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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 2001486, member: 19463&quot;]No to 1 and no to 2!</p><p><br /></p><p><b>(1)</b>Are you really denying the existence of the thousands of Imperial portraits in paint, bronze and marble that are displayed in museums around the world?&nbsp; Yes, there are no photographs but the appearance of many emperors is pretty well documented. </p><p><br /></p><p>(2)In 1906 the collection world was emerging from the previous emphasis on rarity and entering the newly fashionable emphasis on condition.&nbsp; Take as an example of the previous (to 1906) generation&#039;s rarity emphasis the 1834 two volume set of books <b>A Descriptive Catalog of Rare and Unedited Roman Coins</b> by J.Y. Akerman which took over 1000 pages to list all the rare Roman coins (but none of the common ones) known to the author and went further to rank them listing which were rarest of the rare and which were only rare.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>We currently are in a period where most collectors value grade to the point that they pay several times the MS66 price for an MS68.&nbsp; When I last collected US in the 1950&#039;s we recognized grades of Uncirculated and Brilliant Uncirculated but the average collector on the street never thought about breaking it down further.&nbsp; Times change.&nbsp; Currently there are people paying huge sums for the best known examples of common ancients but we have no way of knowing what fad will grip collectors of the next century.&nbsp; Certainly the EF will sell for more than the VF but whether it will retain the current proportions or not is a matter to be seen.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Currently there is also a bit of an avoidance for rare coins that are not on the popular lists of rarities.&nbsp; It is a fact that price follows demand rather than rarity and many of us have relatively cheap coins more rare than the EID MAR denarius (most popular ancient unless you count the Athenian owl and Tiberius Tribute Penny which are as common as can be).&nbsp; The old joke is that the third known example of a coin went unsold because there are only two people who care and they each have one.&nbsp; Will rarity come back into fashion?&nbsp; Maybe, maybe not.&nbsp; I can not accept as gospel the commercial fashion guru of 1906 any more than Mr. Akerman&#039;s opinions from his book (which is not worth much today for a well printed and illustrated work of that age).[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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