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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Valentinian, post: 8354304, member: 44316&quot;]Long ago I wrote this about smoothing and tooling:</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/numis/condition.html#IV" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://augustuscoins.com/ed/numis/condition.html#IV" rel="nofollow">http://augustuscoins.com/ed/numis/condition.html#IV</a></p><p><br /></p><p>Someone above wrote that long ago smoothing was totally unacceptable. Perhaps that was true for US coins but it certainly was not the case for ancient coins and in particular sestertii. Many old major collections had numerous smoothed sestertii. It is in relatively recent times that some (especially US-coin) collectors have been horrified by alterations. Some collectors want everyone else to be horrified by alterations that are minor in the overall appearance of the coin. However, some of us still feel that if the coin is genuine and of historical interest, it is collectable even if the surface has been smoothed. Ancient coins are more than just condition (although slabs are influencing the perception of what ancient coins are). An intense focus on condition would remove much of the joy of the hobby for those of us who collect on a limited budget with emphasis on the history. If a collector wants to reject coins with smoothing, they certainly may. But, I don&#039;t they should try to tell the rest of us that we should reject them too.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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