Auction Catalogues

Discussion in 'Ancient Coins' started by Orfew, Jun 21, 2018.

  1. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

    Lately I have been accumulating auction catalogues that contain the coins I have collected. I have been doing this both with the online catalogues and physical catalogues. Today I received an auction catalogue from FAC which has my Vespasian coin RIC 773. It has the listing and it has a photo of the coin. It took me over a year to find a copy of this catalogue. With the online catalogues I am taking screen shots and storing the images along with photos of the coins. I think that this will be very useful for keeping track of the provenance of my coins.

    Does anyone else collect auction catalogues that contain the coins they have collected?
     
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  3. David Atherton

    David Atherton Flavian Fanatic

    I collect auction catalogues in general, but only from houses that have good write-ups or those of historical interest.

    And yes, I also try to obtain catalogues that list my provenanced coins.
     
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  4. TIF

    TIF Always learning.

    Absolutely!!
     
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  5. Jay GT4

    Jay GT4 Well-Known Member

    I have all the auction web pages bookmarked but I really should print them out.
     
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  6. Johnnie Black

    Johnnie Black Neither Gentleman Nor Scholar

    I think that’s a great idea and a fun way to document your acquisitions. Some catalogues must get pricey though just on shipping weight alone.
     
  7. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    This is a problem. I have boxes full in the attic that formed much of my coin education but have not been seen for 20 years. I have the best 20 feet worth on a shelf in my home but I share book space with my wife so that is what I get. At some point, I or my heirs, will be faced with a choice. Do we put them in the recycle bin where the county will take them for free or do we pay the post office to take them to someone who might care? Postal increases have redefined the meaning of the word free. I know you might want to pay postage for the ones I am not ready to give away yet but there is serious question about where the line is drawn between worth it and not. The local library had a sale last week where books were a dollar and magazines a dime. If I had donated a set of RIC and some antique coin magazines, they would not have sold. Books are only of value when in a hand that values them. Where I live, a political pundit's hate volumes would sell well. Scholarly numismatics, not so much.

    My catalog holding is a small percentage of one of our number. I hope he will post the link to his website.
     
    Last edited: Jun 22, 2018
  8. red_spork

    red_spork Triumvir monetalis

    I have been collecting auction catalogues almost as long as I've been collecting the Roman Republic. In some cases I specifically go for ones that I know I've got coins in but I've also picked up several along the way that I don't have any actual coins provenanced to but which are useful as reference works even without any provenance hits. Like @dougsmit, I share my bookshelf space with my wife and I also have a cat whom I've learned needs his own empty shelf to lay on or he tries to get on top of my books and that limits how many physical catalogs and references I can keep at home so I have tried to focus on buying those catalogs worth their space on the shelf.

    Interestingly enough, the first catalog I actually bought was for Vecchi sale 3 from 1996, a really great sale with a whopping 650 struck Republic and Imperatorial era bronzes. I had just purchased a coin that was provenanced to the sale and I was diving headfirst into Roman Republic bronzes so I picked up the only copy on the market at the time which had some water and cover damage and some handwriting(which doesn't bother me, it's got mine it it now too) but the plates were good. Last summer I came across a run of Vecchi catalogs 1-10 all in pristine condition for not much more than I previously paid for Vecchi 3 by itself so I of course picked up those catalogs and decided I'd sell or give away my previous copy of Vecchi 3. I brought it to NYINC hoping I'd find someone who might enjoy it but while I was there I happened to run into none other than Italo Vecchi himself. We spent some time chatting on Roman Republic bronzes and near the end of our conversation I remembered that I had my ratty copy of the catalog in my bag and he was more than happy to sign it for me. He also pointed out and corrected one attribution error that he'd made in the catalog all those years ago which was a very rare "COZANO" litra from Cosa in Etruria identified as a much more common Roman Minerva/Horsehead litra(which IMHO was almost certainly also minted at Cosa, but that's a discussion for another time). So now I have two copies of Vecchi 3 on my bookshelf and of course my wife doesn't understand but for me it's worth the extra space.
     
    Last edited: Jun 22, 2018
  9. TIF

    TIF Always learning.

    Great story!! :)
     
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  10. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    Anyone who has looked at the "Old Auction Catalogue Madness" thread on FAC will know that I collect old catalogues with strong Roman Republican listings. I do this in the inverse manner of @Orfew . Rather than buy catalogues which I know contain coins I own, I buy catalogues in the hope of finding provenances for coins now owned or latter acquired. I've had very good luck with this over the years. The late John Spring's Ancient Coin Auction Catalogues is my guide.
     
  11. Valentinian

    Valentinian Well-Known Member

    I love catalogs and have since the 1970s. I admit, research is far easier now. I remember taking notes by hand on paper on coin values and having ring binders of pages with citations and prices organized by emperor. The web is a far better way to look up coins.

    However, I still use my catalogs a lot. I have them filed by collecting theme if they have a special emphasis, for example, a collection of Turkoman bronze, Byzantine AE, Parthian, Roman Republican, or Greek fractions. It is very informative to see what someone who put together a good collection was able to assemble.

    For years I took notes on what is in each catalog of major firms. Here is my site on contents by firm:

    http://augustuscoins.com/ed/catalogs/
    and one with some of the same information organized by collecting theme:
    http://augustuscoins.com/ed/catalogs/themes.html

    The sites are pretty much done in the sense I am not intending to keep them up to date. I am not getting many sale catalogs any more and I doubt many people care what is in catalogs they don't have.

    I still have many catalogs on my shelves (some in the garage). I can't resist acquiring duplicates of really good ones thinking they are worthwhile and someone should want them!

    http://augustuscoins.com/numislit.html

    You and I both know the internet is a terrific source of information. But, I still think catalogs with theme-collections thoughtfully assembled over years also have value to the serious collector.
     
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  12. Carthago

    Carthago Does this look infected to you?

    I am an avid collector of catalogues and your site has been an invaluable assistant over the past several years to help me identify catalogues of interest. You've done an incredible service to the collecting community with your website. Thank you!
     
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  13. dougsmit

    dougsmit Member

    This reasoning has filled my attic with more things than just catalogs. I, however, get two benefits from my catalogs. One is the fact that not all old sales are online yet. The CNG resource is wonderful as far back as it goes but they do not include the wonderful books of the last millennium. Second, I still enjoy sitting in my easy chair and flipping through a catalog just to see what I find. I'm not researching a specific coin but just looking in the toy store window wishing Santa would have brought me that one. Sometimes doing this turns up a coin in my collection that I did not know was sold back then but usually I just see coins that are somewhere in a collection I will never see. Here on CT, we see the same popular types over and over again. The catalogs point out things we never suspected.
     
  14. David Atherton

    David Atherton Flavian Fanatic

    I find myself doing this when I'm stressed or worried about other matters. It's the numismatic bibliophile equivalent of comfort food.
     
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  15. Deacon Ray

    Deacon Ray Artist & Historian Supporter

    I know what you mean, David! Although I don't have many catalogs, I do sit and thumb through Meshorer and Hendin books. They're comfort food for me.
     
  16. Carausius

    Carausius Brother, can you spare a sestertius?

    A few of my shelves to give you an idea of the scope of my auction catalogue obsession:

    20180623_161359.jpg 20180623_161346.jpg 20180623_161455.jpg
     
  17. Orfew

    Orfew Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus

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  18. Valentinian

    Valentinian Well-Known Member

    There are great catalogs there that I'll bet most CT members have not heard of. For example, I see three labeled "TNA" (modestly called "The Numismatic Auction" :)) which have superb coins offered by TradArt.

    You have Haeberlin, Niggler, Leu 17 of Roman Republican, and many important collections originally in cardcover now bound.

    I'm sure you can be proud of your coins, but you can also be proud of your reference library.
     
  19. Carthago

    Carthago Does this look infected to you?

    The work you've done to bind many of your key catalogues is exceptional and they are gorgeous. You not only do you get to enjoy them during your lifetime, but I'm certain they will end up in future libraries of people you will never know that will appreciate them like I do the finely bound books in mine from prior collectors. :D
     
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