Most Overpriced Ancient Coin

I was just reading a thread in the US Coins forum about the most overpriced United States "rarity" coin...to save you looking, the 1909-s VDB seemed to be the winner. This got me to thinking about ancient coins that might be considered "iconic" and how they can be overpriced. Now in ancient coins, there are true rarities that fetch OUTLANDISH prices, and rightfully so, but there are others that are just not that uncommon but still can command high prices. What do you think? I'll start with:

Athenian Owl
Alexander The Great Tet
Aegina Turtle

 

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One that comes to mind where their seems to be heaps of quantity is the Julius Caesar elephant denarius just keeps getting more popular and expensive yet a non portrait Julius Caesar Dupondius a lot more rare minted lifetime sells for about half.....go figure.
Julius Caesar, 46-45 BC, 13.05gm, 26mm,Crawford 476/a.

 

The "Widow's Mite" occurred to me also, although there are so many wannabes for this.

Marc Anthony Legionary Denarius

 

Tiberius "Tribute Penny" denarius.

 

Really, any coin the general public knows would be candidates:

1. Cleopatra VII
2. Julius Caesar
3. Shekels of Tyre
4. Athenian Owls

etc. The ancient coin market is very thin, any external demand from non-collectors will increase prices exponentially. I have a friend whose wife is Jewish. When I showed him a pic of a Judea Capta denarius, he had to have one. He thought $500 was cheap for such a piece of history, (it was an extremely nice piece from NN I got for him, I regret letting it go actually).

 

was gonna reply with suggestions but they've all been nicked by the first posters. Caesar esp elephant. Tony's legions. Cleo. Anything with a face pic of Caesar. Tribute pennies.

I don't think owls are so over priced. But maybe that's cos I'm a roman guy and owls are iconically Greek. Probably Greek collectors think elephant denarius prices are just fine.

 

I think the Judaean Bar Kokhba Revolt coins are way up there. I justify not selling my car and buying one by telling myself that they are outside of my area of interest. I Know, I know—Sour Grapes!

 

My definition of overpriced usually goes with ancient coins desired by people who do not collect ancient coins and which are referred to by a name other than that that would describe a 'regular' coin. That means a 'denarius of Tiberius' may not be overpriced but a 'Tribute Penny' probably is. A tetradrachm of Athens??? - 'Owl'. There are exceptions to this but demand increases greatly when there is added demand from people with money to spend and no inclination to learn about such things as supply or grading who believe that all ancients are museum specimens.

A question: What is required to make a coin a "Widow's Mite"? There was a time for reasons I never understood that the term usually referred to anchor/wheel coins of Alexander Jannaeus who died about a century before the story related in the Bible could have taken place. Certainly many of these circulated for a long time and we have no real evidence of the most common bits of metal in use c.30AD. Is it OK to use the term for any small Jewish coin? ....even types made well after the time of the Ministry?

Yes, it is upside down.

 

I have one of those! Praise @John Anthony !

 

Julian II Bull reverse Follis.

Orbiana denarii.

Otho denarii.

 

A lydian lion? A lydia lion would go nice with an athenian owl.

 

This is a great post and question, @Kentucky ! I had a second thought about your question. When you look at the ancient coins we purchase in a strictly practical and monetary sense—all of them are overpriced and aside from their precious metal content if any are essentially worthless. If you don't think they're monetarily worthless—see what happens when you visit a 7-eleven and attempt to pay for a slurpee with a Roman quadrans. Collectors are really the ones who set the high prices by being willing to pay them.

 

Don't forget the standard Judaea Capta denarius struck for Vespasian at Rome.


Vespasian
AR Denarius, 3.35g
Rome Mint, 69-70 AD
RIC 2 (C2). BMC 35. RSC 226.
Obv: IMP CAESAR VESPASIANVS AVG; Head of Vespasian, laureate, r.
Rev: IVDAEA in ex.; Jewess (as type of Judaea), draped and veiled, seated r. on ground in attitude of mourning, knees drawn up, head resting on l. hand, which is propped on knees, r. arm on lap; behind, trophy, consisting of helmet, cuirass, oblong and round shield, greaves, and two round shields

A very common coin which commands a premium price because of its historical connections, much like the Tribute Penny.

The rare variant with palm tree instead of trophy does indeed earn the right to be pricey!


Vespasian
AR Denarius, 2.71g
Rome Mint, 69-70 AD
RIC 4 (R). BMC 43. RSC 229.
Obv: IMP CAESAR VESPASIANVS AVG; Head of Vespasian, laureate, r.
Rev: IVDAEA in ex.; Jewess (as type of Judaea), draped and veiled, seated r. on ground, head inclined downwards, l. knee drawn up, hand bound behind back and fastened to palm-tree

 

A common denominator, as noted, is apparently anything which can be made by its sellers to bear some Biblical connotation or other: as well as the things posted above already, we have (honourable mention) the famous Shekel of Tyre and (dishonourable mention) all those Flavian types marketed as variations on the "Judaea Capta" theme, no matter how remote: things like Vespasian's "Victoria Navalis" or even generic victory types of Domitian.

No disrespect intended to the devout, of course — the desire to possess items constituting a tangible connexion to the origins of one's faith is self-explanatory.

(I'm not a Byzantine collector, but, in incongruous contrast, I don't think I've seen any particular premium attaching to its various bronzes which depict Christ himself — can any experts weigh in?)

On a different note, the portrait denarii of J. Caesar would be somewhere near the top of my own "overpriced" list: their historic importance, of course, cannot be over-emphasised, but the thought of going over £1,000 for a poorly-conceived, badly-struck portrait on a small flan I find rather gruesome, especially as it isn't a rare issue, particularly. If I was spending that amount on, say, an Otho, I could at least expect to see all the letters and his toupée rendered with some attention.

 

Athenian Owls especially. I don't know why they are so damn expensive.

Its the most common counterfeited coin in the world. Why take a chance?

 

Here is it, I'll sell it to you for 1 million dollars!





Actually, take off 5 zeros and I'll still sell it to you. That coutnermarks worth 10 bucks to me.

 

Don't watch the entire video but start at 3:12 and check the charm bracelet. I wonder if the coins were fake, too????
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milli_Vanilli
Were owls overpriced before Milli Vanilli made them cool? How many other ancient coins were shown in music videos?

 

@dougsmit Regardless of who was singing that song is a steaming pile of crap!

But I wonder if the Owl was genuine, it is too far away to ever know I guess.

 

I think there is a fundamental difference in the collecting of ancient coins and modern coins. Most collectors of modern coins strive for completeness and while this is an almost impossible task given the insane amounts of money needed to buy the real rarities. The rare coins in most modern series are either errors, unpopular coins at the time where the majority were destroyed, minted for a very short time, or created by officials for rather dubious purposes. Thus the survival in rather small numbers determines both the desirability and therefore the price. In ancient coins, any attempt towards completeness is all but impossible There are simply too many types and even those who strive to complete a series of an individual emperor, even if they reduce their activity to a single mint or even a period of time of a specific mint find the task very daunting. There are simply too many coins and even relatively common types may be known by only a few examples. Thus most simply try to get a representative sample of all that is out there. Thus many popular coins are by all accounts relatively common. Also many rare coins are rather inexpensive.

 

That's what I wanted to say...