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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 7849855, member: 19463&quot;]Flyspecking: I find it interesting that the hobby so based on minutia has so little consistency in what is considered significant and what is hardly mentioned as a footnote or completely ignored.&nbsp; Emmett assigns numbers to types but the same number serves multiple dates and obverse legend variations.&nbsp; He could have followed the lead of some RIC volumes and lumped together all the year one coins followed by the year two coins of that ruler OR he could have followed another RIC volume and interlaced, for example, all the coins of all the rulers issued in that same year so a Titus would be one number higher than a Vespasian and one number lower than the Domitian of that same type as long as each had the same year date.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>RIC is, in fact, the prime example of a group of experts in their respective fields that totally ignored each other in the way anything was recorded.&nbsp; RIC V can lump together a dozen variations under one number while RIC VIII separates out some variations in letter spacing.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>This Aurelian RIC 62 bears the same number as coins with no lion and the XXI in exergue with the officinae expressed using either a Greek or Latin system located in field or exergue all adding up to a flyspecker set of RIC 62 requiring over 30 coins.&nbsp; [ATTACH=full]1351697[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>The first coin below shows a star * following the mintmark so I logged it as RIC 81 page 454.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]1351702[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>However, the next here lacks the star but adds a dot in the reverse field tempting me to call it RIC 106 page 456 except for the fact that RIC quotes that coin as weighing a gram more than mine which, at 4.1g, weighs closer to the quotation for the next series that has a delta in the obverse field.&nbsp; </p><p>[ATTACH=full]1351703[/ATTACH] </p><p>These minutia are based on a study sequencing the issues in a period of rapidly changing weight standards and makes sense if you are into flyspecking.&nbsp; RIC VIII shows a lot more study than RIC V.&nbsp; We went from a lion barely worth mentioning to a dot (or is it star?) change that changes the page where a coin be found.&nbsp; The approach to the subject changed between the time of Webb and Kent but the books still bear the same title with different volume numbers. </p><p><br /></p><p>I appreciate the advances in scholarship made by flyspeckers but I no longer aspire to be one. </p><p><br /></p><p>Lest you think I am unfair to RIC V, we might mention that RIC IX is worse.&nbsp; There you will find coins similar on the reverse but having different rulers on the obverse distinguished by, for example, 42a and 42b.&nbsp; Yes, it was written by a different person.&nbsp; I do wonder just what the editors (Mattingly, Sydenham, Sutherland, Carson) contributed.&nbsp; It was not order.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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