robinjojo

On 2/27/2024 at 4:55 AM, Treasure311 said:

Hello, I like this period as well. I picked up this about 2 years ago from Netherlands, I believe it to be a 1646 T/V or T/R?  Very crude as well but full weight and rara as well, what do you think about this Cob? Thanks. Dave

Hi Dave

I'm sorry that I haven't responded sooner.  I guess that I don't do a very good job following old threads.

I can say that your cob is from the mid-1640's based on the "furry" lions on the cross side.  The date is not visible, which is typical for this period of wretched strikes and poor, often debased flans.  

As for the assayer (the coin is definitely from Potosi), here we have typical muddle, perhaps intentional.  In addition to the rotated strike, the area with the mint and assayer marks is a mess.  After loading the image into Photoshop for enlargement, I think I see a very crude and muddled P and below that possibly a V, as you mentioned, possibly over an R.  You might send a photo of the coin to Dan Sedwick for his opinion.

His email address is:

office@sedwickcoins.com

Your coin is wonderfully crude and a perfect example of the coinage of this scandalous period!

11 hours ago, ChrisB said:

This is one of my favorite coins. I like it so much that I purchased one of the modern restrikes put out by the Royal Dutch Mint

 

 

Lovely ducatons, Chris!  The dies created from the early 18th century, to the end of the run for these coins really improved artistically compared to the generally crude dies of the 17th century.

I've been searching around for a photo that I took a while ago of another coin from the middle of the 18th century.  Because of my lousy organization it took me too much time to find it, but I did, so here it is.  The cool feature of this coin is the tulip edge design, very similar to the colonial Spanish 8 reales of the time.  This coin came to me through a Chicago auction (forgot the name of the firm) in March 1991, for $330.

Utrecht, ducaton (silver rider), 1748 ,tulip edge.

Davenport 1832

32.6 grams 

This is a fresh purchase, from yesterday/s trip to my local coin shop.  Sal, the owner, picked up a few new coins, including a denarius of Octavian commemorating his victory at Actium.  Alas!  That coin was reserved for another collector.  

I did, however pick out three coins, one of which was photographed today.  I'll add the other two shortly, I hope.

This is an Athenian "new style" owl, Thompson 537.  The reverse die appears to match the reverse for that coin.

Athens new style owl, 121/0 BC.

Obverse: Athena facing right.

Reverse: Owl standing on amphora, KAPAIX – EPΓOKΛE ΔIOΦ; month I on amphora, control ΔI below, symbol galley prow.

Thompson 537

16.8 grams

Overall the centering is quite decent, and the strike very good.  The  obverse die appears to have a good amount of wear, in addition to some circulation/handling wear, but the styling of Athena's profile is very nice indeed!

Here are the two purchases from yesterday.

I've never owned a stater from Aspendos, depicting the two Greco-Roman wrestlers.  There are lots of them out there, but I've never gotten around to acquiring one.  This example is somewhat unusual due to the tapered flan, wide on one side and narrow on the other.  I cannot find a similar example based on my search last night, though I do have a BMC reference number.  I'll keep looking.

This coin, while worn, has nice old "cabinet" tonng on both sides.

Aspendos, Pamphylia,  flash, stater, 400-300 BC.

BMC 63

9.8 grams

The other coin is a Roman Repbulic denarius with a serrated edge, again a type that I have not owned until now.  The coin is unevenly struck, but what is visible is quite nice.

Roman Republic, L. Procilius, denarius, 80 BC.

Sear-280

3.92 grams

7 hours ago, ValiantKnight said:

Good to know, thanks again! What are the usual mints for cobs? Potosi? Mexico City?

Yes, the largest new world mints for Spain were Mexico City and Potosi, Bolivia (Alta Peru).  The smaller mints were Santiago, Chile, Bogota and Cartagena, Colombia and Lima, Peru (probably the third largest in volume), 

Later in the 1730's the mint in Guatemala began operating.  Guatemala 8 reales are unusual and distinctive in style when compared to the other mints.

Here's an 8 reales cob, flip struck error, with the characteristic hold, from 1740.  The indigenous people created holes in order to put the coins on a string or rope, since their clothing generally lacked pockets.

22.88 grams

And here's a milled coin of 1770, virtually mint state:

26.93 grams

4 hours ago, ValiantKnight said:

These two exposed spots look like pure silver (no BD was there)

 

This area was covered with light BD. Silver underneath but the edges around it have a bit of pink/orange (copper?). 

This spot of metal is pink/orange, but it did not have BD.

 

I’m thinking that perhaps the dark patina itself has traces of copper that’s attracted BD (assuming it was BD), or maybe the coin was buried/stored with copper coins, and due to environmental conditions those coins leeched some of their copper onto my coin, or possibly these cobs were minted with some copper in them (what’s the usual silver purity of these?). 

Silver content can range, based on the period between 93.1 % and 91.7% silver, so you don't need to worry about bronze disease with this Spanish cobs or milled coins.  If you see any green or black deposits, they're usually quite superficial, unless the coin is heavily encrusted, as is often the case of coins salvaged from wrecks.

Nice coin, and a scarcer mint (Lima)!

The colors of the fresco seem so fresh and vibrant, it could have been painted yesterday!

 https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/mar/01/pompeii-fresco-phrixus-and-helle-greek-mythological-siblings

A wonderful group for 2023!  The quality of the portraits for some of the coins is excellent, and the reverse of the bonus coin reminds me of Bottom in A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Messana, tetradrachm, 480-461 BC.

Brunswick-Luneburg-Celle, 1662-LW, 2 thalers.

Dav-LS174  

57.5 grams

3 hours ago, seth77 said:

I have actually noticed different these last few months. In fact Jerusalem/Aelia Capitolina is one of the cities I meant that I see getting high prices regardless of emperor or condition in the auctions I follow. Mints from Judaea, Samaria, the Decapolis etc. seem to be more available now than last summer for instance.

I really don't follow Judean coinage, but I have noticed large numbers of bronze coins available through sellers such as Zurquieh.  According to Forum Ancients the First Revolt bronze coins started flooding the market last year, bringing down prices for them.  That trend seems to be carrying over this year.  Could it be that Israeli sellers/middlemen are using other sellers outside the country to market these coins?  As with the origins of other hoard coins the process of these coins entering the market is very opaque to the outside collector.

"It occurred to me that there have always been selkie women: women who did not seem to belong to this world, because they did not fit into prevailing notions of what women were supposed to be. And if you did not fit into those notions, in some sense you weren't a woman. Weren't even quite human. The magical animal woman is, or can be, a metaphor for those sorts of women."
Theodora

And her husband:

Justinian I, follis, Antioch, officina  Γ, year 13 (539/40 AD).

Sear 218

22.7 grams

I think that the war in the Middle East has caused some significant disruption in the flow of coins to the market from Syria, Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and Israel.  In the past Israel has been an important transit point for hoard coins flowing in from the surrounding countries.  I base the observation on the groups that have been presented to me in the past.  The two sources for these coins are gone and I don't know if there are others out there.  The closest to that kind of source is the UAE seller, Zurquieh.  The flow of ancients continues with him, apparently, but where they are coming from is, I am sure, a well guarded secret.  

On the Greek side I have noticed a pronounced drop in the number of pharaonic owls on offer, compared to 2022.  There are still a number of Tigranes II tetradrachms appearing from what must have been a very large hoard that emerged in 2023.  Also, the bronze prutahs of the First Revolt and other Judaic coins remain plentiful on Zurquieh's webpage,  

As far as I can determine, nothing is coming out of Israel since the war began, so how or even if coin hoards from this strife-ridden region enter the supply stream is unknown to me, and really, in perspective, this is a very minor issue compared to the scope of the ongoing tragedy unfolding before us.

8 hours ago, Theodosius said:

Great coins!

What year did they stop hammer striking these?

John

The latest hammer struck silver rider that I have is dated 1673.  I'm not sure how much further they were struck this way before being replaced by a press.  I know that the silver riders recovered from the wreck of the ship "De Liefde" (Shetland Islands, 1711) are all machine struck, so the transition was clearly occurring at the time.

Holland, silver rider, 1673, 3 over 2 (scarcer overdate).

Davenport 4933

32.51 grams 

This coin does have rough surfaces, but the reverse portrait of Isi is rather nice.

Domitian, Alexandria, AE diobol, year 3  (83/4 AD).

RPC 2490

7.40 grams

1 hour ago, ValiantKnight said:

Thanks so much for the information and help! And that’s a very nice 8 reales. Definitely a collecting goal of mine to get one of my own. 

You're welcome.  The KM # for your coin is 32.

While considered desirable, a full crest is by no means the determining factor in judging the qualities of a particular coin.  Since the crest is much more often than not partially or nearly completely missing, the artistry of the portrait and owl are important, and for your coin they are very nice.

3 hours ago, ValiantKnight said:

So I had recently fallen into a bit of a rabbit hole reading and learning about the Golden Age of Piracy and wanted to acquire a coin that could have circulated in the Caribbean at that time. I conducted some brief internet research in how to identify fakes and also looking up authentic examples for comparison. It still feels kind of impulsive but I ended up buying this 1710 2 reales cob from Lima.
 

It weighs 5.58 grams, around a gram under full-weight examples, but I attribute this to its corroded state which indicates it could have been sea salvage. It looks like it might have some small spots of horn silver as well (can silver coins develop horn silver underwater?). And the strike looks uneven (more noticeable underneath the pillars on the reverse). The shape resembles a few authentic examples I saw and the legends match up so I’m fairly certain it is authentic, but given my very limited knowledge some doubt remains. Thanks for any help with this.
 

(Seller’s photos, will update with my own when it arrives)

 

Nice coin!  You're correct about the attribution to Lima, with a blurry by mostly legible "L" in the lower right corner of the "tic tac toe" layout.  The assayer is "H" for Francisco Hurtado.  As for the date, there is a clear "7" and 1", followed by an incomplete number which is likely a "0".  Sedwick, in his cob reference, has two date ranges for this assayer: 1701-05 and 1710, so 1710 for your coin it is.

Your coin has been salvaged, but the corrosion is minimal making this a very desirable coin.  Congrats!

I don't have a 1710 dated cob for this mint.  Here's an 8 reales of 1704, assayer H, purchased from Freeman Craig back in the mid 1980s.

Lima, 8 reales, 1704 H.

KM 34

26.9 grams

That's a lovely coin, perfect as a type coin!

I watched that podcast with great interest, especially the section on Athenian owls.  The dating put forth by Harlan Berk basically is in line with the current consensus. The main issue in the past has been when to start the date of the first owl.  Berk's year of 520 BC is a bit earlier than  510 BC.  For the archaic owls, other scholars such as Seltman based dating on historical and artistic style factors, but I am not sure what approach Berk used, at least based on the podcast.

Coin #11 is a very odd one, the "discovery coin".   The pairing of an apparent Starr group II reverse die with a later obverse die, possibly a group IV is very unusual.  Could this be a case where an old reverse die was reused by the mint for some reason, but on a very limited basis, perhaps even as a one-off?  

For another perspective on the dating of the archaic owls, here's a link to Roberto Delzanno's YouTube video, part two of his series:

Call them silver riders, or ducatons or ducatones or ducatoons, these massive silver crowns produced by the various Dutch mints from 1659 to the 1790s are very impressive coins not only for their size, but also for their place in history.

Since concentrating on ancient coins for the past few years, I have not acquired these and other world crowns on an ongoing basis, but these two recent arrivals are the exception.

A word about these coins.  When production began in 1659 these coins were hammer struck, and remained so for many years.  It really wasn't until the 18th century that machine produced "milled" silver riders were produced by the mints, and that was a slow introduction.  The two coins that recently arrived are hammer struck examples.  As hammer struck coins they exhibit the typical results of this minting process, similar to the Spanish coins of the period and indeed the coins of antiquity.  Strike quality can vary widely, with centering and weak areas being normal quality issues with these coins.

The hammer struck silver riders have a charm all their own.  Each example has its own character, something generally lacking with machine produced coinage.  These early silver riders are by no means coins produced with aesthetically or artistically produced dies.  These coins, after all, were produced to promote commerce and make the Netherlands a dominant economic, political and colonial player on the world stage in the 17'th and much of the 18'th centuries.  As with the Athenian owls, speed of production was the rule of the day.  This rule also applied to the lion daalders and silver ducats produced during this period. 

The first coin demonstrates the variable detail that often is the result of hammer striking.

Netherlands, Gelders, silver rider, 1666.

Davenport 4923

32.35 grams

This coin, which measures 44 mm at the widest point, is well centered, but with obvious weak areas, in addition to a couple of flan flaws on the obverse.  The flan also has two clipped sides, also quite typical for these large coins.  It seems that the flans were cut from a thick strip of sliver before being annealed and struck.  Another possibility for these flat edges is weight adjusting at the mint to bring the coins within the acceptable weight range.

There's the other coin.

Netherlands, West Friesland, silver rider, 1660.

Davenport 4939

32.53 grams 

For a hammered coin, this example is quite remarkable for overall detail and flan quality.  This coin is about 46 mm at the widest point.  It could be a salvaged coin, but regardless, the weight, strike and excellent preservation make it a standout for this type.

Here are two more silver riders, dated 1734, both from the Vliegenthart salvage.  These are machine produced coins.

Netherlands, Gelders, Two silver riders salvaged from the Vliegenthart (1735).

Davenport 1824

32.6 grams left and 32.5 grams right.

So, please feel free to share you silver riders, lion daalders, hammer struck coins or any thing else!  Thanks

2 hours ago, Furryfrog02 said:

Here are the other 3 wins from the NBS Auction. I was super excited to win both a enthroned follis and half-follis of Justinian I from Antioch for a VERY reasonable price. I bid on the other coin just because I liked the funny looking face. 😛

Justinian I
Follis
Antioch
529-533 AD
Obverse: DN IVSTINIANVS PP AVG, Justinian seated facing on throne, holding sceptre and cross on globe
Reverse: Large M, star left, cross above, crescent right, officina letter A below, mintmark +THEVP

 

Justinian I
Half-Follis
Antioch
529-533 AD
Obverse: DN IVSTINIANVS PP AVG, Justinian seated facing, holding cross on globe and long sceptre
Reverse: Large K, long cross to left with T/H/E/U/O/P in the four angles, officina letter Γ below

 

Zengids of Mosul
Badr al Din Lu'lu
1234-1259 AD
AE25, Dirhem
Mosul
Obverse: Diademed head in profile facing left, hair in ringlets,eight-pointed star in bottom left corner, in beaded square. Margin at 3:00: duriba bi’l-maw, at 12:00 sil sana, at 9:00: ahad wa thalathin, at 6:00: wa sittmi’a “struck in al-Mawsil the year one and thirty and six hundred”
Reverse: 4-line legend in center: in Naskh script al-imam / al-mustansir / billah amir /al-mu’minin “the Imam, al-Mustansir billah, Commander of the Faithful" Margin: badr al-dunya wa’l-din lu‘lu‘ al-malik al-kamil al-malik al-ashraf “Resplendent Moon of the World and the Faith, Lu‘lu‘, the Perfect King, the Honoured King”

Very nice purchases!  The seated folles of Justinian I are scarce compared to his portrait types.

Here's a dirhem of Badr al Din Lu'lu that came out of Roma E-Sale 116, lot 1603.  This was a former coin sold by Steve Album back in 2013, Auction 17.  I'm using the Roma photo - I'll take my own soon, I hope.

For a few years now I've focused on the Islamic portraiture coinage.  I find the combination of Islamic and western influences, as well as the symbolisms, fascinating. 

Lu'lu'ids, Badr al-Din Lu'lu Æ Dirham. al-Mawsil mint, AH 631 = AD 1233/4. Diademed head to left; star below chin, all within square border; mint and date in margins / Legend citing the Abbasid Caliph al-Mustansir, Lu'lu, and the Ayyubid overlords al-Kamil and al-Ashraf in four lines and around. Album 1874.1; S&S Type 68. 8.14g, 24mm, 3h.

Yes, overstriking was a very useful expedient measure for emperors of the 6th century and beyond to employ.  It was both economical and, as mentioned, supplants in one or two hammer strikes, the emperor of the day over previous emperors, because, after all, in the business of being a Byzantine emperor, the more publicity, especially in the form of coinage, the better.

I do not have a Heraclius overstrike/countermark follis of Sicily, but instead a follis of Cyzicus, struck over a follis of Anastasias. 

Heraclius, follis, Cyzicus, officina A, RY 3 (612/3AD).  Overstrike on an Anastasius follis of Constantinople.

Sear 839

12.39 grams

I hope you feel better soon, Donna. 

It seems that covid is now the new flu, a seasonal bug that will require an annual injection, especially for older folks and geezers like me.

Link: Canopus of Osiris

Antoninus Pius (138-161), Egypt, Alexandria. BI tetradrachm, year 2 (AD 138/9).

Bareheaded, draped and cuirassed bust right/ Canopus of Osiris right.; ЄTO VC B (date) around.

Emmett 1373

Here are four coins purchased at the recent coin show in San Jose.  The group consists of three Sasanian drachms of Kurshow II (very common), and a  nice follis of Tiberius II Constantine.  The follis came from Kenneth W. Dorney.  I am still doing some research on the Kurshow II drachms (mint, date, etc.).

The Tiberius II Constantine follis is RY 6 (580/1 AD), Constantinople, officina A.  The coin weighs 14.73 grams.