Message:

<p>[QUOTE=&quot;IdesOfMarch01, post: 2877036, member: 39084&quot;]This statement is a corollary to what I&#039;ve been trying to elucidate in my posts, namely, what&#039;s a reasonable definition of &quot;smoothing&quot; and more specifically, how I define smoothing for the coins in which I&#039;m interested. </p><p><br /></p><p>So I started from the literal meaning of &quot;smooth&quot; and &quot;smoothing.&quot;&nbsp; I clearly (I thought) wrote that the literal definition, if applied to coins, would mean that even simple cleaning was smoothing, but of course you had to read the rest of my post to understand that I did NOT believe that was a reasonable definition.</p><p><br /></p><p>Because I&#039;ve never cleaned a coin myself, I can&#039;t possibly be an expert on whether or not a particular ancient coin has been smoothed.&nbsp; And in fact, as Doug writes above, I&#039;m sure there are coins that only the original person who cleaned that coin would know whether or not the coin was also smoothed.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>Has my Caligula sestertius that I posted earlier in this thread been smoothed?&nbsp; Personally, I can&#039;t tell; if an expert told me one way or another, I would probably accept that expert&#039;s opinion, but it wouldn&#039;t make any difference on having the coin in my collection.&nbsp; On the other hand, if the expert told me it had been excessively smoothed or tooled, then I would accept that expert&#039;s opinion and would not acquire the coin.&nbsp; That&#039;s why I pay my dealer his commission to evaluate and bid on coins on my behalf.</p><p><br /></p><p>It should be clear that I and many (if not most) other collectors on this site are willing to accept some smoothing on our coins, partly because we ourselves can&#039;t really determine whether or not a coin has been smoothed.&nbsp; Heck, even after collecting ancients for 10 years, I&#039;m never even sure whether or not a particular coin has been <i>tooled</i>.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

Your name or email address:

Do you already have an account?

• No, create an account now.
• Yes, my password is:
• Forgot your password?

Stay logged in