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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;dougsmit, post: 1880602, member: 19463&quot;]<a href="http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/feac59ugl.html" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/feac59ugl.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.forumancientcoins.com/dougsmith/feac59ugl.html</a></p><p>Some of my finer uglies are on my page but I&#039;ll post here my favorite ugly and the one I would most like to know who has owned since it was minted.&nbsp;&nbsp; It is a survivor of bronze disease.&nbsp; </p><p>[ATTACH=full]318988[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>&quot;When a &#039;good&#039; Emperor died he was &#039;deified&#039; with a special issue of commemorative coins. Caracalla was not very &#039;good&#039; and (by coincidence??) his consecration issues are very rare . The coins were possibly issued by Elagabalus who deified Caracalla (and claimed to be his son) but some students assign them to Severus Alexander because of the MAGNO reference to Alexander (the Great). I do not know. Rarest are the sestertii. In the American Numismatic Society book <b>Treasures of Ancient Coinage</b>, page 116, a gorgeous fine+ specimen with 5 level pyre is listed as &#039;Probably the finest of four known&#039;. (Sorry, those of you who only will have mint state!) Banti, <b>I Grandi Bronzi Imperiali</b>, IV-1 p. 144, lists two 5 level pyre coins; one, sharing the obverse die with my coin, is illustrated. The 4 level version is listed as being in Vaillant (a book from 1743 which I have not seen) and illustrated with a line drawing. First, we need to be aware that few coins are as rare as such census reports would indicate. This coin was probably a recent hoard find. Finds over the last century could well have doubled the census of these coins. The coin has been tooled considerably to remove bronze disease (ugly pits are better than losing the whole coin!). I consider the die match with the Banti illustration to be evidence that the coin was not tooled into a rarity but actually is what remains of a very rare coin. Is it too ugly to appear in your collection?&quot;[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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