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<p>[QUOTE="Curtis, post: 8552807, member: 26430"]Thanks for sharing the blogpost again Ras -- that was an interesting one, well worth reading and thinking about.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Another that I highly recommend is the article by [USER=44316]@Valentinian[/USER] :</p><ul> <li>Esty, Warren, 2002, “On Rarity-Rarity and the Value of Ancient Roman Coins,” pp. 22-25 of <a href="https://social.vcoins.com/files/file/179-vol-16-no-02-february-2002/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://social.vcoins.com/files/file/179-vol-16-no-02-february-2002/" rel="nofollow"><i>The Celator</i> vol 16 (no 2)</a>, Feb 2002 [<a href="https://community.vcoins.com/thecelator/The-Celator-Vol.16-No.02-Feb-2002.pdf" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://community.vcoins.com/thecelator/The-Celator-Vol.16-No.02-Feb-2002.pdf" rel="nofollow">direct to PDF</a> from VCoins community].</li> </ul><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>In my view, two dimensions of context matter very much for the application of rarity labels: Demand and the <i>Categorization Process </i>(or "granularity").</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Demand</b> has a better-recognized relationship to rarity: We call EID MAR Denarii "rare" even though there are 85-100+ known, while we describe many Roman Provincial Coins as common if half that many are known.</p><p><br /></p><p>More importantly...</p><p><br /></p><p>The <b>Categorization Process</b> plays a much more fundamental role, but less recognized. Even when trying to apply the most "objective" and strictly quantitative standards (e.g., "unique," "seventeen such specimens in the Reka Devnia Hoard," "10-30 specimens known"), we cannot escape the qualitative process of defining the category.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Consider an Example</b>:</p><p>My Electrum Hekte (1/6 Stater) of Bithynia, Herakleia Pontika. (Formerly considered to be from Ionia, Erythrai, before <a href="https://www.academia.edu/45579782/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.academia.edu/45579782/" rel="nofollow">Fischer-Bossert 2020</a>.)</p><p><br /></p><p>There are many ways to describe its category and rarity. Interestingly, 2 years ago, this coin went from being "scarce/common" to "unique" as new categories became available:</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1510232[/ATTACH]</p><p><br /></p><p>If I use <a href="https://www.academia.edu/45579782/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.academia.edu/45579782/" rel="nofollow">Wolfgang Fischer-Bossert's (2020)</a> most granular-level of category -- Type 10 (V5’’/O9) -- then this coin is "unique" or close to it, since it was the only example he could find of this die pair in his study of all known examples (including auctions).</p><p><br /></p><p>However, if we don't really care so much about the specific dies, and we want a category that captures something distinctive but slightly more general (such as "this design from about the same period, same mint, same size"), we might call it a Fischer-Bossert Group 2, of which there are at least dozens.</p><p><br /></p><p>Using older references, a few years ago we might have described it as a "von Aulock 1942" or "BMFA 1804," which are usually taken to apply to all of the Ionia, Erythrai (as it was traditionally identified) Hektes with Herakles and Quadratum Incusum. Using that category there are at least hundreds known, if not thousands.</p><p><br /></p><p>To someone who is only interested in the coin as, say, "an Archaic Electrum Hekte," we would say there are tens or hundreds of thousands of examples. More if we apply more general categories such as "Archaic coin," "small Greek coin of Herakles," etc.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The fact that categories are socially shaped -- not intrinsic to the objects themselves -- tends to be most apparent in two places</b>.</p><p><br /></p><p>In the <b>history of scholarship</b>, there is a tendency for the numismatic labels to move from a few general groupings to a multiplicity of narrow categories (it's always instructive to see how your coins were defined by Eckhel or 19th century numismatists through to the present). Of course, this is a general phenomenon of descriptive sciences, not limited to numismatic.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Individual collectors</b> (or dealers or scholars) will have a different interest in any given coin. For Hellenistic coins, e.g., lots of collectors just wanted an "Alexander the Great" tetradrachm; or an "early posthumous Alexander III tetradrachm"; or an "early ... tetradrachm from Babylon." Which of the dozens of M.J.Price categories the coin's monograms fall into matters not -- they may have no idea that there are "only 2 examples" known of their coin; in fact, probably only a few people in the world would recognize it or care.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Or, as I like to think of it, "Which 'what' is that?"</b>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>
[QUOTE="Curtis, post: 8552807, member: 26430"]Thanks for sharing the blogpost again Ras -- that was an interesting one, well worth reading and thinking about. Another that I highly recommend is the article by [USER=44316]@Valentinian[/USER] : [LIST] [*]Esty, Warren, 2002, “On Rarity-Rarity and the Value of Ancient Roman Coins,” pp. 22-25 of [URL='https://social.vcoins.com/files/file/179-vol-16-no-02-february-2002/'][I]The Celator[/I] vol 16 (no 2)[/URL], Feb 2002 [[URL='https://community.vcoins.com/thecelator/The-Celator-Vol.16-No.02-Feb-2002.pdf']direct to PDF[/URL] from VCoins community]. [/LIST] In my view, two dimensions of context matter very much for the application of rarity labels: Demand and the [I]Categorization Process [/I](or "granularity"). [B]Demand[/B] has a better-recognized relationship to rarity: We call EID MAR Denarii "rare" even though there are 85-100+ known, while we describe many Roman Provincial Coins as common if half that many are known. More importantly... The [B]Categorization Process[/B] plays a much more fundamental role, but less recognized. Even when trying to apply the most "objective" and strictly quantitative standards (e.g., "unique," "seventeen such specimens in the Reka Devnia Hoard," "10-30 specimens known"), we cannot escape the qualitative process of defining the category. [B]Consider an Example[/B]: My Electrum Hekte (1/6 Stater) of Bithynia, Herakleia Pontika. (Formerly considered to be from Ionia, Erythrai, before [URL='https://www.academia.edu/45579782/']Fischer-Bossert 2020[/URL].) There are many ways to describe its category and rarity. Interestingly, 2 years ago, this coin went from being "scarce/common" to "unique" as new categories became available: [ATTACH=full]1510232[/ATTACH] If I use [URL='https://www.academia.edu/45579782/']Wolfgang Fischer-Bossert's (2020)[/URL] most granular-level of category -- Type 10 (V5’’/O9) -- then this coin is "unique" or close to it, since it was the only example he could find of this die pair in his study of all known examples (including auctions). However, if we don't really care so much about the specific dies, and we want a category that captures something distinctive but slightly more general (such as "this design from about the same period, same mint, same size"), we might call it a Fischer-Bossert Group 2, of which there are at least dozens. Using older references, a few years ago we might have described it as a "von Aulock 1942" or "BMFA 1804," which are usually taken to apply to all of the Ionia, Erythrai (as it was traditionally identified) Hektes with Herakles and Quadratum Incusum. Using that category there are at least hundreds known, if not thousands. To someone who is only interested in the coin as, say, "an Archaic Electrum Hekte," we would say there are tens or hundreds of thousands of examples. More if we apply more general categories such as "Archaic coin," "small Greek coin of Herakles," etc. [B]The fact that categories are socially shaped -- not intrinsic to the objects themselves -- tends to be most apparent in two places[/B]. In the [B]history of scholarship[/B], there is a tendency for the numismatic labels to move from a few general groupings to a multiplicity of narrow categories (it's always instructive to see how your coins were defined by Eckhel or 19th century numismatists through to the present). Of course, this is a general phenomenon of descriptive sciences, not limited to numismatic. [B]Individual collectors[/B] (or dealers or scholars) will have a different interest in any given coin. For Hellenistic coins, e.g., lots of collectors just wanted an "Alexander the Great" tetradrachm; or an "early posthumous Alexander III tetradrachm"; or an "early ... tetradrachm from Babylon." Which of the dozens of M.J.Price categories the coin's monograms fall into matters not -- they may have no idea that there are "only 2 examples" known of their coin; in fact, probably only a few people in the world would recognize it or care. [B]Or, as I like to think of it, "Which 'what' is that?"[/B][/QUOTE]
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