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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;satootoko, post: 54682, member: 669&quot;]Was he a real newbie at his business, or was he just shocked that the guy he tried to peddle them to was too alert for him? <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie9" alt=":eek:" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> </p><p><br /></p><p>Noone who has been collecting or dealing in Far Eastern crowns for more than a couple of weeks can help being aware that there are far more fakes than real ones out there.&nbsp; Not only are there the recent Chinese and Bulgarian forgeries, but during the heyday of such coins from the mid-19th Century to the early 20th, they were heavily counterfeited and passed off as real money.</p><p><br /></p><p>The custom of &quot;chopmarking&quot; such coins represents the earliest known &quot;third party grading&quot; of coins. <img src="styles/default/xenforo/clear.png" class="mceSmilieSprite mceSmilie7" alt=":p" unselectable="on" unselectable="on" /> Prominent merchants marked them to show that they had been inspected and found to contain the correct weight and fineness of metal.&nbsp; Of course, the bad guys&#039; use of phony chopmarks led to &quot;re-chopping&quot;, resulting in the existence of coins with 20 or more marks.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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