This chronicle has been a long time in the making. After putting this rare Herculi Romano Commodus denarius through the wringer, it now looks a lot better than ever before. When I first got it, it was so discolored and rough looking that I genuinely thought it was a small bronze. I threw it in vinegar, then lye, and still was unable to fully clean it. It still had a bit of horn silver and some iron oxide(?). I foolishly scraped at it with a screwdriver (what was I thinking) and left some nasty marks beneath the club. Finally, after a few soaks in Sodium Thiosulfate, here's the end result: The final result is more pleasing overall, but has a dull, muted color. I suppose I could put it back into lye or vinegar to brighten it up, but this has been abused more in the past 2 weeks than the past 2 thousand years at this point.
Well done, I remember this coin. Glad to have another introduced to the wonders of sodium thiosulphate
people have used sodium thiosulphate for years with mixed results. I would have only soaked this coin in ammonia with periodic scubs.
Yes...coin cleaning is iffy business; which is why I don't discuss it much on this board. You should never mess with a coin, unless you can accept it being ruined. There are things, however, you can do if the surfaces are dull after an ammonia soak.
I'd leave it alone at this point and let the coin re-tone. You've done a nice job restoring some of the coin's detail.