SimonW

There is no plugged hole but some scratches above the head. BAC usually has retail starting prices and, thus, does not sell a lot. They are offering the same coins over and over again. Given the current market situation, 3'800 EUR is not overly expensive, but not cheap either. I think you can get a better one for the same amount with some patience.

Thank you for showing those two, @Severus Alexander. What function Tesserae served (be it lead or bronze) is mostly unknown AFAIK. There are lots of speculations (gifts, game tokens, entrance tokens, etc.), but nothing tangible. I believe the word Tessera in (ancient) numismatics is used interchangeably with anything coin-like with unknown purpose. The first one is Cohen VIII, p. 273, 62. It has VL (ligate) on the obverse and N on the reverse. There are many variations of this kind of Tesserae with different letters and other motives, such as galley, etc. You can find some of them in Cohen (same range of numbers as your piece). They somehow remind me of the Spintriae (another group of Tesserae with mostly erotic scenes on one side and numerals on the other) but likely were issued later. Unfortunately, yours looks as if some lines have been a bit strengthened (tooled). The second one is probably not roman (the style of the letters does not fit). I was not able to fully identify it, but it reminds me of Italian coins from the 12th-14th centuries with an omega over one or two letters: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=3641764 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=4767682 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=5636019 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=6124145 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=6625404 I informed Vico about the wrong description, but they didn't change it. Here is one of the letter-series from my collection: Anonymous, Tessera (3.33 g), Rome, 1st-2nd century AD. Obv. Galley r. Rev. T. Cohen VIII, p. 272, 57.

There seems to be another one with a plugged hole, IMO. Lot 1072, the rare Probus Aureus. Although I don't have a before picture or a picture of a coin from the same dies, the areas between 12 and 1 o'clock on the obverse and 11 to 12 o'clock on the reverse look quite characteristic: strange looking soft letters and slightly different colored and smoothed fields. The overall look and wear is typical for Aurei comming from the Ukraine (almost all of which are holed/plugged). Does anyone have access to a picture of the cited coin in the Hermitage Museum that appears to be from the same obverse die?

That's a very nice Quadrans, @Octavius! You definitely should, @Aleph. I just went through a few older catalogues this morning and found five pretty cool pedigrees. If you have some time, also look at the following three catalogues. All of them have lots of fractions: Dr. Jacob Hirsch, Auction 18 (27.05.1907): 35 fractions (Tafel XXII-XXIII) Naville & Cie, Auction 2 (12.06.1922): 29 fractions Münzhandlung Basel, Auction 1 (28.06.1934): 46 fractions Here are two of the ones I found today: Anonymous, Quadrans (3.50 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Bust of Mars, helmeted, r., cuirassed. Rev. S – C, cuirass. RIC 19. Ex Dr. Jacob Hirsch, Auctions 18 (27.05.1907), Lot 1804 Domitianus, Quadrans (2.66 g), Rome, 84-85 AD. Obv. IMP DOMIT AVG GERM, bust of Ceres l., draped. Rev. S – C, bundle of three poppies and four corn ears. RIC 243 (R). Ex Münzhandlung Basel, Auction 1 (28.06.1934), Lot 557 I am sure we have been fighting for the same few rare ones 🙂 I thought I'd start this thread with something very unusual 😋 Looking forward to seeing more of your coins. Did you get my PM?

Thank you, Aleph! And congratulations on your great Mars type, which is still missing in my collection. This reminds me of when I wasn't able to bid on the same type in a Naville auction in 2016 because of a technical glitch. Hurts to this day. No problem at all. Although I would gladly have taken the coin at a lower price, I don't mind a good bidding battle 😀 Luckily I managed to snag a few more, although no less embattled. Did you notice the Mercury Quadrans in this sale that looked a lot like Hadrian? There are other cases I've noticed, such as a Jupiter eagle type on which Jupiter looks just like Antoninus Pius. Maybe just a coincidence, maybe some lead as to when those coins were actually minted. I can completely relate to that. I started collecting ancient coins around the same time (but started focusing on fractions a few years later). There have been lots of great coins and lost chances since then. All we can hope for is that they will come back to market in some years at a price that we can afford. Do you recall which auction number it was? CNG has sold two larg fractions collection around that time (Sale 49 and 53). I only got one coin that was sold in CNG 49, but purchased it many years later, also from CNG. Domitianus, Quadrans (2.31 g), Rome, 84-85 AD. Obv. IMP DOMIT AVG GERM, trophy. Rev. S – C, olive branch. RIC 247 (R). Ex Classical Numismatic Group, Auction 49 (17.03.1999), Lot 1359 For Nero I only have 7 varieties that are not listed in RIC, but bought 1 or 2 more in a recent Artemide auction. I believe Nero produced the highest number of different imperial fraction types/varieties (at least according to RIC numbers), although not the most intersting ones. Do you mean this one? If so, then no. I've bought mine in an Aureo & Calico auction in 2018. Anonymous, Quadrans (2.97 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Bust of Hercules, l., wearing lion-skin. Rev. S – C, club. RIC -. Ex Aureo & Calicó, Auction 311 (31.05.2018), Lot 40

Absolutely. And even the more common groups/types have lots of exceedingly rare sub-types and smaller variations. Many of them completely unrecorded. Here's one of the Jupiter group. I must have been bidding against you or another fractions collector as the price went way beyond what I would have imagined. Anonymous, Quadrans (17-18 mm, 3.31 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Head of Jupiter, laureate, bearded, r. Rev. S – C, eagle stg. left on thunderbolt, wings closed, head r., wreath in beak. RIC 1 var. (eagle with wings spread, no wreath in beak); van Heesch 12 var. (no wreath in beak); Mlasowsky 15. Or the following special type of the Minerva group, which looks like a combination of two reverse types, but is not a mule in my opinion as there is no S C on the owl-side. Anonymous, Quadrans (2.37 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Owl standing l. Rev. S – C, olive tree. RIC -; van Heesch -.

That's a very interesting observation I wasn't aware of. Same thing is currently happening with coins minted for circulation in Syria as well as the Hadrian Semis (or Quadrans?) with eagle/thunderbolt. Congratulations on both your Domitian Quadrans (I remember this one, but wasn't bidding on it for once 🙂) and your Hadrian Semis/offstrike, which I have never seen before. One of my white whales is this one: Anonymous, Quadrans (15-16 mm, 2.85 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Bust of Mercury, draped, wearing winged petasus, l., caduceus behind. Rev. S – C, rooster r. RIC 30 (C). Göbl, Antike Numismatik, Taffel 10, 148D (this coin). Ex Dr. Jacob Hirsch, Auctions 18 (27.05.1907), Lot 1802. Funnily, RIC rates this as "common".

Unfortunately, your picture doesn't show (seems to be a permission issue as the link shows an "Access Denied" warning from the cloud storage where it's hosted). Thank you, Aleph. Yes, it has a different reverse legend and the S C is missing. Although the missing S C is not completely uncommon for fractions, the fact that the type exists as a Denarius and the oversized flan make this rather an offstrike than a Semis in my opinion. Heritage "estimated" the weight at 3.5-4.5 gramms because it was in an NGC slab, which was kind of funny. Turned out to be more than 5 gramms 🙂 That's a very insteresting theory. If it were only for the less common fractions after Vespasian, I could probably reconcile with that idea. The huge number of certain fractions (e.g. some anonymous types, Trajan & wolf, etc.), however, rather speak against it, in my opinion.

It looks like it 😄 I was bidding on this one, too 😅 Congratulations on your win! Glad to see another fractions collector got it. I bought some of the fractions lots they offered instead. Here is one I got with another rare Tessera (top row, second from right): Looking forward to see more of your coins.

I'm happy you didn't notice then 🙂 Heritage has some hidden treasures in their weekly auctions from time to time. I was surprised about the low hammer, especially since Hadrian is a particularly sought after emperor. Here's another one I bought from them recently: Antoninus Pius, Semis [or Denarius offstrike] (20 mm, 5.36 g), Rome, 139 AD. Obv. ANTONINVS AVG PIVS P P, bare head of Antoninus Pius r. Rev. TR POT COS II, modius with two corn ears and poppy. RIC -, cf. 58 (denarius). Ex Heritage Auctions, Auction 232226 (29.06.2022), Lot 65244

If anyone is interested in more examples of plugged roman coins (mostly Aurei), there is a thread dedicated to this topic on the German Numismatikforum: https://www.numismatikforum.de/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=59785

Although, and that's missing on my earlier post, this rare type may be a mule. All four examples that I know are from the same dies: https://www.forumancientcoins.com/catalog/roman-and-greek-coins.asp?param=13602q00.jpg&vpar=409&zpg=11715&fld= https://www.forumancientcoins.com/catalog/roman-and-greek-coins.asp?zpg=108417 https://www.collection.ly/9QjWzTLtrW/53GdaZGGBh https://www.collection.ly/9QjWzTLtrW/7Pciu5J2yx Edit: Just found a fifth example of the type on @Valentinian's very informative website: http://augustuscoins.com/ed/quadrans/TrajanQuadransHercWolfLeft.jpg (same dies as well, I believe)

For Hadrian there is a particularly high number of exceptionally intriguing and rare coins. Here is RIC 626, the only one I have seen on the market for decades: Hadrianus, Semis (3.31 g), Rome, 119-123 AD. Obv. IMP CAESAR TRAIAN HADRIANVS AVG, bust of Hadrianus, laureate, r., draped, cuirassed. Rev. P M TR P COS III, bust of Minerva, helmeted, r., draped, wearing aegis. RIC 626 (R). Ex Heritage, Auction 231926, Lot 64103

Thank you very much for sending me the two papers, @Severus Alexander! 🙂 Since the fractions were in circulation for several decades - if not centuries sometimes -, and the size of Quadrantes and Semisses partly overlap and also change over time, I highly doubt that the average roman citizen was able to tell the difference based on a specific type (there must have been dozens of different types in circulation at the same time) or a combination of metal, size and/or weight (in some cases, the differences are too small to tell without exact measuring). If they were, why bother to use a crown on Dupondii or Antoniniani? It must have been something obvious. Thus, for fractions circulating in Rome, I am a big supporter of the rule of thumb: with emperor's head = Semis, without emperor's head = Quadrans. Of course there are exceptions, as are with Dupondii. Good question.

Thank you very much, @YOTHR 🙂

Thank you very much for sharing the Giles F. Carter and C.E. King papers, @Severus Alexander. I wasn't aware of them. Would you be able to email them to me? I don't have a JSTOR account. If there were both copper and orichalcum versions of certain Quadrantes/Semisses types, how did the average roman citizen distinguish them? There must be a certain criteria that's easy to spot. I could certainly provide a list with descriptions and images. Unfortunately, descriptions are unstructured data and you would have to use some algorithm to extract weights and diameters. I believe this is RIC 759, RPC III 3761. It's another one produced for circulation in Syria. I would simply adopt Woytek's denomination classification for Hadrian as well. In this case AE-23/25. Here's its small brother 🙂 Hadrianus, AE-19/21 (19 mm, 3.57 g), Rome (for circulation in Syria), 124-127 AD. Obv. HADRIANVS AVGVSTVS, bust of Hadrianus, laureate, r., draped, cuirassed, seen from behind. Rev. COS III / S C (ex.), Roma seated l. on cuirass, holding Victory in right hand and spear in left; shield at her side. RIC 760 (C). RPC III 3765.

I am sure that's what Ken meant. But I find it highly important to stress that there is no certainty or guarantee with slabs (although the name Numismatic Guaranty Company says so). Slabing an ancient coin is basically just getting a paid opinion (usually a good one, though), nothing more. I don't know about the first link, but the one in my second link above was slabbed in 2021: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=7922678 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=8979394

Yes, they do slab fakes, just not on purpose. In the german Numismatikforum a member has just recentyl posted two: https://www.numismatikforum.de/viewtopic.php?p=567562#p567562 https://www.numismatikforum.de/viewtopic.php?p=567615#p567615

Opisthodomos is run by two persons. One of them disappeard completely a few months ago and the other one does either not care about handling invoices and shipping coins or is not capable to. Not sure if the guy who did the work is back as new items have been listed, but I wouldn't bet any money that you actually will see any of the coins you buy from them.

I strongly recommend not to buy from this seller.

Sorry, @Severus Alexander, I completely missed that question. To be honest, I actually can't tell. You can clearly not rely on size and weight. There is a huge variance for both. Standard reference books usually distinguish the two based on their metal (copper/red = Quadrans, brass/yellow = Semis). Since most of my coins have a patina, it's hard to tell. But I have some where you can see the metal. There are some yellowish that are supposed to be Quadrantes and some reddish that are supposed to be Semisses and then there are some that are more of an orange and you can't really tell what metal it's supposed to be. So I don't know how reliable the metal is. As a rule of thumb: if it has the emperor's face on it, it's a Semis, otherwise a Quadrans. For my records, I generally use the denomination given in RIC. For coins issued under Trajan/Hadrian for circulation in Syria, I use Woytek's classification: "AE-19/21" for the smaller denomination (19-21 mm) and "AE-23/25" for the bigger denomination (23-25 mm). Some call them Semis and Dupondius, but I agree with Woytek that those terms rather don't fit. And here are a few of the rather confusing examples (as to metal <-> denomination): Anonymous, Quadrans (4.31 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Bust of Mars, helmeted, r., cuirassed and draped, seen from behind. Rev. S – C, cuirass. RIC 19 var. (bust draped and seen from behind). Hadrianus, Semis (3.42 g), Rome, 124-127 AD. Obv. HADRIANVS AVGVSTVS, bust of Hadrianus, laureate, r., draped, cuirassed, seen from behind. Rev. COS III / S C (ex.), legionary eagle between two standards. RIC 888b var. (bust draped, cuirassed, seen from behind). Titus (as Caesar under Vespasianus), Quadrans (16-17 mm, 3.02 g), Syria/Rome, 74 AD. Obv. T CAES IMP, head of Titus, laureate, r. Rev. PON TR POT, winged caduceus. RIC 1575 (R2). RPC II 1998.

Here you go, in case you need it for your records: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=8080370 Ex NAC and Gorny & Mosch: https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=5294048 https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=1877479

Those are very cool Augustus Quadrantes, @Justin Lee. When I started collecting the small denominations, my collection would start with Nero. It was only later that I learned to appreciate the early ones, too. That's a very nice rhino, @DonnaML. There are 4 variations of this type in total (rhino l. or r. and reverse legend starting at 6 or 12 o'clock). Thank you, @Severus Alexander. I love your Trajan/Hercules Quadrans. I have quite a few of them, but none as nice as yours 🙂 Regarding the Trajan Decius Semis: I think the point NGC makes is about the radiate coins (Dupondii?) that weigh about the same as the "Asses". You could argue that they are both Asses or both Dupondii. Or they are Asses and Dupondii and the weight simply doesn't matter. Now, the Sestertii weigh about half what the double Sestertii do on average, I would say. So calling all the coins that weigh half a Sestertius "Dupondius" and the smallest denomination "As" or "reduced As" is not completely unlogical. The fact that there haven't been any Semisses for almost a century inbetween adds to that theory. As a collector of Semisses, however, I still like to believe that they are Semisses 🙂 Here is mine: Traianus Decius, Semis (3.41 g), Rome, 249-251 AD. Obv. IMP C M Q TRAIANVS DECIVS AVG, bust of Traianus Decius, laureate, r., cuirassed. Rev. S – C, Mars, helmeted, in military attire, standing left, resting right hand on shield and holding vertical spear in left hand. RIC 128 (S). Ex Numismatica Ars Classica, Auction 64, lot 2703

That's a particularly nice coin for the type, @maridvnvm. I probably was tempted to clean those earthern deposits 🙂 Great types, @Roman Collector. There is a large variety of those anonymous Quadrantes. Here is one of my favourites. Anonymous, Quadrans (3.57 g), Rome, 81-161 AD. Obv. Bust of Minerva, helmeted, r., draped. Rev. S – C, olive tree. RIC 9 (C). Ex. Roma Numismatics, E-Sale 69, lot 943 Wish you all a great weekend!

Thank you for clarifying, @DonnaML. What upsets me is when colleagues, who I know work very hard, are made fun of. Be that sarcasm or a hyperbolic joke. I still don't agree with everything you say, but I'll leave it at this.