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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Calpurnia, post: 1343718, member: 35419&quot;]I think the comment that there are only 2 grades of coins, &quot;Coins I like and Coins I don&#039;t like&quot; is most appropriate. </p><p>One pleasant aspect of being a collector of Roman Republican denarii is that I won&#039;t have to decide if I prefer rain bow toned or &quot;blast white&quot; uncirculated coins, or perhaps more importantly I won&#039;t have to go to extra measures to preserve the tone or the &quot;blast white&quot;, since nature is always going to be conspiring to turn either one into a dark,&nbsp; surface and nature will certainly win out.&nbsp; You never see a rainbow toned or &quot;blast white&quot; ancient silver coin, or least not an original one. </p><p><br /></p><p>Since my Roman Republican denarii have already lost the battle over rainbow or &quot;blast white&quot; toning to Nature, I can concentrate on determining if the strike is strong, or if it has really distracting scratches or nicks or very importantly, does it have a nice dark tone to it that makes it look like an antique(ancient) coin and do enough of the design elements remain to have &quot;eye appeal&quot;. The design may be diminished by wear, weak strike, off center strike, or deposits or banker&#039;s marks(actually I don&#039;t mind minor banker&#039;s marks in the field).</p><p>And if it&#039;s in a slab, it won&#039;t be for long.</p><p>Of course if I were a beginner I would maybe prefer bright ancient coins and feel secure that slabbed one are authentic, but I believe that most longer term ancient coin collectors want a coin to look like an ancient coin(toned) and one that they can actually handle.</p><p>It really does boil down to &quot;Is it a coin I like or a coin I don&#039;t like&quot; and the decision is one most experienced ancient coin collectors prefer to make and are able to make without the aid of a third part grading service.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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