELIANVS AVG, Radiate and cuirassed bust right.
R: ORIENS AVG , Sol advancing left, raising right hand, globe in left, flanked by two captives at feet, txxt in ex
Ticinum Mint 2nd Emission. 3rd Officina
3.81g
RIC 151

 

No worries Mat, I know these are extremely common. Mine was six bucks, shipped - an act of bottom feeding. I'll pick up one of the fully silvered ones eventually - yours is lovely!

 

It is something we each must face. Do we want to buy just one representative coin in perfect condition or a selection across the range of mints, styles, special portraits, mintmarks of note (see the whale?) or maybe a thousand different coins of this one ruler? The OP coin has a nice portrait and is nothing to be ashamed of. It is easy to find some mints in round while some rare mints (earliest Milan comes to mind) are more often ragged. Are we to care whether we have a coin that is representative of its type and period or is the only thing that matters that the edges fit our modern standards of what a coin should be. Aurelian had a problem with 'difficult' workers at the mint not doing their jobs to his satisfaction. After the screaming stopped, we got the XXI coins and things got a lot more round. A proper collection of Aurelian's coins needs some early period uglies as well as some perfect, silvered circles. One of these coins is only worth half of the others but IMHO belongs in any group of this ruler. Can you spot it?

 

6 bucks shipped!? heck yeah!

 

Even being very common, I like Aurelian coins. I have several, but this is one of my favorites from Antioch:

 

As a side note JA, your images seem to come across as quite dark and very hard for me to see clearly. Perhaps it's just me though.

 

Nice deal, I paid like$10 for this.

 

augie-augie-augie!! => oy-oy-Aurelian!!!

 

Yup. Here's the auction. I won another coin from the guy, and he refunded the shipping fees on both...

eBay

I suppose I still haven't decided what I want from photographs. Do I want an accurate depiction of the coin? Or do I want to tweak the image to the point where you can comfortably see all the details? - in other words, not an image of the actual coin, but a graphic. This piece is very dark, and my pic represents it faithfully, but perhaps that's not the way to go?

Here's the same image with an adjustment to the luminosity curve and saturation. Better?...

Maybe not a thousand, but a handful is nice. I've seen quite a few Ants of Aurelian that have uneven strikes - great portraits and weak reverses. This one possesses both artistic engraving, in my opinion, and a strong strike on both sides. I find it quite appealing.

I don't know enough about the series to answer your questions, but I have one of my own: is the swimming mammal mintmark a whale or dophin? ERIC has it as a dolphin...

 

I think it's better (it isn't as dark as the OP photo)

 

I prefer photos I can see to photos I can't. If I have a coin in hand and it is too dark to see, I move to brighter light rather than cursing the darkness. There is nothing more accurate about a black and blacker photo. Most dark coins have a degree of shine and what we see/photograph is partly the glare from that gloss.

Yes, Dolphin. Is it a dolphin fish or a cetacean dolphin? Mine is a squiggle.

 

Much better from a viewer's standpoint.

 

Lol, Doug. Fair enough. I've got a little portable set-up I can move outside into the sun, but then I have to curse the cats that insist on interfering.

 

JA, great pick up, you'll make the bottom feeders list in no time, your 2nd pic, even with the cats help, shows more detail. Ob. bust is great, lot of these were well struck.

 

I just retook this coin...paid $25 last yr.




Aurelian...270- 275..AD..
AE Antoninianus..
Mint..Rome.
20 mm x 4.67g.
Some silvering left..

 

Again, nice photography

 

Man I need to upgrade my Aurelian, condition-wise:

 

Looks good to me, VK. I'd like to add at least one of the long, thin-necked portraits - the ones that look like caricatures.

 

Since nobody else has posted an Aurelian from Lugdunum I thought I would add my best Aurelian to the thread. I must admit that this was not a low budget coin.