My Hadrian denarius arrived today!

Since it arrived today I wanted to take some of my own photos to share with you guys .

I apologize for the scratches on the reverse of the holder. It didn’t show them in the auction lot but I guess it’s better to have a scratched up holder than a scratched up coin xD.

 

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Crack it out and you can then take a better photo. It looks to be a very nice coin, but it is hard to see a coin when the slab screams a grade and numbers at you.

 

Nah I don’t want to risk damaging it since I’ve never cracked open a slab before and all it takes is one sharp piece of plastic going the wrong way and scratching it up.

I can try to take some better photos and cropping the grade & stuff out of the photo.

 

Huge coingrats!!!
I would have to handle that coin if it was me! It's just calling to be held and that toning is bonkers!
My best Hadrians are far off but still some sweet little Denarii:

 

Thanks mate ^_^

Everyone seems to want me to crack it out..but I’ve never cracked open a holder before so I would definitely want some practice with cheaper coins before trying on this $360 coin and risk damaging it.

Maybe I’ll crack out one of my 1955 Proof Roosevelt Dimes for practice.

 

Oh yeah by the way do you happen to know why my denarius is so light?

2.89 grams instead of the 3.4 grams it’s supposed to be.

Normally I would say “just wear & tear” but this coin doesn’t have much wear & tear at all.

 

Great coin!

And I agree with @Valentinian ... crack it out! You will appreciate the beauty even more.

 

Thanks!

Maybe when I learn how to crack coins out. I don’t want to risk this coin on my first try and have it get all scratched up.

Besides the holder doesn’t really hurt anything. It keeps the coin safe from my clumsiness ^_^

 

Here's a picture of my dog...

 

Aww cute!

 

It's actually a 'stock photo'...My poor attempt at humor. Apologies.

 

Were you making fun of my scratched up holder? XD

 

I have several "Golden Age" denarii in my collection in the 2.7 - 2.9 g range. Could be a combination of wear, mineral leaching, etc. Usually the weight was determined for a large number of flans rather than for an individual one. If, say, 100 flans totaled 340g, then that was good enough. No one worried if one particular flan was a little light or heavy.

At the extreme end, here's a denarius of Commodus weighing in at only 2.0g:

Silver Denarius
Rome mint, A.D. 192
Obv: L AEL AVREL COMM AVG P FEL
Rev: P M TR P XVII IMP VIII COS VII P P - Pietas, seated, facing left, holding scepter in left hand and reaching out with right hand to small child, in front. Star in left field.
RIC 236
18mm, 2.0g.

 

Thanks! I appreciate you answering because I just couldn’t figure it out and Googling “Why is my Hadrian denarius so light?” wasn’t turning up anything useful :/.

But wouldn’t people have been upset getting lightweight denarii?

Like you said if 100 flans were 340g and some were underweight and some overweight then Gresham’s Law should take place resulting in the heavier denarii being hoarded and only the light ones in circulation.

Unless transactions were by weight rather than number of coins?


What is a “flans”? I’ve seen lots of coins graded as like “bent flans” but Idk what that means.

Is it the extra metal on the edge?

Nice Commodus coin! I was just watching the Netflix series “Roman Empire” and it has 3 seasons each depicting the life of one emperor.

Season 1: Commmodus
Season 2: Julius Caesar
Season 3: Caligula

It’s pretty good!

 

If someone handed you two denarii, would you be able to tell if one of them was a half gram lighter than the other? Unless you were planning to melt down and stamp your own coins, it wouldn't make any difference. Gresham's Law applies more to debasement--90% silver vs. 50% silver. If both coins are 90% silver and trade at the same value, very few people would care about a slight weight difference, especially if they were confident that the government treated them all equally.

A "flan" is just the metal disc that the coin is stamped into--a pre-stamped coin.

 

You won't regret it.
Ps, you can also search CT. There are several tutorials on how others release the beasts

 

Not too far out of the norm. Whenever I worry about discrepancies I compare similar coins on ac search. A very useful site for study.

 

I actually checked on Heritage Auctions past sold denarii of Hadrian of the same type.

They seemed to be between 3g-3.2g

 

But then what would protect the coins from my clumsiness?

 

I would definitely be able to tell if they were that underweight. People would lose confidence in the government guarantee of equality the moment they weighed different denarii and found some much lighter than others.

Back in Ancient times coins were often used as bullion and if someone was expecting 3.4g per silver in each denarii and they got 2.9g they would quickly realize they got ripped off.