In past year, I have noticed a slew of electrum coinage in auctions. most from Kyzikos/ Mytilene/ Phokaia/ Lesbos. Seems some recent hoards have come on marketplace.
I think this started a few years with CNG auctions. I heard they got a massive consignment in and they had a LOT of them for a few months in every auction. Unfortunately, due to bad laws in many source countries, we will probably never have any idea the circumstances and size of the hoard(s).
Good observation John ! Heritage & Roma have been unloading lots of these small electrum coins too. Pretty soon they'll be dumping them in random group lots.
I just picked up my second piece of EL for like $80! A year or 2 ago I am pretty sure this thing would have gone for twice that.
There are times when I wonder how much material is out there, and if there is a flood wave of coins waiting to be collected by a decreasing number of collectors. It may be just a day dream. I try to keep some kind of oversight on how frequent coins that I’m interested in are for sale. Some of them occur on almost every auction, and then I consider them overpriced. It may be just me who is underfunded, however. But I have put the 1/6 stater coins that you mention in the «not worth 300 dollars» category. On another note, there are several coins that are actually rare. I just spent a few hours searching for former sales of a coin type that I bought for 65 euros last week. Sixbid came up with one the last 10 years. It illustrates that collectors of ancient coins are more attracted to beauty and design, than rarity.
I guess I still have to convince myself that I want some of the coins I have seen at any price. I am not hard on worn coins but there are some off center losing faces which I don't think will make melt value due to the sheer number of little coin with nothing going for them other than their gold. I hate to see ancient coins melted but I don't have the money to save all those coins. How many do you want? What is the melt value of an electrum hekate?
That new book on Electrum coinage is slated for release this month. I pre-ordered mine in December, maybe it will give some figures on recent hoard numbers/ total examples known?
Let's say 50% gold content for hektes of 2.5 g. So 1.3 pure gold with the currently super high prices of gold it's no more than 80$ best case scenario. I have no idea how much it costs to extract gold from the electrum alloy so maybe it's not even worth the effort...
I strongly believe that all recent electrum (kyzikos and lesbos) are from the same source as the Athenian tetradrachms and the rest of the recent coins from Side/Aspendos/Kelenderis/Cyprus. @dougsmit: I got an off centre strike some years ago for a modest price and I would still buy it today... Edit: this is just the 4th (?) known example, yet it didn't draw much attention because of the bad strike...I still prefer it to the other one I post below, which technically is much better, and cost me double despite being quite common.
I rarely see population numbers for ancient coins. Only when it’s lower than 10. It must be next to impossible to make any serious estimate unless the coins are really rare. Some of the big hoards found are accounted for though. Will you give us an update when you get the book?
Thanks to this influx I managed to get this from kunker, otherwise the last time I was successful in their auctions was 6 years ago
Thanks, my man! I will surely have to do a write up on it. Though, not until I recieve it in the mail. I am not superstitious about many things...EL coins are one that I am.
I have puzzled over this current group of coins for some time now. The source of the Electrum coins is not the same as the current Athenian source which is a hoard. The hoard of Athenian coins seems to have pretty well defined boundaries for dating which would start with earliest group of coins seen in any number, the Starr Group IV coins which started circa 470 B.C. and with the majority of the 454 to 404 B.C. issue ending with the Flament Group II coins which might end circa 420 B.C. But even if we assume that the last coin in that hoard was minted in 404 B.C. that would give the hoard a roughly 65 year span . The electrum issues seem to span from about 550 B.C. with the early staters from Kyzikos to about 326 B.C the terminus date for the hektes of Mytilene and Phokaia. I have noted that many of the earlier coins are in high grade. This would be unusual for a hoard with about a 225 year span. I have made inquiries and have been told that the source was a very large collection which included a number of hoards. This evidence does make sense to what I am observing about this current group of coins except that so far I have seen no evidence of any of these coins with any kind of pedigree. Erythrai El Hekte 550-500 B.C. Obv.Head of beardless Herakles left. Rv. Hexapartite punch anepigraphic SNG von Aulock 1942 2.53 grms 10 mm Photo by W. Hansen
