In 1996 I wrote a "Guest Commentary" for Coin World in which I made a comparison between collecting US coins and collecting ancient coins. Today I put it on the web here: http://esty.ancients.info/numis/CoinCollecting.html Almost seventeen years have passed and I still agree with what I wrote so long ago. Do you?
Hey Warren, I agree wholeheartedly. I wish I could get my wife to read this. She says she has no understanding of why I collect coins, ancient coins to be explicit. You have summed it up quite succinctly.
I believe that article still holds up well. Its why I got into ancients. After I finished my type set in the u.s. coins I was like "now what". I dont care about varieties, sheldon numbers, VAMS and such. Plus I find them intimidating and I have a mental block trying to learn that B.S. Ancients have their quirks too but at least I can define what I call a set and there is a giant path to take if one chooses too. With U.S. its your stuck with...U.S.
I think the hobby is what you make it. Of course, there are plenty of ways to make collecting US coins boring but there are also many things you can do to spice it up. Collect coins the way you want to and it will never be stale.
Totally agree. Sure, value ($$$$) has its place (duh!), but the "activities of the mind" that a coin provokes is what this hobby does for me. I love seeing these kind of posts at CT. They serve as necessary correctives to the "value," and gold and silver droolers out there! The first Christian-themed coin that you mentioned definitely strikes one with its significance. Perhaps less "earth-shaking, " I can think of what meaning that certain pattern coins (die trials) hold: Sometimes they represent failed attempts at what "might have been" for the design of a country's coinage, or they sometimes mark the point of a big currency reform. Historical/cultural significance is as much of a human construct as "value" is. I just find the historical/cultural stuff much more interesting.
After careful consideration, I believe you went too far with the line assuming you are not crazy. I certainly would not pay $330 for that chi-rho coin but that just means I am crazy in a slightly different way making me pay $330 for something you would value at $12. In the time since the article first aired, I see a few changes but mostly in degree rather than direction. 'What is it worth?' has always been the driving force behind 90% of coin collectors and 99% of non-collectors viewing coins. Those numbers seem to be growing. When I started collecting, shops selling coins had signs in the window naming the store. Today, the biggest letters in the window read 'We Buy Gold!' When I started collecting ancient coins, I had trouble with the concept of paying a dollar (or a nickel, for that matter) for a Lincoln cent. I was able to rationalize paying a dollar for an ancient (many were 50 cents then) and even spent $13.50 on one denarius in 1963. They were somehow different and immune from my feelings that cents should be a cent. Today, as then, I would be happy if the bottom fell out of the market and I could buy tetradrachms for melt value. My collection would grow in size as it diminished in value. Unfortunately, such a crash would cause the elimination of 99% of the coin dealers/sources I rely upon so it is in my best interest for my collection and yours to retain their inflated values supported by thousands of people interested in what coins are worth not why. Why is your $330 coin worth more that its cheap brother? Rarity? Maybe, but more likely it is that there are more Christian collectors than botanists interested in whatever that is in the middle of the other coin. Why am I willing to pay more for a coin that I will never sell and could never sell without an exhaustive search for a collector that agrees with me that the coin is a keeper. Why? Because I really am crazy. Why are some Lincoln cents worth (several times) $330? It is because owners know there will be no problem finding a thousand people with $330 willing to pay for it even if they do not have the slightest idea why? How many owners of 1909s VDB know where to find the VDB on a 1917s? How many care?
I have to say Mr. Esty that not only does your article hold up well, it was in fact some of the earliest articles I read on ancient coins. Yours was one of the first "ancient coin sites" I ever saved in my browser. So, I am basically saying you are to blame for me being here. Its his fault gentlemen.
