Newer than new to ancients and looking at some "Templar" coins

sevaral years ago, I was asked whether the templars minted coins. they definitively did not.

also, the hospitallers are a completely separate order

 

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You've got one! Awesome! You might enjoy the series of novels by Maurice Druon called the Accursed Kings. The first one (The Iron King) is all about Philippe IV, and the Templars figure prominently.

 

Great coin! Well...off I go to have a look for one.

 

Welcome to the forum.

Check out vcoins.com as a source of ancients that are guaranteed to be authentic. Stay away from ebay until you know much more or have been pointed to good ebay dealers by knowledge ancients collectors (like the people here).

Slabbed ancients tend to cost much more than their raw counterparts. Ancients collectors prefer to be able to handle our coins and generally don't like slabs.

There are a lot of fakes and way overpriced coins out there that even fool people who have collected for decades. There are also very cool Ancient coins available for $20-50.

John

 

Thank you John! That's my second ancient coin bookmark now. In the US coin realm I do like my slabs, but only for coins the Chinese enjoy to exploit, like the Morgan darrer. Is it fair to say the only coins in the ancient arena that are faked tend to be the more valuable?

 

You may be surprised. Even many inexpensive Ancients have been faked. Best to be a careful buyer from the get-go. Besides, NGC does not guarantee authenticity, and, once encapsulated, it can be very difficult to examine the coin closely.

 

There are fakes of even the cheapest ancient coins. There are people out there who take a $30 denarius (or similar) and make a mold from it to use in casting copies. Usually the fakes of cheaper coins tend to be more crudely made and thus easier to spot. Casts tend to leave either lines where the obverse and reverse molds met (or file marks) and their devices (especially letters) tend to be soft looking and/or have little raised pills on their surfaces.

The more valuable coins are faked by using a real coin to make a "transfer die" that is used to strike a fake copy. The really tricky people take the same ancient coin in F condition and restrike it with their die as an EF. These take a lot more skill to detect. One giveaway is that any flaw in the coin used to make the transfer die is replicated to all the copies. What should be a random corrosion pit for example is seem in the same place on all the copies.

There are multiple websites that track fake ancient coins that can be consulted. You can also ask for help here, but it is considered bad practice to post coins in upcoming auctions.

If you buy from vcoins or reputable auction houses, they will refund your money with no hassle. With help from CT you can enjoy ancient coin collecting without much worry. People get in trouble when they buy stuff from ebay or non-specialist coin dealers or shops who aren't experts.

John

 

Maybe the OP would want a coin with a knight on it? Bohemund III of Anrioch comes to mind.

 

I would also recommend the Fake Coin Report at Forum Ancient Coins, as a great resource for if you ever have concerns about the authenticity of a coin. Also as a seller of coins too.

Great coin @Sallent It's the most iconic coin of the Crusader States in my opinion.

This Is an example of a coin struck by the Hospitallers, this one from Malta during the time of Grand Master Jean Parisot de Valette im the 1560s. Sadly not my coin.

 

In a somewhat wider venue, there are always the "Crusader" coins with the crosses. I'm sure some of these are connected to the Templars.

 

Check out some of Doug Smith's web pages. He's a member of this forum.

http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/

 

Do you guys have the same SNs over there?

 

crosses were an extremely common motif at the time. there is nothing particularly templar about their use