Post Your Lathe Marks

[KenDorney]

This Ptolemaic coin is fairly low grade, but it exhibits a number of characteristics of ancient coin minting methods.  Most prominently the lathe marks and the casting sprues from the blank planchet.  Post your interesting coins showing minting remnants.

 

[Alegandron]

 
Kingdom of Egypt
Ptolemy IV, 221-205
AE Drachm, 40.01mm x 6.5mm thick, 69.46g
Obv: Diademed head of Zeus Ammon r.
Rev: Eagle standing left on thunderbolt
(Struck during Republican Rome's 2nd Punic War)

[DonnaML]

Thanks for this. @Roman Collectorand I gave these marks the name "lathe dimples" over in the other place, so as not to confuse them with compass dots a/k/a centration dimples. The best explanation of them I've seen is on the  now-defunct classicalcoins website, which is fortunately still available on the Wayback Machine at https://web.archive.org/web/20210411064927/http://www.classicalcoins.com/flans1.html. (If you keep clicking "next page" at the bottom, or substitute the numbers 2 through 8 in the url, you'll see the subsequent pages of the discussion, all preserved at web.archive.org.) See also Butcher, Kevin, Roman Provincial Coins: An Introduction to the Greek Imperials (Seaby, London, 1988) at p, 67: "The coins [of Moesia Inferior] frequently have a small circular depression in the centre of the obverse and reverse, possibly the result of being clamped in a sort of lathe device used to smooth off the edges of the coin."

Just about all of my Roman Provincial bronze coins from Moesia Inferior, as well as those from Thrace, have these "lathe dimples." Here are some examples:

 

Edited June 20, 2022 by DonnaML

[robinjojo]

 

There are two obvious flan casting sprues at the edge. 180 degrees apart, on this AE 29 Litra of Syracuse, 344-336 BC.

 

Edited June 20, 2022 by robinjojo

[Steve]

Sweet!! ... man, those are some fantastic coins!! (what a great bunch!)

 

Here are a few of my ol' holey-examples ... 

 

Edited June 20, 2022 by Steve

[Roman Collector]

This coin has a little bit of everything! It has two flan chips from where the sprue was broken off of the cast flan. It has a compass dot between the emperor and empress from laying out the design before engraving the die. It has a lathe dimple from flan preparation. It has doubling of the obverse from a die shift during striking.

 

Gordian III, with Tranquillina. A.D. 238-244.
Roman provincial AE 4.5 assaria; 28.92 mm, 15.89 g, 7 h.
Moesia Inferior, Tomis, A.D. 241-244; Magistrate Pontianus.
Obv: AVT K M ANTΩNIOC ΓΟΡΔΙΑΝΟC // [C]ABINIA (TP)AN / KVΛΛINA, confronted laureate, draped and cuirassed bust of Gordian right and diademed, draped bust of Tranquillina left.
Rev: MHTPO ΠONTOV TOMEΩC, Nemesis standing facing, head left, holding arshin (rod) and sling, wheel at feet; Δ - < (denomination) in fields.
Refs: RPC VII.2, 1701; AMNG I 3537; Varbanov 5701; Moushmov 2279; Cf. SNG Cop 305.

Edited June 21, 2022 by Roman Collector

[Finn235]

I won a small lot of nicer Ptolemy bronzes a couple years ago, two of them had very prominent lathe marks

This one additionally has visible file/lathe marks on the edge from where the flan was "edged"

[AncientJoe]

Here are my two, the first of the Zodiac and second of Noah's Ark. Both are rare types and often come with these central alignment dots. I don't find them distracting at all.

[NewStyleKing]

Athens New Style Tetradrachm 144/3 BC

Obs : Athena Parthenos right in tri-form helmet
16.75gm 34mm Thompson issue 21
Thompson catalogue : Obs : GAZIANTEP 185 : Rev NEW
Rev : ΑΘΕ ethnic
Owl standing on overturned panathenaic amphora on
which month mark Ε control ΤΙ below
2 complex magistrates monograms
RF symbol : Filleted Thyrsos
All within a surrounding olive wreath

 

Notice lathe marks  under left of owl Mac, aka David MacDonald thinks this is to get some silver back. I'm not so sure cos good  conditioned  Thyrsos NewStyles  have weights that vary in the reduced Attic weight "standard" For silver this level of quality control seems pointless when weights per coin varied so much.  Gold is a different matter!