I am just cruising along looking for coins of Livia and, of course, Tribute pennies come up. Not a fan. I have my 1 and need no more. But, knowing these are heavily faked, this coin jumped out at me as a modern cast forgery. Soapy, little detail, craters and the auction house itself make me suspicious. Then I looked closer and it has flow lines?? I have often heard that you cannot fake flow lines on cast coins. My eyes aren't the best at spotting them, but I am working on getting better by looking at LOTS and LOTS of coins every day. Is it just well worn? Am I mistaken, could this be legit?? Next up is his buddy Trajberius. This one doesn't have all the tell tale signs, but the portrait made me chuckle due to it having a resemblance to Trajan: We know the "Tribute Penny", as this type is often called when for sale, is heavily forged due to some folks wanting to believe a book from a couple millenia ago is word for word factual. Again, this is purely educational as I am not interested in these coins nor even the type, but want to improve my eyes and know if I am seeing something or just seeing things? I've been wrong before. As Frank reminds us, Insight and opinions are appreciated, especially from experts...or at least folks that have been around ancients longer than I have (around 5 years now give or take).
Personally, I too would be weary with #1. I have seen a fair amount of these with similar appearance being offered by what I would presume to be 'on the up and up' auction houses. Then I'm reminded that even auction houses with good repute have fakes that slip through their screening process. I'd like to believe unintentionally, but then...money talks...so??? Could it be a: "see no ___" "hear no ___" "speak no ___" type of thing? Yeah, I understand that these being a quite popular type; they are heavily faked. That all stated, it's really hard to say for absolute certainty. Some coins can have that "soapy" pitted appearance, soft legends, and it can simply be due to natural wear, corrosion, and perhaps aggressive cleaning. I also see the 'flow lines' that you're referring to. That's a tough one. I would likely avoid it; knowing that there are others to be had that I'd feel better about. I too already have my one and only needed for the type. There aren't a lot of Imperial AR varietal options for 'Tibby'.