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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;DonnaML, post: 7850266, member: 110350&quot;]One problem with relying on old coin catalogs for provenance is that in my limited experience, the majority of auction catalogs prior to 1970 -- and, really, prior to 1990 and even 2000 -- illustrated only a selection (usually a minority) of the coins offered, primarily the most important or notable of them. (Leaving aside all the coins sold at retail outside catalogs, or through mail-order catalogs that contained no illustrations at all.)&nbsp; And that doesn&#039;t even take into account the difficulty sometimes of proving -- at least to the satisfaction of a governmental authority or court if it ever came to an actual legal dispute -- that a particular coin is the same as the one illustrated (rather than a double-die match), especially when the proof takes the form of catalog photographs of casts of coins rather than the coins themselves.</p><p><br /></p><p>To give a couple of examples, I do not believe that there is any doubt that my solidus of Arcadius has a provenance dating back to Auktion 116 München Münzhandlung Karl Kreß [Kress](Otto Helbing Nachfolger), Lot 729 (28.10.1960), as described by the dealer from whom I made the purchase, Dr. Busso Peus Nachf. in Frankfurt, Germany. See the photos and discussion at&nbsp; <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/my-first-ancient-gold-coin-a-solidus-of-arcadius.378975/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/my-first-ancient-gold-coin-a-solidus-of-arcadius.378975/">https://www.cointalk.com/threads/my-first-ancient-gold-coin-a-solidus-of-arcadius.378975/</a>, including photos, provided by the dealer, of the relevant pages from the catalog -- including the plate illustrating Lot 729. (Copies at link.) Is it a bit difficult to tell from the tiny illustration that it&#039;s my coin? Yes, but the resemblance is pretty clear, and it&#039;s not as if that catalog is available on the Internet. So it would hardly have been worth anyone&#039;s time to search randomly through old catalogs for the last 60+ years, looking for an illustration of an Arcadius solidus that resembled mine in order to manufacture a fake provenance. I&#039;m satisfied that the provenance would have held up if it had been questioned when the coin passed through Customs on its way to me. (Once a coin is successfully imported, I don&#039;t think anybody is going after individual $100 coins or even $1000 coins on the basis that they were illegally excavated or imported.)</p><p><br /></p><p>On the other hand, as a second example, I am equally certain as a factual matter that my Roman Republican denarius of M. Herennius,</p><p>Crawford 308/1b (depicting Pietas on the obverse and either one of the Catanaean brothers carrying his father, or Aeneas and Anchises, on the reverse), has a provenance dating back to the Stack’s Public Auction Sale, “A Collection of Ancient Roman Coins,” June 14-15, 1971, Lot 127, at p. 16. See my thread at <a href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/roman-republican-no-55-aeneas-or-catanaean-brothers.380718/" class="internalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.cointalk.com/threads/roman-republican-no-55-aeneas-or-catanaean-brothers.380718/">https://www.cointalk.com/threads/roman-republican-no-55-aeneas-or-catanaean-brothers.380718/</a>. Unfortunately, however, Lot 127 is not one of the coins illustrated in the plates to that catalog -- which, after a diligent search, I was able to find on the Internet; see <a href="https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/auctionlots?AucCoId=3&amp;AuctionId=516472#search" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/auctionlots?AucCoId=3&amp;AuctionId=516472#search" rel="nofollow">https://nnp.wustl.edu/library/auctionlots?AucCoId=3&amp;AuctionId=516472#search</a>. So the provenance could theoretically have been faked. Even though I think that&#039;s highly unlikely, given the fact that the contents of the catalog cannot be found though Google, and someone would have to have known ahead of time that the catalog included an example of my coin in order to pick it out to cite in the first place. Absent such knowledge, it would, once again, hardly have been worth anyone&#039;s time to search randomly through 50 years of old catalogs to find an un-illustrated example of the coin that could fraudulently be attached to mine as a fake provenance. Still, though, in the absence of a catalog photograph, I&#039;m not sure this provenance would hold up in a legal proceeding, whatever my personal certainty.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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