ANCIENTS: Can a lower grade coin be better than a higher grade one?

Many of us take the opportunity to buy a better coin to upgrade one in our collection but here is an example of a time this did not work for me. I showed my original coin in another thread here yesterday buy am repeating it here to start this discussion. My old coin was worn but clear when it came to minor details and had the smallest bust of the very young Constantine II that I had seen. The small bust indicated that the Caesar was young but the facial features (what remains of them) and attire hardly looks like a 13 month old when his first issue as Caesar was released.

Constantine II Caesar 317 AD Heraclea mint .MHTE. The dots before and after the mintmark make this a RIC 26 p.545 (R5) rather than the dotless RIC 20 (C2). The only problem with my coin is the wear.

Later, another coin came my way:


Look, no wear ...... but also no dots so it is the super common RIC 20. Retained silver (especially on the reverse) obscures the details but more important is that the portrait is somewhat larger lacking all that blank space over the head. Of course being a different RIC number allows me to keep both with no guilt but I could not 'upgrade' that original coin with this one even if both were dotted.

More:


Equal time requires showing the Licinius II version RIC 19 lacking dots and also C2 level common. This one has enough silver that it still looks good without the patchy problem of the Constantine II RIC 20. Again Licinius II was a little kid so the bust is small.

Another:


This time we see Constantine I with old-guy big bust. The bust breaks the legend in the typical manner for centuries giving extra honor to a ruler whose legends break into right and left sections compared to lesser ones with the whole legend all in one arc. Perhaps you note that this coin also has a lot of silver and you might suspect that this issue is among the most common of the period to be found today with silver intact. I do not know what process they used that year at Heraclea but it really worked compared to other years and other mints.

The issue also comes in Licinius I and Crispus but I have not found them yet. This issue shows how it is good to look at all the coins that were issued together as a group rather than only studying one coin at a time. Sometimes comparisons show additional points of interest to a student of the coinage.

 

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Here are the same issue coins from Licinius I and Crispus. These were part of my original collection that was disposed of some time back. Both coins retained decent silvering.

 

Notice Crispus is larger than the two little boys but still has the continuous legend. These coins were struck at the time that Constantine ans Licinius made a peace pact (including killing Valens) and named their children Caesars. Only Crispus was old enough to know what was going on.

 

very interesting => I love the mini Constantine II bust (super cool) ... that really must have been a strange dynamic in the ol' castle, eh? (not unlike Game of Thrones, where brothers are jockeying for power ... must have been a very interesting/violent and random time period!!?)

... thanks for the neat info!!

 

I doubt that Constantine II and Licinius II knew each other. Their fathers ruled from different cities.

I like Game of Thrones but have to root for the dragons.

 

A better Game of Thrones would be the 3rd Century... the number of rulers, usurpers and the amount of internal strife is so close to the Song of Ice and Fire...

 

If I were writing a historical drama I would center it on the life of Julia Maesa. The first season would have her view of the events of late 192 through 211; the next season would cover 211 to Macrinus and her jockeying for position for her grandson just to realize, at the end of season three, that she needed to swap out grandsons for season four.

What is good about Song of Fire and Ice is that it has no history to abuse so you don't get people like me sharpshooting nitpicky details where they didn't get it right. If they needed a new continent or a new dynasty they could make it. The ast half of the 3rd century has so much in question that writers would have to make decisions that would offend most people who have heard the names. It is better to have fictional fiction.