Howdy folks! I'm new to this forum are relatively new to coin cleaning & collecting. I purchased a batch of uncleaned roman coins and have been working on them with olive oil & brushes. One of the super crusty coins was about the diameter of a half dollar and 3 times as thick. It was more like a rock than a crusty coin. Olive oil wasn't loosening anything on this one. I finally went at it with a steel brush & scalpel to get through the outer layers. What I found looks like gold to my untrained eye! This "coin" isn't very coin-like other than being generally round and about the size of a quarter though. No identifiable features at all. How can I determine if it is really gold? If it is gold, is there any reason to preserve this as an ancient coin rather just treat it as a gold nugget?
After people get done lecturing you about cleaning coins - I'd like to say Welcome to the forum. You can learn a lot here and my guess is that it isn't gold or no one would have sold it to you. If a deal seems too good to be true in coin collecting circles, it usually is. How did you come across these pieces?
Thanks! This coin was included in a batch of "Uncleaned Roman Coins" from ebay. I know these are presearched at least a couple times before they end up for sale like this but I'm not sure that this one would have looked like anything. It was encased in 2-3mm of rock-like stuff. I went ahead with the aggressive cleaning because otherwise it would just be a good skipping-stone. Here's a "before" pic:
You have a point Southbay! It was really more of a rock cleaning than a coin cleaning. I don't know much about ancient coinage but there are many here who do. I do know that gold would feel pretty heavy like lead in your hand. It's probably bronze or some other alloy.
Moen1305 is probably correct in stating that is probably bronze or some other alloy! Although Gold will tone somewhat, it is one substance that pretty much nothing will stick to it in it's solid state. Frank
Normally I wouldn't dream of recommending that you ask a jeweler to test your piece, but it seems to be far enough gone that the test wouldn't really harm it. :whistle: Most jewelers have the testing kits, consisting of a special stone, hyhdrochloric and nitric acids, and a set of "needles", which can be used to determine whether or not an item has a gold content, and if so how much. You can read all about it here.
