Post Your Favorite Damaged Ancient

This is a very rare coin, I'm happy to have it despite its damage. The striations are common for AE coins of this age and place, but apparently a bronze bug took an unhealthy interest and nibbled into it.
It's a Qarakhanid fals of the year 494 AH = 1100 AD with a lion chained (or maybe just broken loose), minted in Bukhara (which is now Uzbekistan). 25 mm, 3.47 gr.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

Here is a coin that has quite a bit of damage due to corrosion which has impacted on the surfaces. Along with that is flan damage that was made pre-strike this is in the form of a weight correction where silver has been scooped from the reverse. This alone would put many people off this coin but enhanced it from my point of view from an interest perspective. The corrosion makes this coin UGLY.

 

Do you have some mutilated money to post @Aethelred?

 

Great damaged coins

 

I dont see forato in the description in coin

 

My new "Vercingétorix" AR Fouree Denarius...

 

Macedonian Kingdom, Alexander III The Great, 336 - 323 B.C. Bronze AE 18, 4.435g, 17.6mm
Obverse defaced in antiquity for unknown reasons. (Was head of Herakles right.)
Reverse ALEXANDROU, club above legend, bow in case below;
(The cataloger believed this was a an Amphipolis issue, Price 326.)

In my photo file I have found several other examples with similar lined pattern.

 

I did not post the seller's description of the coin. Here it is -

Lot 56 Serie anonima sestantale. Asse, dopo il 211 a.C. Cr. 56/2. AE. g. 32.56 mm. 33.00 Forato MB.

Turns out, I did not agree with the seller's attribution. I think it is an anonymous anchor (Cr 194/1) or V (Cr 87/1). Cr 56/2 has no symbols. The seller's pics -

When you look at my pic in the last post, you can see the left half of what I think is a V, but it could be the bottom, left part of an anchor.

 

Maybe used as a gaming token?

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Roman_board_game_from_Silchester.jpg

 

Here are a few.

This Otho denarius (RIC 2) was used in a metallurgical study of the coins of Otho and has a tiny hole drilled into the edge - not visible from the front or back - it just looks a bit grotty from those sides


This is about 2/3rds of a dupondius of Vienna (Gaul):


Plautia 12 denarius with a banker's mark on Leuconoë's cheek:


ATB,
Aidan.

 

Here is an electrum piece of Theodore I (acclaimed 1205, crowned 1208-1221) of the Empire of Nicaea which was founded as a Byzantine alternative to the Crusader's rule at Constantinople after Constantinople fell in 1204.


35-30 mm. Chipped. 3.65 grams.
Christ seated facing
Emperor on left and St. Theodore on the right.
Sear 2064. DO IV.II Theodore I 2.
I bought it already chipped. The flan is quite thin and if you handled it you would think "This is fragile." Apparently someone in the past was not careful with it.

 

WoW! A very curious break in such a magnificent specimen! Congrats!!

 

Good coins

 

Oooops, I forgot about these pretty fricken cool broken/busted winnas ...

Trajan Bronze Dichalkon
98-117 AD




Constantine V with Leo IV & Leo III Folles
741-775 AD

 

Pegasus

Domitianus as Caesar
AR 18mm, 2.56g, Rome 76AD
CAESAR AVG F DOMITIANVS: Laureate head right
COSIIII: Winged pegasus standing right
RIC 921 SEAR 5 2637

 

Interesting coin! To me it looks like the portrait was deliberately and aggressively attacked, while the surrounding area is mostly untouched. So I don't think it's wishful thinking: damnatio seems to be the most likely explanation.

 

Alegandron, are coins with banker's marks one of your collecting themes? Imagining the hands they have passed through and the things they have purchased is amazing. I can't help think about the second or two it took for the banker or merchant to decide where on the coin to place his mark so it didn't overlap or obliterate the ones previously placed! Maybe the one banker always made it a point of striking his directly over the eyes of each Athenian owl he received.

 

I enjoy bankers marks. I collect on a historical basis, not so much numismatically. I enjoy wear on a coin as it shows that people used them, traded, purchased items, etc. With Bankers marks, another dimension emrges: they are proven to be an authentic coin during ancient times, and they have been used in commerce.

I do not specifically collect them. Rather, I am not averse to capturing them as well as wonder about the whats and whys of the various bankers marks. Purdy cool.

On the Athenian Owl, I understand that bankers were not afraid to chop or test the coin between the Owl's eyes. Kind of a dig at Athens. However, there were reluctant to deface the Goddess Athena, being a powerful goddess. Mine are kind of cool with bankers chops all over Athena's faces, and not damaging the Owls. I am Curious as to why. @dougsmit suggested one time that they may had traded well out of the Greek world, and either were ignorant of or not cared about Athena. Would love to know the mystery behind them

 

Wow, so interesting. I hope you are able to acquire more banker's marked coins and post them to this or another thread in the future, along with some discussion and speculation. Thank you!