Hello, I was at the Chicago Coin Expo, the inheritor of the dealers of CICF two weekends ago. I bought an unattributed bunch of Greek coins as a lot of you probably have seen as I worked my way through the group. The show was good. I didn't notice any absences of folks compared to CICF. I spent one whole show day there. Spent a lot of time going through some boxes and piles of coins which is kind of my fav. Also bought a few nicer coins off of my want list at some friendly dealers' tables. Mark Reid of Time Machine and Mark Breitsprecher of Ancient Imports and I had a really nice time talking together at Mark Reid's table as I looked through coins. I also had a nice time stopping by Josh Moran of Civitas Galleries. I also had a nice time as I bought a sweet Vespasian caduceus denarius from him! I had planned on attending two days but I hadn't planned on blowing my budget by 150% on the first day. I figured to preserve my marriage and what was left of my bank account, I better not. After adding about ten coins, I realize how unwieldy this post is getting. I will stop and just encourage folks who are curious to see what I scored there to just check out the recent additions on my Wildwinds page. Also I don't have to retype the descriptions. http://www.forumancientcoins.com/gallery/index.php?cat=41431 Nick
I really regret my trip to Chicago. Construction traffic messed up my time, so I did not get there at the 10am opening, rather 11:30am. At 2:00 I received a call for a family emergency, so only had a short time there. I did not get to everyone that I wanted to see and/or meet. This was very regretful for me. I did meet a great CT friend! and a couple folks that I have done biz with for years... (Cool) HOWEVER, I DID happen to snare a couple nice coins that I chase as a niche: Bad pics that I did at the show: RR Anon AR Drachm Half Quadrigatus 225-212 BCE 3.1g 18mm Janus dotted border Jupiter in Quadriga LEFT Victory ROMA Cr 28-4 S 35 SCARCE RImp Antony-Octavian AR Denarius 41 BCE 3.65g 18.7mm Military mint Syria star Craw 528-2a Sear 1507
Thanks Bing, Alegandron and Mat. I appreciate the compliments. I only posted about one third of my haul when I looked at how long the message was getting. But I was happy with what I found. I think I have some poor photography skills or just a crappy iPhone that is not the best for photographing large bronze coins. But that is the least of my worries. I know you had to take off Alegandron, which is unfortunate. I hope the family stuff worked out okay at the minimum. But at least you made two very nice pickups. I really like seeing the left quadriga because you just do not see those that often. I also think that the Anthony/Octavian coin is really nice as well. The collection is sparse on the early years because of cost. I like to get coins at a good price yet still be nice and as most of you know that is hard when you are talking about Anthony and Octavian. Bing: I agree with you in that the Septimius Severus and Vespasian are two of the favorites. Even amongst the others which are not shown. The SS is better in hand than my crappy pic shows and the flan crack which looks like the Grand Canyon in the picture is not even noticeable in hand. The Philip I is actually the nicest coin in terms of straight grade that I bought but I really only bought it because it was such a nice coin at such a cheap price from the dealer I was already buying a bunch of stuff from that I just said why not. The Ariarathes IV from Cappadocia was another example of finding a coin I wanted with a minor scratch and slightly rough surfaces for under 1/3 of the cost of similar coins I had seen elsewhere. It is by far the highlight of my year to go to this show. Even when ANA has had their shows in Chicago several years, this show has been my favorite of all the shows of the year by far. You just don't get the offerings or depth in the ANA for foreign/ancients and CSNS is no comparison even though I enjoy the show. Local shows, forget it. It's so much US stuff that I don't bother with a lot of shows anymore.
