Show us your first and last acquisitions.

Great thread idea @Spaniard !and cool Obulco

Thanks!
And one worth worth fighting for
One of my favorite sub sub sets I'm working on is all of the various symbols/monograms below the helmet on the reverse of these thunderbolt bossed MSCs.
Here's one with a reverse like your recently acquired beauty and a very differently styled obverse:

And a few more different designs:


Funny enough, I just won this today


My collection started with a bunch of coins that my dad gave me to start my collection early on.
However, the first coin that I purchased at auction was at the 4th blue auction, back when they identified the coins, and it's pretty telling of things to come; an archaic dirty little silver coin with a satyr playing pocket pool (their pics and minel:

Islands off Thrace. Thasos circa 525-463 BC.
Obol AR

10mm., 0,91g.

Naked satyr kneeling right / Quadripartite incuse square.

nearly very fine

SNG Ashmolean 3653; Rosen 144; Le Rider Thasos Group I and pl. I, 4.

 

Log in or Sign up to hide this ad.

First Coin:
I started collecting when I was 8 or 9. Started with Moderns. Believe it or not, I found a US Civil War Token in my Grandparent's change jar. I asked my Grandmother if I could have it, and gave her a dollar bill so I felt that It was mine. We went to a local coin shop, Mr LLoyd Fudge’s Coin Shop in Mountain Home, AR. He explained the coin and all the history behind it. I WAS HOOKED! In fact, I would spend my summer's savings from working (farm work, cutting grass, cleaning out barns, etc. to make money), on other US Modern Coins. In fact, I gravitated to the Odd Denominations (1/2c, 2c, 3c Ni and AR, 20c), Trade Dollars chopped or not, Fractional Currency, Civil War Tokens, Hard Time Tokens, several Feutchwangers cents, etc. as it was cool HISTORY. Yes, of course, I collected some of the other denoms, but that was boring. No real HISTORY.

This is my COIN #1 for my Coin Collecting Hobby:


US Civil War Token, 1863.


First Ancient Coin:

After 25 years, I dumped 90% of my Modern Coin collection, and really pursued my passion of Ancient History. I captured 4 Athens Owls and an Alexander III Makadonwn Drachm in one transaction.

Alexander III Drachm

(and 3 other Athena/Owls)
Purchased from a friend on mine who regrettably passed a year later from Bone Cancer.


Latest Ancient Coin:


KINGS OF MACEDON. Philip II, 359-336 BC.
Æ18, 6.7g, 2h; struck 359-336 BC.
Obv.: Head of Apollo left, hair bound in tainia.
Rev.: ΦIΛIΠΠOY;Youth on horseback galloping left, head of lion right below.
Ref.: SNG ANS 872-4; SNG Alpha Bank 371-3.
Ex: @John Anthony JAZ Numismatics Auction 200 (I believe that I started buying from his auctions very close to the first one he started Auctions on CT...) I see @FitzNigel captured #1 from John's same auction!

 

@Ryro You truly have a great collection of Helmet coins, and not only of helmets yours are real beauties!

 

Agreed. @Ryro ‘s helmets are cool.

This might be the last of them...


Makedon Amphipolis Philip V - Perseus - lost empire to Romans - helmet Tetrobol

 

@Alegandron, you too collect helmets, nice! The one you posted has perfect ear-flaps; guess it is not anonymous. Do you know what monograms are on the reverse?

 

Thanks my man.
But your freaking Perseus with his HP monogram and what appears to be a gnarly mace head is, is...

My favorite bronze Perseus... might be

ThessalianLeague, Thessaly,Greece, c. 170 B.C. GB84862. Bronze chalkous, Warren, "Two Notes," NC 1961, pl. I, 11; BCD Thessaly II 24.2; HGC 4 236; Rogers 4 var., VF, dark green patina, cleaning scratches, earthen deposits, Demetrias(?) mint, weight 2.535g, maximum diameter 14.7mm, c. 170 B.C.; obverse Macedonian shield with star in central boss; reverse kestrosphendone (dart sling) with dart inside, ΘEΣΣA/ΛΩN divided in two lines, the first above, ending below; ex John Jencek;

"The object on the reverse was long considered somewhat mysterious. Roger identified it as a lyre. Robinson suggested a diadem or more probably a sling. Warren argued it is a stylized depiction of a dart sling, or Kestrosphendone, a weapon first introduced during the Third Macedonian War between Rome and Perseus of Macedon. Warren suggests this type was struck at Demetrias, under orders from Perseus, to commemorate the success of the weapon.

At the end of the Third Macedonian War (171 - 168 B.C.), King Perseus of Macedonia was decisively defeated by Rome at the Battle of Pydna. He surrendered to general Lucius Aemilius Paullus and was imprisoned in Rome with his half-brother Philippus and his son Alexander. Around 300,000 Macedonians were enslaved. The Antigonid kingdom was replaced with four republics, which were later dissolved and became the Roman province of Macedonia."

 

Hehe. Thanks my friend
I've Macedonian shield coins with helmets and without them as well as the Macedonian helmet coins I have with no shield:

 

Awesome idea for a thread!

My first coin was a pristine Gordian III antoninianus that is long gone. I remember being surprised that a 2000 year old coin could be in such a condition.

Last purchase today was this coin from Baris.


PISIDIA. Baris. Caracalla (198-217) Ae. Julios Dionysios, magistrate. Obv: MAP [AYP ANT]ΩN[ЄINOC KAIC] (or similar) Bare-headed, draped and cuirassed bust of Caracalla to left, seen from behind. Rev: BAPH[NΩN] Zeus seated left, holding thunderbolt in his right hand and long scepter in his left.
25mm, 9.84gm.
BMC -. SNG Copenhagen -. SNG Leypold -. SNG von Aulock -. Von Aulock, Pisidien II -.

 

My first ancient coin is an Athenian Owl with a punch mark:


My latest pickup is a RR denarius:

 

I am sorry, I do not know the monograms. I just did a quick check on a coins of Makedon site, could not find the monograms...

 

When I decided to collect ancient coins, my first acquisition was a lot of 34 coins. Described as "Roman bronze" but there were a few silver coins and a Greek from Campania, Suessa Aurunca
Being an absolute beginner, I identified the coins one by one and had lots of fun. I added the coins in my album in the order I took them from the envelope. And I kept this habit since - I add the coins exactly in the order I bought them from.

This was the first and it's position 1 in my album




Constantine I AE Follis. Arles. 315-316 AD. IMP CONSTANTINVS PF AVG, laureate, draped and cuirassed bust right. / SOLI INV-I-CTO COMITI, Sol standing left, chlamys across left shoulder, holding globe and raising right hand. S-F across fields. Mintmark SARL. RIC VII Arles 56

Here is the first coin I bought in the last auction



Caria. Uncertain mint circa 500-400 BC.
Tetartemorion AR
7 mm, 0,19 g
Confronted bull heads / Forepart of bull right, within incuse square.
SNG Kayhan 969

 

This is my first coin, a gift from a friend who was in Rome. I think it was 2012, or 2013. Not a purchase, strictly speaking. After that I purchased a couple of coins via ebay. Mostly via Lanz, that turned out to be fakes. I only have a Alexander drachm left here somewhere, from that time.
After that I stopped for a short while, but purchased my 'first proper' coin, in 2015, in Rome.


I haven't properyl photographed my latest acquisitions, so I can't show those. I will post my latest one that I have photographed, a siliqua of Constantine the Great, acquired late 2021. The portrait is lovely, but I do wonder why he's staring at a tiny sphere just in front of him

 

First in 1981:


Last Jan 2022:

 

Update: Actually the Romans defeated Shapur at the Battle of Raesena, marched on Ctesiphon and were defeated in turn by the Persians at the battle of Misiche, in the Anbar province of Iraq where Gordian either died from his wounds or was supplanted by Philip.

The Battle is mentioned on the trilingual inscription king Shapur I made at Naqsh-e Rustam:

When at first we had become established in the empire, Gordian Caesar assembled from all of the Roman, Goth and German lands a military force and marched on Asorestan (Mesopotamia) against the Ērānšahr (Sasanian Empire) and against us. On the border of Asorestan at Misiche, a great frontal battle occurred. Gordian Caesar was killed and the Roman force was destroyed. And the Romans made Philip Caesar. Then Philip Caesar came to us for terms, and to ransom their lives, gave us 500,000 denars, and became tributary to us. And for this reason we have renamed Misiche Peroz-Shapur [literally "Victorious Shapur"]

 

That's a very nice coin, for a first purchase! Did you intentionally go for a Marc Anthony legionary for your first one?

 

My first ancient was this tribute penny:

Tiberius, AD 14-37.
Roman AR Denarius, 3.87 g, 18.5 mm, 5 h.
Lugdunum, AD 16-37.
Obv: TI CAESAR DIVI AVG F AVGVSTVS, laureate head, right.
Rev: PONTIF MAXIM, Female figure seated right, holding long olive branch and inverted spear; legs of chair ornate, triple line below.
Refs: RIC 28; BMCRE 42-44; RSC 16b; RCV 1763 var. ​

My most recent was this Julia Domna denarius I acquired from @PeteB:

Julia Domna, AD 193-217.
Roman AR denarius, 3.13 g, 16.0 mm, 7 h.
Rome, AD 198.
Obv: IVLIA AVGVSTA, bare-headed and draped bust, right.
Rev: MATRI CASTRORVM, Julia Domna standing left, sacrificing over lighted altar from patera held in right hand and holding box of incense in left hand; to left, two standards.
Refs: RIC 567; BMCRE 57; Cohen/RSC 134; RCV 6596; Hill 370.​

 

My first ancient coin, a denarius of Geta which I bought in 1965 from Gimbels Department store in Philadelphia. It would be many years before I would get back in the ancient Roman coin collecting game. I bought this to butter up my high school Latin teacher. It didn't work. I still got a B.



My latest purchase, a siliqua of Valens (364 - 378).

 

My latest purchase from CGB website, which had a 20% off compared to the MA-Shops listing. It was around £50. I wanted a Constantine Eyes to Heaven portrait alongside the cryptic Dafne reverse and had been looking for some time. Many of the listings seemed bizarrely expensive, probably owing to Eusebius writing about the coins, and their Christian significance.

Speaking of Christian significance, I do enjoy the interpretation that Dafne is turning away from the pagan symbol of victory The Laurel towards the Christian symbol of victory, the Palm (in line with the Triumphal Entry scene in the Bible). There is also a mythological aspect wherein Dafne resisted the advances of Apollo, much like Constantine appeared to resist the initial allure of Solar divinities. Whether this is the true reason for the coins reverse, I have no idea, but I choose to subscribe to it.

The particulars of this portrait is my favourite aspect. Many of the "Eyes to Heaven" busts appear unnatural and almost cartoonish due to the elongated neck and jutting jawline. This one appears more subtle, and because of the orientation of the photo (aligned with Constantine's face, rather than neck), you can almost miss the fact that it is an Eyes to Heaven bust. I am not sure if this subtle bust is simply one mint workers style, or whether this is an early version that was deemed too subtle and lifelike, or maybe a later version after the others were deemed too garish.

It does have surface problems, and I am not knowledgeable enough to comment on exactly what is happening. The roughness is not nearly as apparent in hand, nor does it look quite so devoid of patina. I respect CGB for being honest with their photos as I think they could have made it look a lot more attractive. The bottom half of Dafne's dress is weakly struck, however all the key figures and details are visible. I am extremely happy with this purchase.



My first coin ever purchased was this from Tavium Numismatics on eBay:



I don't have full pictures anymore and they are no longer accessible on eBay. It was a Constantine with tetrarchic style bust and Jovi Conservatori reverse of the Siscia mint. I remember only wanting a coin where the word "Constantinvs" was clearly visible. I probably overpaid at the time, but it's probably in line with today's prices. I did not know about vcoins and MA-Shops at this time. I still love this coin, and it has a striking green patina.

 

Great idea for a thread and some purdy kool coins and stories to boot!..1st, last and some Roman coins in between.....free shipping on a $5 'Bank of Libera coin" honoring the space shuttle Columbia bought in 2004 started the path that brought me here ..

 

Yes, but there is a story behind my selecting an MA coin. To make a long story short, I was a thespian with a private club while I was in junior and high school. I played MA in the Shakespearean play of the Death of Julius Caesar. When I saw this coin I had to have it.