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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;kirispupis, post: 7853902, member: 118780&quot;]My ancient collecting history is very short but has been an incredible ride. In November I&#039;ll celebrate my first year anniversary of collecting.</p><p><br /></p><p>Two things pushed me that time oh so long ago. First, I&#039;d been intrigued by ancient coin collecting for some time. Ten years earlier I&#039;d bought some fakes in Jordan, and was surprised to learn that the real ones didn&#039;t cost much more. I&#039;d been waiting for an opportunity, but lacked the budget.</p><p><br /></p><p>At the same time, my wife wasn&#039;t pleased with the space some of my collections were taking. I had a pile of commemoratives and mint sets that I&#039;d erroneously thought would increase in value. I also had boxes of Transformers, GI Joe, and Star Wars toys from when I was a kid. A few were still in their original boxes. Finally, I had my antique firecracker collection, which I&#039;d carefully gathered during my teens and twenties. My budget was very limited back then, but I spent time talking to the bigger collectors and knew the value of everything. When something was underpriced, I grabbed it.</p><p><br /></p><p>So, the natural solution that occurred to me was to sell all these and finally finance my ancient coins.</p><p><br /></p><p>My first thought was to collect one coin from each Greek city and one from each emperor. I figured a few cities would only be in museums, but the rest should be doable. I quickly realized that wouldn&#039;t work.</p><p><br /></p><p>I made a list of the coins that looked the coolest. High on that list was an Athenian tet, and this <i>really</i> got me going. Up until then, the few coins I&#039;d purchased were a bit drab, but this one was stunning. Even more amazing to me was the thought that Socrates was alive when it was minted, and that there was a fair chance that someone who held this coin knew someone, who knew someone, who knew someone, who had spoken to Socrates.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353044[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>My next targets were Roman emperors. I&#039;d realized I couldn&#039;t &quot;collect them all&quot; but I figured I&#039;d keep adding them until I ran out of budget.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353045[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>Note that one tenet of my collecting, which I continue to keep, is I&#039;m interested in the history. I&#039;m not out there to find the shiniest coins for everyone to admire. I just want my own little piece of history. To me, the stories are worth far more.</p><p><br /></p><p>Soon, I read some about Alexander the Great. The history fascinated me, and I had to have a lifetime coin. I lost a number at auction before I finally got one.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353047[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>I read about Demetrios I Poliorketes too. He seemed like an incredible guy, so I had to add him too.</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353048[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>That got me started on the Diadochi, and I&#039;ve been hooked ever since. I read <i>Ghost on the Throne</i> and have been poring through all forms of papers to learn as much as I can about this period.</p><p><br /></p><p>My collecting has moved entirely to what I term the &quot;Era of the Diadochi.&quot; This is literally a real life <i>Game of Thrones</i> (but with a higher body count), and I can&#039;t get enough. Here are a few more I&#039;ve picked up. (Ptolemy I Soter, Antiochos I Soter, Asandros)</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353046[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]1353052[/ATTACH]</p><p>[ATTACH=full]1353053[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>Currently, I have a document I update containing every target coin I know of. So far I have 29 different coins that make up the &quot;Era of the Diadochi&quot;, with 5 more (including Seleukos) on the way. My total collection that I&#039;ve accumulated since November is about 100 coins.</p><p><br /></p><p>Alas, my budget is at an end, so now I&#039;ll need to beg for each coin from my better half. I therefore expect to accumulate far fewer coins over the next year. I still have a lot of targets remaining, so I expect to remain in this space for some time.</p><p><br /></p><p>Will I always collect coins from this era? There are others that interest me such as:</p><p>- Philip I coins celebrating Rome&#039;s 1000 year anniversary</p><p>- Italian Greek colonies, especially from the Puglia and Basilicata region, which I just returned from</p><p>- Filling out the Seleukid, Antigonid, and Ptolemaic lines</p><p>- Maybe doing the blase thing and collecting the 12 caesars (I have 6)</p><p><br /></p><p>Those should keep me collecting for many more years.</p><p><br /></p><p>Easily the best thing I&#039;ve done since starting is join this forum. I&#039;ve learned a ton in all areas of collecting, and the answers to my questions have been immensely helpful.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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