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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;nerosmyfavorite68, post: 24894533, member: 134416&quot;]$300 would net some good starters.&nbsp; If you can put up with c. $25 shipping (fast FedEx from Germany), Savoca is a good one.&nbsp; They have many attractive coins at a budget.</p><p><br /></p><p>The only bad thing about Savoca, they didn&#039;t put their coins in subcategories; it&#039;s &quot;Roman&#039;, Greek, etc, no rulers, sub-kingdoms.&nbsp; You can sort by price lowest to greatest, list A-Z, etc.</p><p><br /></p><p>This overlaps with the &quot;recommend a collection&quot; thread.&nbsp; I would recommend reading my recommendations to the poster.&nbsp; As I also recommended to him, knowing the history can make it so much better with collecting.&nbsp; I recommend the Totalus Rankium podcast, which ranks all Roman and Byzantine emperors.&nbsp; Justinian II (685-695, 705-711) won #1 most interesting emperor, by the way.&nbsp; If you like Game of Thrones, he&#039;s your guy.&nbsp; However, coins of his aren&#039;t exactly super-rare, but they&#039;re not super-common, either.</p><p><br /></p><p>With your recovery, you have some time to listen to podcasts.&nbsp; Valentinian I has a really fantastic story.&nbsp; There are more scholarly podcasts, but Totalus Rankium is presented in a really entertaining way.</p><p><br /></p><p>I recommend Gallienus Antoninianii from the Cologne mint.&nbsp; Really affordable,has some of the best style, and there are some neat busts with him holding a spear and shield.&nbsp; Gallienus was a really underrated emperor, holding things somewhat together at a time where the Empire could have easily ended.</p><p><br /></p><p>If you can put up with silver-coated copper, there&#039;s the Antoninianii of Aurelian and Probus.&nbsp; Probus has many interesting bust types and both are affordable in nice condition.&nbsp; Aurelian has a really interesting story, too.&nbsp; Listen to his podcast.</p><p><br /></p><p>Delve around the &#039;recommend&#039; thread for Augustuscoins (Valentinian&#039;s) beginner links.&nbsp; I also recommended some of my favorite go-to dealers.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;ve been collecting since the 1980&#039;s, almost all ancients.</p><p><br /></p><p>I&#039;d also recommend quality over quantity.&nbsp; Although you can get 6 attractive coins for $300, why not make it 3 and get 3 really good ones?&nbsp; It&#039;ll also depend on the emperor.&nbsp; If you&#039;re going 12 Caesars, an imperial will be decrepit under about $75.&nbsp; A Nero imperial for a decent one would run at least $150.&nbsp; Nero&#039;s debased silver Tetradrachms from Alexandria, Egypt are quite affordable.</p><p><br /></p><p>I have no idea what you like, big coins, little coins, etc. I like BIG coins.</p><p><br /></p><p>But with non-silver coins (copper, brass, etc) avoid bronze disease.&nbsp; Patchy, bright green spots.&nbsp; That&#039;s really bad. That&#039;s different from patina.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Greek is going to be more expensive, generally speaking, unless you go for AE&#039;s or the tiny silver fractions.&nbsp; A large silver tetradrachm is going to go for over $200, and that&#039;s for the &#039;cheap&#039; rulers.</p><p><br /></p><p>Oh, and once you pick what period you want, may I suggest investing around $35 for a pdf copy of the relevant issue of David Sear&#039;s Roman Coins and their Values book?&nbsp; Available from Spink Publishing.&nbsp; Volume IV (235-280&#039;s) isn&#039;t available in pdf.&nbsp; Really helpful guide.</p><p><br /></p><p>I wouldn&#039;t recommend the 5th century coins. The interesting ones are super expensive and the affordable ones are largely little pencil-eraser sized coins, about 10mm. wide.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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