Observations from CNG 115, Part 1

Discussion in 'Ancient Coins' started by Al Kowsky, Sep 17, 2020.

  1. Al Kowsky

    Al Kowsky Well-Known Member

    The ancient coin market is alive & doing well :D! Most of the coins with a provenance of 20 years or more were getting exceptionally high prices. Some of these coins can be pedigreed to over 100 years. As usual some of the coins sold for many times estimate, but there were bargains to be had also :smuggrin:. Below are a few coins that got my attention.

    CNG 115, lot 7 image.jpg Lot 7, Tarentum, c. 380-325 BC, AR Diobol: 13 mm, 1.06 gm. This tiny gem hammered for $1,600 with an estimate of $500.

    CNG 115, lot 9 image.jpg Lot 9, Tarentum, c. 350-330 BC, AVObol: 8 mm, .64 gm, Ex Hunt collection. This tiny coin hammered for $6,500 with an estimate of $2,000.

    CNG 115, lot 55 image.jpg Lot 55, Syracuse, 405-367, AR Decadrachm: 31 mm, 43.31 gm, on the style of Kimon. Hammer price of $22,5000 with an estimate of $25,000. This coin didn't do so well because of the unsightly die-brake on Arethousa's neck, that looks like an exploding goiter, & tooling on her face.

    CNG 115, lot 129 image.jpg Lot 129, Thebes, c. 425-400 BC, AR Stater: 18 mm, 12.27 gm. This coin hammered for $2,750 with an estimate of $500. I'm sure the provenance going back to J. Hirsch XIII, May 15, 1905, had something to do with the result :smuggrin:.

    CNG 115, lot 137 image.jpg Lot 137, Athens, c. 454-404 BC, AR Tetradrachm: 22.5 mm, 17.05 gm. This coin hammered for $1,800 with an estimate of $3,000. This coin hammered for $5,500 in CNG Auction 78 :jawdrop:! In light of the flood of Owls in the last 2 years I'm surprised this coin had an estimate of $3,000 & sold for $1,800 :rolleyes:.

    CNG 115, lot 141 image.jpg Lot 141, Athens, c. 454-404 BC, AR Tetradrachm: 24 mm, 17.22 gm. This coin hammered for $3,000 with an estimate of $1,500 :jawdrop:! Yes, the coin has a full crest, but Athena's nose is deformed & the Owl is deformed because of doubling :eek:.

    CNG 115, lot 78 image.jpg Lot 78, Koson, Geto-Dacians, mid 1st cen. BC, AV Stater: 21 mm, 8.31 gm. This coin hammered for $3,500 with an estimate of $1,500 :jawdrop:! Yes, the coin is mint state, but a long way from the best examples I've seen :smuggrin:. My Koson Stater pictured below is far superior to this coin :cool:.

    2491172-001, AK Collection.jpg

    CNG 115, lot 667 image.jpg Lot 667, Marcus Aurelius, AD 161-180, AE Sestertius: 31 mm, 26.91 gm, Rome Mint. This coin hammered for $6,000 with an estimate of $2,000. Being a Banti plate coin & having a pedigree going back to 1973 certainly played into the price realized :smuggrin:.

    Any thoughts on CNG 115, Part 1 o_O?
     
  2. Avatar

    Guest User Guest



    to hide this ad.
  3. Limes

    Limes Well-Known Member

    Some mighty fine coins were auctioned, but somehow I felt this particular auction had less amazing showcase material in comparison to their other, previous auctions and current auctions by other auctioneers. Just my opinion though, nothing more! And in any case, all the coins are way out of my reach (and I prefer not to buy from another continent). By the way, is the Feature auction the follow-up of the triton auctions?

    I focused on Roman coins, and the coins mentioned below merely show my collecting interests.

    Some noteworthy hammerprices that puzzle me:

    Why is this Hadrian Hispania restitutor - denarius sold for $ 700 (est. $ 300)? https://auctions.cngcoins.com/lots/...itutor-type-rome-mint-struck-circa-ad-130-133
    Surely there are better deals available? What am I missing?

    Why is this pretty sestertius of MA as caesar sold for $ 2.250 (est. $ 1.500)? is it very rare? Very special? Is the mentioned provenance very noteworthy? The reverse shows some serious pitting.
    https://auctions.cngcoins.com/lots/...-rome-mint-struck-under-antoninus-pius-ad-145

    Some other noteworthy hammerprices:

    The plated eid-mar denarius sold for $ 5.000.

    This lovely denarius sold for $ 45.000! It's either the last denarius struck by Caesar, or the first by Octavian. https://auctions.cngcoins.com/lots/...ling-with-octavian-in-italy-or-cisalpine-gaul

    A very nice Plotina denarius, hammered for $ 13.000 (est. $ 5.000): https://auctions.cngcoins.com/lots/...me-mint-struck-under-trajan-ad-112-summer-114

    A very interesting Hadrian sestertius, with Galley reverse, hammered for $5.500 (est. $ 750). https://auctions.cngcoins.com/lots/...-2700-g-12h-rome-mint-struck-circa-ad-129-130
     
  4. Roman Collector

    Roman Collector Well-Known Member

    No idea why the Marcus Aurelius as Caesar sestertius went for so much. As you say, the coin is not without problems. A bidding war between two well-heeled Marcus Aurelius enthusiasts?

    There are two varieties of this coin -- a bare head, right, and a bare-headed bust right with drapery on the left shoulder. They appear with about equal frequency in the marketplace. Strack notes specimens of this particular bust type in Berlin, London, Munich, and Vienna, and Cohen notes an example in the BNF. They are not commonly up for auction, however, and only a handful appear in a search at acsearch. Most of these examples have been smoothed.
     
    robinjojo, Restitutor and Limes like this.
  5. AncientJoe

    AncientJoe Well-Known Member

    I bought my main lot for 1/3rd of my max bid so I can't complain!
     
  6. TIF

    TIF Always learning.

    I bid on two and won one-- my primary target for less than the planned max. I only watched when my lots and friends' targets were approaching and can't speak to the whole of part I, but some lots hammered for reasonable prices and some for inexplicably high prices. Seemed like business as usual :D.
     
  7. Limes

    Limes Well-Known Member

    Congratulations to the winners! Be sure to post your wins! :)

    The right, and perhaps only sensible conclusion one can draw! :)
     
  8. Restitutor

    Restitutor Well-Known Member

    I agree, definitely some lovely coins but overall feels more lackluster than the prior feature auction. I was really liking Lot 443, Nero in Drag, but after my prior EA wins going for way more than I initially budgeted, had to bow out in the $500ish range.

    C7019913-D8E7-40F5-ACA6-B2AD5F7A1D59.jpeg
     
    robinjojo, Bing, DonnaML and 5 others like this.
  9. Limes

    Limes Well-Known Member

    So true! :hilarious:

    lovely coin by the way, too bad you couldn't win it.
     
    Restitutor likes this.
  10. Restitutor

    Restitutor Well-Known Member

    So this one was on my watchlist and I really wanted to bid on it. Honestly if I had had the cash I would have been that $700 person also. I’ve only been collecting since Oct 2019, but it seems incredibly rare to find a Hadrian with such detail in both hair and beard on the same coin, so at least for me that would have been the reason to spend so much on it. If there are coins with this level of detail for sale at present in a non-auction format please send my way so I can scoop one up without auction fees :hilarious:
     
    DonnaML likes this.
  11. Al Kowsky

    Al Kowsky Well-Known Member

    I was eye-balling that coin too :cool:, but for a hammer price of $1,300 no thanks. I'm happy with the Nero Tet I've got :D.

    Prieur 86, AK Collection.jpg
     
    robinjojo, Bing, DonnaML and 2 others like this.
  12. kazuma78

    kazuma78 Supporter! Supporter

    I was also considering bidding on lot 7 but for the size of it, I couldn't justify it at this point. Really cool coin though. And I was also surprised on the Koson. Thats a coin on my list, but that price was crazy. These are common enough now that I hope to get a nice example like yours for less than the CNG example sold for. But who knows with some of the crazy prices lately.

    All 4 of the lots I was bidding on went crazy, in my opinion. Here are the ones I liked and was after:

    Lot 35
    Screenshot_20200917-090530_Chrome.jpg
    SICILY, Himera. Circa 483/2-472/1 BC. AR Didrachm (19.5mm, 8.68 g, 5h). Cock standing left / Crab within shallow incuse circle. Westermark, Himera 39 (O9/R31); HGC 2, 438; SNG ANS 157 (same obv. die); SNG Lloyd 1012 (same obv. die). Toned, a few scratches. Good VF.
    Estimate of $1500 and went to $4250.

    Lot 116
    Screenshot_20200917-091033_Chrome.jpg
    KINGS of PAEONIA. Lykkeios. Circa 358/6-335 BC. AR Tetradrachm (23mm, 12.71 g, 7h). Astibos or Damastion mint. Laureate head of Zeus right / Herakles strangling the Nemean Lion; bow and quiver to right. Paeonian Hoard 63 (same obv. die); HGC 3, 142. Lightly toned, typical die wear on obverse. EF. Well centered.

    From the James Barry Collection. Ex CNG inventory 720263 (May 2000).
    Estimate of $1000 sold for $3500.

    Lot 357
    Screenshot_20200917-091235_Chrome.jpg
    PERSIA, Achaemenid Empire. temp. Xerxes I to Darios II. Circa 485-420 BC. AV Daric (14.5mm, 8.31 g). Lydo-Milesian standard. Sardes mint. Persian king or hero, wearing kidaris and kandys, quiver over shoulder, in kneeling-running stance right, holding spear and bow / Incuse punch. Carradice Type IIIb, Group A/B (pl. XIII, 27); Meadows, Administration 321; BMC Arabia pl. XXIV, 26; Sunrise 24. Lustrous. Good VF. Well centered.

    Estimate $1500 sold for $4500

    Lot 363
    Screenshot_20200917-091433_Chrome.jpg
    PTOLEMAIC KINGS of EGYPT. Ptolemy I Soter. 305/4-282 BC. AR Tetradrachm (27mm, 14.19 g, 12h). Alexandreia mint. Struck circa 294-282 BC. Diademed head right, wearing aegis around neck; tiny Δ behind ear / Eagle standing left on thunderbolt; to left, P above monogram. CPE 132; Svoronos 252; SNG Copenhagen 69. Attractive cabinet tone. EF.

    From the El Medina Collection. Ex Spink Numismatic Circular CII.8 (October 1994), no. 6283.
    Estimate $1000 sold for $3750.
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2020
  13. Romancollector

    Romancollector Well-Known Member

    Hammer prices were absolutely ridiculous. There were a few coins, including one I lost, that had previously sold in the last few months for far less than what they realized in this auction. There were also a few coins whose hammer prices were equal to or higher than their higher grade counterparts from the last feature auction. I agree with the observations about the Koson stater and the Nero tetradrachm. Looking at the CNG archives (for the Nero), there are quite a few similar grade examples to be had for 1/3 to 1/2 of the price...That being said, I managed to get a measly 1 out of 5 coins I had bid on.
     
    kazuma78 likes this.
  14. pprp

    pprp Well-Known Member

    I think there were several recycled Greek coins from Triton XXII of last January either unsold or sold around the estimate, which now went quite higher than the previous hammer prices.

    The low hammer prices of lots 55/56 (the syracyse decadrachms), 95 (the Mende tetradrachm) and 97 (the Alexander Oktadrachm) demonstrate that CNG is increasingly relying on 2-5 bidders like Clio and McDuck from Chile. They are utterly unpredictable and don't focus on a collecting field. Some times they ignore coins with noted provenances, sometimes they go crazy for others. There is no pattern.

    The bidding platform failed again.

    Prebidding did not close at 09:00am, instead people kept bidding after that time which is not at all understandable and caused more issues in the live as the auctioneer had to remove live bids because they discovered last minute "prior" bids.

    On some occasions the auctioneer said that he needed one more bid to clear the book - this caused a lot of negative comments the previous time and yet it happened again.

    I was the underbidder in all lots I participated; the hammers for most of them were 2-6 times the estimate. I am fed up with Clio, McDuck and their numismatic advisors. Yes it's a free market and they can do whatever they like. If they have so much money why don't they move to NAC and let the mid-value coins for true-normal collectors?!
     
  15. Al Kowsky

    Al Kowsky Well-Known Member

    One shocker I missed while getting a snack to go with my coffee is pictured below.

    CNG 115, lot 347 image.jpg Lot 347, Judaea, Year 3, War with Rome, AD 66-70, AR Shekel: 22 mm, 14.16 gm. This coin hammered for $6,000 with an estimate of $10,000 o_O. This very same coin hammered for $16,500 at a Goldberg auction 3 years ago :jawdrop:! Whoever won this coin may have scored the ripoff of the auction :D.
     
  16. Ardatirion

    Ardatirion Où est mon poisson

    A lot of this is off base. First of all, prebidding is by design supposed to continue up until the lot opens on the floor. As a collector myself, I think this is a fantastic feature. Second, the "prior bids" are any that were placed since the sale went up. Earlier book bids should take precedent over floor and internet bids, but unfortunately, as we discovered in CNG 114, the system was not able to handle that manually. A promised update would have resolved this, but there were problems with it that forced us to delay the start of the first session to have it rolled back. We were forced to manually correct this issue on each lot, rolling back the bid so that the book bid correctly took precedent.
     
  17. pprp

    pprp Well-Known Member

    If your webage said prebid ends at 09:00 then NOBODY SHOULD BE ABLE TO ENTER BIDS AFTERWARDS. The bid button should be deactivated. End of story. Otherwise write this explicitly.

    What else I said is off-base?
     
    Magnus87 likes this.
  18. SeptimusT

    SeptimusT Well-Known Member

    Some very high prices, some of which make sense, and some of which do not. I still managed to come away with what I think was a good bargain: I got Lot 499 for the opening bid price, over $120 below the estimate, which is also coincidentally what it last sold for in 2005! Goes to show that there's always value to be found if you look for it.

    [​IMG]
     
  19. Restitutor

    Restitutor Well-Known Member


    Not taking a side either way in this debate, but at least for me my view doesn’t say specifically that pre-bidding ends, it just says live bidding begins.

    E76732BB-C77A-4BB4-8D58-225E6BE1C24A.jpeg
     
  20. pprp

    pprp Well-Known Member

    There was a count down clock which ended at "void=zero minutes left for internet bidding"
     
  21. Nvb

    Nvb Well-Known Member

    I was hoping to upgrade my Hadrian Nilus drachm with this coin
    upload_2020-9-17_11-12-30.jpeg
    One of the most eye catching examples I have seen... but in the end it was just too rich at $1200


    Besides, my example still looks decent when compared side by side and I got it for a measly $100! Also from CNG in 2019

    upload_2020-9-17_11-16-26.jpeg
     
    Last edited: Sep 17, 2020
Draft saved Draft deleted

Share This Page