Opinions please: Philetairos fine style tetradrachm

Generally it's Roman portraits i'm after, but occasionally i find a Greek portrait that really appeals to me, like this Eumenes I (in the name of Philetairos) high relief tetradrachm:




With a hefty price-tag of a few thousand dollars, i don't want to do anything foolish.
I'm assuming the dies are fresh and the hair detail isn't tooling? (I don't see tooling on silver as often as i do on bronze).

So, what do we think - is this coin good?

 

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I think it's okay but my opinion is worth what you are paying for it . Have you considered using a dealer now that you're down to your last and more expensive acquisitions where the risk of a mistake is more costly? Seems like it would be well worth it now and a viable alternative to crowdsourcing authenticity opinions from other hobbyists.

Did you compare it to all 300+ examples in ACsearch? I did and thought I'd find other examples with that obverse die break but I came up empty, although perhaps I overlooked some. Your target coin does not have any prior auction sales in ACsearch. Style-wise and condition-wise it is definitely top tier, as the retail price tag reflects.

It is interesting that, as the listing says, the dies appear fresh yet there is a die break on the obverse. The break looks thin (new) on this coin. Maybe the die fell apart soon after this coin was struck and that's why I didn't see any other coins with this break. I wasn't looking closely enough to find non-broken die matches.

 

Could it be a lamination flaw rather than a die break? Beautiful coin, nonetheless!

 

Yeah, I was just looking at it again. Maybe it's not a die break? Maybe it's a toned scratch or lamination?

Whatever it is, I don't find it very detractive. The coin is gorgeous. If I were to get a Euemenes I tet I'd also look for this general style (bull neck, big jaw, etc).

 

Ditto.

 

I've done the CNG hammer price search and I consider the price to be fair.

I don't find the crowdsourcing of opinions in CT to be a waste of time. There are a few people here, yourself included, whose opinions i find valuable and insightful. I remember when I posted the Manlia Scantilla and learnt a lot of things I had never considered - ie, how easy it is to make a Manlia sestertius out of a common Julia Domna. The level of knowledge (and specialism) of some Cointalkers surpasses many dealers.

Your point is well taken - I know one or two "full service" dealers, who can help in this regard.

 

I think the coin is beautiful. It's in a price range that would be unthinkable for me, however

 

I recognized this coin from a sale a few years ago. It was cataloged as: "A few light deposits and minor marks, flan flaw on jaw, otherwise sharply struck and well centered"

Most examples of the type don't have a flan flaw and this coin sold for under the estimate in 2014 so I'm guessing it has bothered other people. (PM me if you want the previous sale information).

I suppose it depends what you are looking for but personally, the flan flaw is enough of an issue for me to not buy it. It's a type that comes around fairly regularly so you should be able to wait if you wanted.

 

Interesting perspectives.

Eye appeal is a strong selling point for me, and a small flaw on an otherwise fine style coin is no deal breaker. And I like the toning, the coin felt right to me......

BUT

... then I dug further into CNG's "research sold items" and I realised how good it gets in this price range:



This one above hammered for $3750 (excluding buyer's fee), and is superior in every way to the original coin I posted. I'd gladly have this one instead!

And for even more money? Well, I think at that point it becomes a case of diminishing returns.

$8750 buys you this:



Yeah it's great... the obverse is even better still. But at more than double the price, does it have $5,000 more "wow" factor? Not for me. I guess I'm not yet in that elite group of collectors who reach for the very top shelf. And how confident can I be that such a price would hold? I'm concerned that the collectors who care for finest-knowns are a small club, and if membership diminished enough (natural attrition could do that), so too could the demand for the best of the best, and the willingness to pay large amounts for it.

(Note - i do not know this series well enough to know if the different arrangement of devices on the reverse is important in terms of value/rarity. For me, it's all about the style and eye appeal).

 

Certainly no tooling that I can see.

 

For what it's worth, the original coin you posted hammered for $1700 in 2014. Giving a dealer a profit is absolutely fair but I don't see it being a $3K coin today, if that's the range you're being offered.

 

I don't think there has been any tooling. If you really like the coin (and it is a beauty) then I would go ahead and pull the trigger unless you think you can find another example at a substantially lower price.

 

The coin is absolutely stunning, without question! But the price - even if I could afford it, I would leave it for someone to whom a few thousand dollars is like peanuts !!!

 

I have a Philtairos tetradrachm with his head diademed. It is thought to have been minted while he was still alive. The celators working at the mint of Pergamon at this time did really impressive work. The massive featureless cheek and neck combined with the tightness of eyes nose and mouth creates an image of real power and brutality. Really impressive eally impressive

 

Coin is beautiful, but in my opinion is not worth 4K

 

this is priced at 4K now! as I mentioned in my previous posts this particular seller's markup 100% +

 

This really shows the price difference you encounter when comparing 99% perfect coin and 98% examples. They were issued for quite a while by more than one ruler in the 'dynasty' founded by the eunuch Philetairos. Mine is very different. I would suggest working through a dealer who you feel has a handle on the questions of style that are important to you. It is not like you are seeking a coin with only one sold every decade. Whatever that jaw flaw is, I can't see it being ignored by the market segment that buys such coins. There are a lot of these. Don't rush. They even existed in my price range: $220 from Stacks/Coin Galleries a mere 29 years ago.

 

I bought this yesterday. They are similar coins but vastly different grades. My price was 3.4% of $8,750.

Pergamene Kingdom
AR Tetradrachm
Attalos I
241-197 B.C.
16.93 grams,
Obv: Laureate head of Philetarios right
Rev: ΦIΛETAIΡOY Athena seated left holding wreath and resting elbw on shield at side, spear against shoulder, bee outer left field, monogram inner left, bow behind.
Grade: a VF with cabinet tone.
From Eye Appealing Coins July 2018


Edit to add: Doug's coin & mine have the same monogram. I didn't find this monogram on any of the coins on Wildwinds. Please let me know if you folks can share reference numbers or edits for my coin label above.

 

In US coins a small difference in grade can make a big difference in price, especially at the top end. The difference may not be so pronounced in ancient-coin collecting, but it is there. It is hard to know if a great coin is worth X or 1.5X if the condition is very high. When condition is very high, instead of counting the positives, you are looking at the coins (minor) flaws and counting them (This is explicitly how US grading is done; start from perfection and note the flaws).

For example, consider two coins, one 98% perfect and the other 99% perfect. From the point of view of positives, they are pretty similar (98 to 99). From the point of view of negatives, one is 1% problematic and the other 2% problematic--twice as much. Therefore some collectors will value the better coin a lot more.

Part of the problem with the OP coin is it is too nice. (What?). Yes, too nice. At that high level of excellence you begin to seek perfection and the die crack across the face leaps out at you as falling short. Instead of thinking "What a great coin in great style with excellent centering and virtually no wear," you think "Too bad it has the die crack across the chin."

I think many collectors who spend $2,000 or more on individual coins think that way and don't want to have to apologize for anything regarding the coins they buy. To them, that is a pretty obvious big flaw and lowers the price a lot.