Numismatik Naumann Auctions

I've been doing this for decades. There is plenty of supply. No issues there.

This younger generation, well, they will decide the fate of our hobby. They have no mind of their own, they just do what Instagram/Twitter/Kardashians/etc tell them. Its a sad time for humanity.

 

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So true

 

I don't think many x'ers who are into Ancients are into "Instagram/Twitter/Kardasians/etc"
While I am a millennial, I don't really share any of the same habits or values.
But, just to put things into perspective; I'm sure the Traditionals were saying the same thing about the Baby Boomers, "They have no mind of their own, they just do what Michael Jackson, MTV, and Duran Duran tell them."
Then, I'm sure the same thing with the turn of the century generation, "They have no mind of their own, they just do what the radio, television, and Henry Ford tell them."

The Ancient Numismatics hobby will be fine.

 

I knew as soon as I wrote it someone would point out the flaws in my statement. You are right, I might be very close to telling the neighborhood kids to 'stay off my lawn'. But the 'younger' crowd is a whole new beast, something that has never been seen before and something none of us truly understand as yet. Society has changed so fast and so dramatically in the last 20 years that we cannot possibly understand as yet the implications. True, some might try to compare to all previous generations, but as I said, humanity has never seen a change so quick and drastic as this.

I am constantly at odds with my kids. I challenge them on all their perceptions. I applaud them when they can tell me how they looked something up or thought more about something. But sometimes they just dont have an answer other than "Youtube".

Anyway. I am a Duran Duran fan, actually!

 

I agree.

 

The “grade” does not matter, but a “description of a coin’s condition” certainly does. They are two very different things.

 

Woah, I did not see that coming!

Same here. I sometimes feel very alienated.

I often think about how crazy many of the college students of today are (Georgia Tech much less so, thankfully), and then I wonder how people felt about the “hippies” of the 1970’s. I think we are watching history repeat itself, but the introduction of smartphones had created an entirely new dynamic.

 

Speaking of the auction, I was planning on bidding on the double daric, then @AncientJoe and others scared me. I'm glad they did. Because now I'm not so sure of authenticity when comparing it to any other known examples I can find. I wonder how soon we'll see it at a prestigious auction.

 

I tend to keep away from discussions about grading since I seldomly find them insightful. What generally bothers me about the concept of grade is the underlying idea that a coin starts as perfect and then slowly deteriorates. There is a certain amount and type of wear that I personally find more desirable than "mint state." Others might consider it damage, but in my eyes some coins have become more interesting and/or appealing through historical use. If you disagree, that's fine - we might simply have different tastes and, even better, won't compete for the same coins in the next auction.

Below is an example – for me, much of the charm of this coin lies in the "war paint" banker's mark on Heracles' chin:

Alexander III "the Great," Kingdom of Macedonia, AR tetradrachm, 325–323 BC, Amphipolis mint (under Antipater). Obv: Head of Herakles right, wearing lion skin. Rev: ΑΛΕΞΑΝΔΡΟΥ, Zeus Aëtophoros seated left; in left field, rooster standing left. 26mm, 17.17g. Ref: Price 79; Troxell 1997, issue E3. Ex CNG, e-auction 376, lot 47; ex Tiberius collection; ex AMCC 1, lot 39.

Ditto, ditto, and ditto – we might be more or less the same age, and I couldn't agree more.

 

When I was a teenager, my friends and I all collected something - coins, comic books, baseball cards, stamps - and often with an edge of competitiveness. Today's teenagers collect "followers" and "likes", with an edge of competiveness. That's why I sometimes worry about the future of our hobby.

 

You must be referring to auctions with which I'm not familiar. Every auction I see on Sixbid has pictures of their coins, most of which are very sharp and well lighted. I would agree that buying a coin "sight unseen" is a mistake, but that's not the case for Sixbid's auctions, nor is it the case for VCoins dealers.

True, but as has been pointed out by others here, description of condition and a coin's grade are entirely different data from a dealer's or auctioneer's estimate of grade. The former is helpful; the latter, just a curiosity.

 

Today that is true but before the era of fully photos for every coin we had something that I fear has been lost. There was a time that many coins offered for sale unillustrated were offered by a seller known to his customers as someone who did not sell problem coins. Rather than taking consignments including junk or splitting up hoards of, for example, 10,000 low end Lycians, these dealers offered coins that they could sell as VF and I would expect to be happy with the coin. If the coin was very rare and possibly an exception to normal expectations, there would be an apologetic additional description that would serve as fair warning. I guess we still have that from our slab friends who should not complain about the appearance of an EF 1/5, 1/5. Of course this is much more a problem with auctions than with list sales. In the past, I recall calling (using the voice feature of the telephone) and asking if the dealer thought I would be happy with the coin. This was as if we had a rating for eye appeal as well as strike and surface. There was a somewhat major dealer that I patronized in the 1990's that I knew for having poor taste in style. Fortunately his lists included more photos than most. Today, I know a couple dealers whose taste in style is such that I would feel comfortable buying from based solely on the fact that they were willing to sell the coin but they are less common (and much more expensive) than they were back in the old days. Today, dealers really need to have photo skills or hire someone who does. We no longer like surprises.

 

Personally, for my collecting habits, I wholeheartedly agree. Every single one of my Ancient coin purchases has had absolutely no regard for the grade. I capture them for Historical reasons, or that I feel that they were “cool”! It is what I saw, felt, or knew about the coin that determines my interest. To be honest, if I posted a grade in an attribute, it is because I copied the Seller’s attrubute, and forgot to delete it.

 

I don't really understand how you can complain about fees here, Naumann have among the lowest buyers premiums out of all the bigger houses out there at 14.90%.

As for shipping 15€ is what I pay for their DHL express service that has the coins delivered to my doorstep less than 24 hours after being posted.