Hi, I'm new to this forum so please excuse me if I break any forum rules during the first post. Anyways, I am currently trying to build up the early Roman Republic collection so I recently purchased a Janus didrachm (Crawford 31/1) and then the early anonymous denarius shown in the pic to be able to display the Roman Republican currency reform during the Second Punic War. I paid quite a bit of money for the denarius (perhaps too much) solely based on the seller's coin attribution to Crawford 44/5 from ca. 211-206 BC, as I am specifically seeking a denarius from this timeframe. The coin is 20.1 mm and 3.76 grams. After doing some research on Steve Brinkman's page and Ancient Coins Forum I've discovered that the coin was misattributed and is in fact a Crawford 53/2 type Group 4 or 5. Now, my question is, given the attribution and the coin's weight (which is about half of a gram lighter than a typical early denarius), is there still a chance that it might fall into 211-206 BC timeframe or is it out of the question? Also, what would be a fair market estimate of the shown coin? Just want to know by how much I overpaid. I know I should've done my research prior to the purchase but I've doing business with this particular seller for a while and normally trust his attributions. Thanks in advance!
Don't be too hard on the seller of your coin for his misattribution; this confusion between 44/5 and 53/2 is very very common. The weight of your coin is on the low side but still within normal tolerances. In general, 53/2 tends to be a bit lighter than 44/5. The issue is almost certainly later than 44/5, but your coin still falls within your desired timeframe. It's not an example the very earliest denarius, but it still is near the introduction of the denomination. Here are a couple of examples of 53/2 from my collection: Phil Davis
And here's an example of 44/5, with partial-incuse ROMA inscription, from my collection. Weighing about 4.5 g. Note the difference in the helmet visor.
And here are a few coins of very different style, placed by Crawford within the catch-all 44/5 rubric along with Carausius' coin. Steve Brinkman and Pierluigi Debernardi have made enormous and long-overdue strides in sub-dividing these early anonymous issues, but their efforts are still ongoing.
Not a denarius, but a sestertius, which also falls into the Crawford 44 bucket. There is no Crawford 53 variant of the sestertius(that I know of), but there are almost as many different styles of sestertii lumped into the Crawford 44 bucket as there are denarii.
Thanks for the replies! All beautiful coins listed here! I've actually acquired a Crawford 44/5 type coin similar to Carausius' albeit in somewhat of a rough shape a few months back. This one was dated to ca. 187-146 BC. It's 19.8 mm, 4.04 grams. Knowing what I know now, I believe that it's safe to assume that it might very well be closer to 211 BC mark timeframe. Correct?
I have one of those Crawford 44 Sestertius also... (sorry fuzzy pic... I need to reshoot) I did put that SILVER Sestertius up against a BRONZE Sestertius for comparison...
An INSPIRATION! I love looking at that one every time. Still chasing for a hand Aes! Had to fix my muffler on my truck last week. This was the only hand I got: At least it is gold...
