I went to the Ft. Lauderdale Coin Club's show today, mainly to sell of the remainder of my US collection. But after selling, I just couldn't help myself and gravitated towards my favorite in-person dealer (i.e. not online). Walked out with this coin, an As of Trajan. This is the best condition coin of him I have so far. And while the temple is a bit hard to see in hand, it makes for an interesting reverse. Trajan, As (98-117 AD) Obv: IMP CAES NERVAE TRAIANO AVG GER DAC P M TR P COS V P P, laureate head right Rev: SPQR OPTIMO PRINCIPI, Pax standing within temple, SC in ex, Rome mint RIC II 575
I really believe the coin has been tooled adding detail on the ear/hair/head but I can't say that I see evidence on the legends or other parts.
My thoughts exactly, although I had refrained from posting my observations earlier since my experience in detecting tooling is not as extensive as others on this site. With regard to the obverse legend, though, doesn't the internal part of the "A" in "DAC" look a bit too sharp relative to the other letters in the legend? I think this might be tooled as well.
Thanks all for the comments. The tooling comes as little surprise for me; it only confirms the suspicion I got when examining it at home after the show and was going to ask about it if no one noticed those tooling marks. While I am normally against owning tooled coins and could always go back next time and exchange it for another coin, the rest of the coin itself, especially the portrait (minus the tooling marks) looks great, and the tooling is hardly distracting, so I may just end up keeping it. On to my question: how much would you all pay for it?
With no detail where the tooling is I suspect $40-50. As is, $15-20. I'll allow possible tooling on the obverse legend ERDA as suggested by Rudi but I'm not 100% sure there. The laurel wreath and ear are poorly done and 99.9% certain to me.
Tooling or no, I think it is a lovely coin. Doug is most always correct, but I think the value has to be higher. Perhaps $25-$30
That's definitely a nice coin. Even with the tooling, dealers would probably sell that coin for more than $30-$40 I bet.
I agree but a dealer that sells a tooled coin without mentioning it is running the risk of making Santa's naughty list.
It is, especially in hand. I paid a little more than the $40 in gil-galad's range but I will chalk it up as lesson-learned (lesson being examine the coins more carefully before buying). The dealer is a great guy and has sold me problem free coins in the past, so I'm sure he didn't know or forgot to mention about the tooling. I'll let him know of course about the tooling but won't hold it against him.
I think the coin would have looked perfectly ok without any tooling, but it really doesn't bother me. It's a very attractive piece.
