Good news -- after vanishing for a month, a package finally arrived.

I was very pleased today to receive (finally) a package containing two ancient coins I purchased from a Canadian dealer in late July. The package was mailed on July 28, but there were no tracking updates between July 29 and today. It's as if the coins fell into Niagara Falls and remained there for a month:

Tracking History

August 28, 2020, 2:19 pm
Delivered, In/At Mailbox
NEW YORK, NY 100--
Your item was delivered in or at the mailbox at 2:19 pm on August 28, 2020 in NEW YORK, NY 100--.

August 28, 2020, 8:16 am
Out for Delivery
NEW YORK, NY 100--

August 28, 2020, 8:05 am
Arrived at Post Office
NEW YORK, NY 100--

July 29, 2020, 3:55 pm
Arrived Shipping Partner Facility, USPS Awaiting Item
NIAGARA FALLS, NY 14304
Shipping Partner: CHITCHAT

July 29, 2020, 7:44 am
Shipping Label Created, USPS Awaiting Item
NIAGARA FALLS, NY 14304

About a week ago, I filed a missing-mail report. Did that have something to do with the coins turning up? I'll never know. But whatever the reason, I'm greatly relieved. The package was insured, but I'm much happier with the coins!

I made the obvious mistake of posting about them here right after I bought them, something that undoubtedly caused the package to vanish. Now that I have them in hand, I'll post them again. Along with a question about the tags that came with them.

I bought them as a pair, at a nice discount from their combined individual prices. They were both originally sold at the 2012 Triton XV auction of the "BCD Collection":

1. Thessaly, Thessalian League (under Roman Republic from 146 BCE, Province of Macedonia). Late 2nd-mid 1st centuries BCE, AR Stater ( = Double Victoriatus* = 1.5 denarius), Magistrates Sosipatros and Gorgopas. Obv. Laureate head of Zeus right / Rev. Helmeted Athena Itonia advancing right, holding shield with left hand and preparing to hurl spear with right hand; vertical legend ΘΕΣΣΑ-ΛΩN to left and right of Athena; [ΣΩ]ΣIΠ-ATPOΣ above spear; ΓOPΓΩΠΑΣ in exergue. BCD Thessaly II 861.2 [CNG, The BCD Collection of the Coinage of Thessaly, Triton XV Auction, Jan. 3, 2012, Lot 861.2 (this coin)]; HGC 4, 209 [Hoover, Oliver, Handbook of Coins of Northern and Central Greece: . . . Thessaly . . . ., Sixth to First Centuries BC, The Handbook of Greek Coinage Series,Vol. 4 (2014)]; SNG Soutzos 397 [Tsourti, E. and Trifiro, M.D., Sylloge Nummorum Graecorum, Greece 5: Numismatic Museum, Athens, The A. G. Soutzos Collection (Athens, 2007)]; Klose pp. 339 & 346, 2 (same dies) [Klose, D.O.A, "Zur Chronologie der thessalischen Koinonprägungen im 2. und 1. Jh. v. Chr., Ein weiterer Schatzfund aus Südthessalien," in Peter, Ulrike. ed., Stephanos nomismatikos: Edith Schönert-Geiss zum 65. Geburtstag (Berlin, 1998), at pp. 333-350]. 22 mm., 6.08 g., 2 h.



2. Thessaly, Thessalian League (under Roman Republic from 146 BCE, Province of Macedonia). Mid-late 1st century BCE, AR Stater ( = Double Victoriatus* = 1.5 denarius), Magistrates Italos and Diokles. Obv. Head of Zeus right, wearing oak wreath, [ITAΛOY] [behind head, off flan] / Rev. Helmeted Athena Itonia advancing right, holding shield with left hand and preparing to hurl spear with right hand; vertical legend ΘΕΣΣΑ-ΛΩN to left and right of Athena; ΔIO-KΛHΣ above spear, N-I across field. BCD Thessaly II 874.4 [CNG, The BCD Collection of the Coinage of Thessaly, Triton XV Auction, Jan. 3, 2012, Lot 874.4 (this coin)]; HGC 4, 210 [Hoover, Oliver, Handbook of Coins of Northern and Central Greece: . . . Thessaly . . . ., Sixth to First Centuries BC, The Handbook of Greek Coinage Series,Vol. 4 (2014)]; McClean II 4797-4798 [Grose, S., Catalogue of the McClean Collection of Greek Coins, Fitzwilliam Museum, Vol. II, The Greek Mainland, the Aegean islands, Crete (Cambridge, 1926)]. 20 mm., 6.09 g., 12 h.



* [Applicable to both coins] CNG did not use the term “Double Victoriatus” in the Triton XV catalog, and apparently has not used it in general since at least 2006, because of the absence of evidence that that term, rather than simply "stater," was used contemporaneously in Thessaly.

The Triton XV auction catalog can be viewed at https://issuu.com/cngcoins/docs/bcd_triton_xv_virtual_catalog .

The coins came with their original tags from the BCD Collection (whoever BCD was or is)! Here they are, in order:



Would anyone like to hazard a guess as to the significance of what's written on the backs of the two tags? The first one seems to read something like "Franke hd. [or Rd.] Summer 1983." The second one seems to read something like "West of Karditsa Dec. 96 hd. [or Rd.], S. Fr. 90,--" Karditsa, it seems, is a city in Western Thessaly.

Any thoughts? I'm at a complete loss. Normally one would think that dates refer to when a coin was purchased, but is there any possibility that these dates refer to when and where the coins were found? On the other hand, perhaps "S. Fr. 90.--" means 90 Swiss Francs.

 

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@ab initio might know

 

I don't get the joke -- who's @ab initio ?

 

Be nice, TIF.

 

Congratulations on them showing up, whatever TF happened.

 

He's BCD.

He doesn't stop by very often but occasionally he comes by and drops some great information or interesting anecdotes.

 

He is BCD and he posts here. Btw, great coins Donna. I am glad they finally showed up.


Aww..TIF beat me to it. BTW TIF just tagged him so he might even stop by...

 

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/board/index.php?topic=15065.0

 

Is that SHORTHAND for @TIF ???

 

Thanks for the information, everyone!

 

Nice job, and super patience, @DonnaML ! Nice looking coin.

Just me, and I am not the Shell Answer Man, but...


Roman Republic minted Drachmae sized coins (slightly smaller in weight than their Denarius) for trade with Magna Graecia. The Victoriatus.

When Republican Rome went on to control Greece, effectively breaking them into Provinces, they issued some coins, double sized Victoriatus, that roughly matched the Stater or Didrachm size, hence Double Victoriatus. However, perhaps the ROMANS called them that, as the local Greeks may had stayed with their local nomenclature...


RR Victoriatus after 211 BCE Jupiter Victory Trophy VF Craw 53-1 Syd 83



Thessaly AR Stater Double Victoriatus 21mm 5.7g 50 BCE Zeus - Athena Itonia spear shield RR Prov. SNG Cop 299var

Does not matter much to me, I just think they are very cool coins.

CONGRATS!!!

 

Well.....I do not know anything about ancient coins.....but I can answer your shipping questions.
1. No your missing mail complaint had nothing to do with your coins showing up. The key here is the phrase "shipping Partner." and USPS awaiting item. When a 3rd party shipper (CHIT CHAT, UPS or DHL")prints a label with a USPS tracking code. USPS gets that info electronically, and also notified when the shipping parner is in possession of the item. That is the last info USPS will get until the item is turned over to them. USPS missing mail inquiries can only be helpful if the item is in USPS possession.
In your case, the coins were in possession of CHITCHAT until they got to the USPS in NY. Why it took so long for CHIT CHAT to turn them over to USPS is beyond me. Probably due to transportation issues caused by covid19,
I have never heard of a shipping partner called CHITCHAT. But once it gets turned over to USPS.....you should get tracking every step of the way (which you did).

 

Hi all,

See https://chitchats.com/carriers

- Broucheion

 

Good to hear that it arrived. The ones I mentioned in past threads I did the PO missing mail/search and that's when they all of a sudden moved after weeks of nothing.

Great looking coins though.

 

I think Rd is actually hd and he meant hoards

 

I think that makes more sense than any other interpretation I can think of. Thank you. So that would mean that one coin was part of a hoard discovered in the Summer of 1983, and the other was part of a hoard discovered west of Karditsa in Thessaly in December 1996. Nice provenances, if so.

 

Those are nice examples, with probably the best pedigree you can have for them. Hopefully @ab initio will reply to this thread, but I think @pprp is correct. I have one ex BCD coin with a tag that reads "W. of C'm Hd", and BCD kindly confirmed that it meant the coin was from a "West of Cierium (Kierion) hoard."

 

I'm sure that's how it's supposed to work in theory, but it's not really consistent with the facts as I know them. First, the dealer always uses Chit Chat to deliver packages to the USPS from Canada across the border at Niagara Falls, and Chit Chat confirmed to him that they did so in this case before the end of July. But whenever they did so, I obviously didn't get tracking every step of the way: one entry says the Post Office is awaiting delivery in Niagara Falls, and the next entry, after a month of complete radio silence, says that the package arrived at my local post office in my neighborhood in New York City, on the same day it was delivered. When did the USPS receive the package? Not stated. How and when did the package get from Niagara Falls to New York City? Tracking is always supposed to show that. Not in this case. Perhaps by teleportation? And how and when did it get from the post office distribution center in New York City to my neighborhood post office? Tracking is always supposed to show that, too. Not in this case. Some very noticeable missing steps, I think!

Moreover, I wouldn't be so sure that the missing-mail report had nothing to do with the package finally showing up. This was the fourth time I've filed such a report, each time after several weeks to a month or more of no new tracking entries. Three of the four times, the package magically appeared within a week or so. (The fourth time, I never received the package.) Coincidence? Perhaps. But perhaps not.

 

That pretty much clinches it, I think. I was pretty sure that the tags did say "hd." rather than "Rd.," but it simply never crossed my mind that hd. stood for hoard. I should have realized it, but I didn't.