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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Nap, post: 8092392, member: 73099&quot;]This is a question to ponder.&nbsp; With some coins, it&#039;s obvious, but others less so.</p><p><br /></p><p>My thought was that the coin should be nearly unobtainable in any grade, or unobtainable in higher grade according to one&#039;s budget.&nbsp; Obviously there is some subjectivity as to what a budget could be.&nbsp; You could probably obtain a most wretched Athenian tet if your budget is only $100, though these coins are certainly not rare in high grade.&nbsp; On the other hand, there are some rare varieties of coins that probably are dirt cheap just due to lack of knowledge or interest.</p><p><br /></p><p>Ok, here is my definition:</p><p>To be a rarity, a coin must be difficult to obtain (rare), with a small number known (pick your number, but I&#039;d say less than 100 for a major variety or monarch, and less than 20 for a minor variety).&nbsp; To be wretched, the coin must be impaired beyond just a low grade, with damage of sorts, and would certainly look out of place in a high quality collection, such as Hunt, Norweb, Garrett, etc.</p><p><br /></p><p>The accident of appearance at auction is challenging.&nbsp; For example, I showed a coin of Aethelwald Moll above.&nbsp; There are 5 known.&nbsp; Four of these have appeared at auction in the last 5 years, and the 5th traded hands privately.&nbsp; Maybe another won&#039;t appear on the market for 20 years, maybe it will appear next year.&nbsp; Pure happenstance in any case.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here&#039;s another challenging one that I&#039;m on the fence as to whether to call it a wretched rarity.&nbsp; A penny of Matilda, disputed queen of England 1139-1148</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1406556[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>Penny of Matilda, queen of England (disputed) 1139-1148</p><p>Mint: Cardiff</p><p>Moneyer: Bricmer</p><p>S.1326</p><p>N.936</p><p>O: [MATI]LLIS IMP</p><p>R: [+BRIC]MER:CAIE[RDI]</p><p><br /></p><p>There are probably around 100 coins known of Matilda, a contender for the throne of England in the 12th century during a period called &quot;The Anarchy&quot;.&nbsp; Many are in museums, but it&#039;s still not a truly rare issue.&nbsp; And this coin, broken in three parts and glued together by the Museum of Wales back in 1982, certainly is somewhat wretched.&nbsp; But is it enough of a rarity for the coveted title of &quot;wretched rarity&quot;?&nbsp; High grade unimpaired examples are out of my budget, despite that most examples don&#039;t look much better than this due to poor manufacturing at this time.&nbsp; This is because of demand from collectors trying to obtain &quot;one of each monarch&quot;, a challenging task even if you start at William the Conqueror.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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