INTERVIEW WITH A MEMBER: Tejas

[Ocatarinetabellatchitchix]

We can't always be impartial in life, can we? I admit that our member of the week has one of the coin collections that I prefer the most among the collectors of this forum; especially its more than 160 pieces from the Gallic empire ! I have enjoyed reading his articles for years on aspects of numismatics completely unknown to me. So let's talk with our friend Tejas...

 

 

Can you tell us a bit about yourself, where you are from, your family, hobbies, work …?

My name is Dirk, and I am originally from northern Germany, but I have spent most of my life overseas, in the United Kingdom, Russia, and the wonderful country of Switzerland. I'm married and have two children. I'm a professional economist who works for a central bank. In fact, I work in a field related to money markets that, sadly, has nothing to do with coin markets.

I've always been interested in history and prehistory. As a child, all I could think about were knights, castles, and dinosaurs. Indeed, I recall an incident in which I collected "dinosaur bones" from the remains of earthworks outside our local church. Not knowing that the area had once been a cemetery, I took the bones home, and to my mother's horror, stored them under my bed for further investigation.

Unsurprisingly, most of my hobbies are history-related, including numismatics, genealogy and heraldry (my avatar shows our family coat of arms). I’m also a great fan of classical music, with Bach being my all-time favorite composer. My family is originally from Eastern Prussia, with some members having lived in Russia – indeed my grandfather was born as subject of the last Tsar - which I mention because it is relevant to my numismatic interests.

 

How did you get interested in ancient coinage?

When I was about 10 years old an Italian guest worker and tenant of my parents, gave me a 10 Centesimo coin of king Vittorio Emanuele, dating to 1867. I calculated the “incomprehensible” age of the coin and was immediately hooked. Firmly believing that it would not be possible to ever obtain a coin of greater antiquity, I started collecting German coins of the “Kaiserreich” and everything else I could get my hands on. My fascination with coins had much to do with time, age and the idea that these objects are dateable, everyday objects that “witnessed” times long past.

What was the first coin you ever bought?

My Confirmation at the age of 14, brought me into the possession of sufficient funds to buy a taler of Prussian king Fredrick the Great. I still have the coin. Here is the picture:

Taler of King Frederic the Great of Prussia

 

Obv.: FRIDERICUS BORUSSORUM REX

Rev.: EIN REICHSTHALER 17 E 86

Mint: Königsberg (the capital of East Prussia)

With the Vittorio Emanuele coin now beaten by nearly 100 years, I set out to acquire more coins of 18th century Prussia and the Teutonic Order of Knights, who once ruled over East Prussia, the ancestral home of my family. My first coin of the Teutonic Knights was a Schilling of Grandmaster Michael Kuchmeister von Sternberg dating to around 1414.

Shilling of the Teutonic Knights

 

Obv.: MAGST MICHAEL PRIM

Rev.: MONETA DNORVM PRVCI

I have a considerable collection of coins of the Order, including some rare pieces. I guess, besides the link to East Prussia, what fascinated me most about the Teutonic Knights was the ephemeral nature of their state, which existed far back in history, in a province whose once mighty name is now all but forgotten and erased from the maps. Their coins are witness to their existence and their 300-year struggle for their believes and their survival. This fascination with ephemeral polities remained a guiding principle of my collecting activity, which started to spread to ever more tentative states and peoples. However, as a student in Cambridge and London I was faced with a tight budget constraint, which caused me to focus on common Russian kopecks and dengas of the 16th and 17th centuries, which could be bought for 5 pounds or less at the time. Here is a picture of a much rarer and earlier denga of Dmitri Donskoi:

Denga of Grand Prince Dmitri Donskoi

 

Obv.: Pechat’ velikogo knyaza dmitriya (Seal of  Grand Prince Dmitri)

Rev.: Arabic script

Date: ca. 1390

Mint: Moscow

 

However, London was also the place where I encountered Sceatta or Sceats, those 8th century Anglo-Frisian coins, which look so entirely alien to us. Once again, I was immediately hooked.

 

Dirk, can you tell us an anecdote about a coin you own? Your best bargain? Your rarest coin? The specimen you will never sell? The one you dream of acquiring?

I have many anecdotes, some bargains, but probably more coins that I overpaid on, and some coins of extreme rarity. Most of my coins I will never sell and there are hundreds of coins that I dream of acquiring, but which I know I will never own. More about this later.

Now, for anecdotes: The saddest episode of my collecting career took place in 2003, when some of my coins were stolen in a burglary in London. Since then, my collection is not only in bank vault, but probably one of the most impregnable bank vaults in Europe. Some coins could be recovered shortly afterwards, thanks to an attentive coin dealer in London. The culprits were put on trial, but were not convicted, as the police had fumbled the evidence. One coin dealer predicted that the coins would resurface, but I would need to be patient. Indeed, 10 years later, some of the coins appeared in a French auction in Paris. The seller was from Morocco. The auction house impounded the coins and the prospective seller agreed to hand them over to me.

Some of my coins are still missing:

Stolen coins database - Base de données des monnaies volées - Münzen (colleconline.com)

 

One of the coins, that I miss most, appeared again in France, but at a different auction house. Unfortunately, the auction house did not withdraw the coin, but sold it and in general proved to be unhelpful in its retrieval. Here is the piece:

Suevian Solidus in the name of Honorius

 

Now for a happier subject - bargains: As I said, I’m an economist. I count the immaterial pleasure that I receive from a coin as non-monetary return. Hence, even a coin that appears to be expensive can subjectively be a bargain in my view. However, the coin below was a bargain in both monetary and non-monetary terms. I found this exceedingly rare Gothic Deka-Nummus piece on Ebay, where it was offered for EUR 450 or best offer. I remember the great excitement when I saw it. Inexplicably, I send in an offer below the already low asking price, and waited with great anxiety until the seller agreed to the deal. I don’t know what I had done if I had lost the coin. In auction, I would expect the coin to fetch EUR 1000 to 2000, not that such a coin in this condition has ever come up in an auction.

Deka-Nummus from Marseille (Monogram of Theudebert or Amalaric)

 

My rarest coin? The Deka-Nummus is very rare, but I have many coins that are just as rare or rarer. Here is a small selection:

A Quarter-Siliqua from Sirmium with unusual reverse

 

A Burgundian Quarter Siliqua with the monogram of King Gundobad

 

A Gothic/Germanic imitation of an aureus of Probus

 

For the coin I will never sell; I think I can pass on this question. There are too many coins that I will never voluntarily sell.

Finally, for the coin I dream of acquiring; again, there are so many that I cannot provide a list. A little anecdote: There are two specimens of an Ostrogothic Quarter-Siliqua with the INVICTISSIMVS AVTOR legend known to exist. One is in a museum, the other one is in the hands of a Croatian collector. After some negotiations I came close to acquiring the second coin. I even met the collector in Split in Croatia, but at the end it didn’t work out.

Among the many other coins that I would love to own is a REX QVADIS DATVS sestertius of Antoninus Pius. However, these coins are generally too rare and too expensive for me. I should add here two things: First, I am a “condition crank”. I don’t derive any pleasure from badly worn coins, no matter how rare and historically important they are (but I do respect collectors who do). Secondly, I have an imaginary budget constraint in my head. Even if I could theoretically afford a coin above that constraint, I don’t derive that much pleasure from a coin that exceeds this amount. These two things combined prevent me from acquiring most of my most desired coins.

 

What do you collect exactly? What is the size of your collection?

Some years back in London somebody once asked me if I had a “professional” collection. I didn’t really know what to answer because I was initially unsure of what he meant. Apparently, according to his definition, a “professional” collector – and he left no doubt that these are the only true collectors in his mind – systematically assemble collections along certain historical or numismatic themes with the overall aim of completeness. Anyway, it was clear to me that I was not a professional collector and that I never will be one. I basically collect what I like. Hence, I am (proud to be) an amateur collector who wanders aimlessly among different collecting themes, the only real constants being condition and esthetic appeal.

This makes it rather difficult to explain what I collect exactly. I have long focused on Migration Age coins, including Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Vandals, Burgundians and Franks. I probably have the largest collection of Gepidic coins worldwide. I also have collections of early German medieval coins, coins of the Teutonic Order, Prussia, Russia and some other medieval states, including some 200 Chinese coins about which I know next to nothing. I think I was among the first persons in the west who owned and knew about Taman-Imitations, and I bought Gothic imitations of Roman aurei at a time when most of the experts laughed them off as obvious fakes. I have a large collection of Roman imperial coins with a focus on the 3rd and 4th centuries. I guess I have around 4000 coins altogether, many of which still need to be catalogued properly. I also collected other objects, including migration age fibulae, stone age implements and ancient Egyptian scarabs.

 

What did you write about?

I have written a couple of articles on coins. These articles represent perhaps 1% of the ideas for articles that I had over the years. In one article I introduced so called Taman-Imitations to western numismatics.

I also wrote about the 6th century coins of the Sirmium mint. These coins are partly attributable to the Gepids. When I first encountered these coins, I was immediately captured by the ephemeral nature of their long forgotten, but once powerful kingdom.

 

(99+) The "Sirmium Group" - an overview | Dirk Faltin - Academia.edu

 

I have a number of articles, which I started but never finished. One of them deals with a unique Ostrogothic Quarter-Siliqua in my collection, another one is about a unique and utterly intriguing Gepidic/Gothic coin from Sirmium – also in my collection. Let’s see if I find the time to get them out in future.

 

Can you tell us more about Tasman Imitation and the Sirmium Group?

When I read the typo in the question above – i.e., “Tasman Imitation” instead of “Taman Imitation” – I knew I had to say a few words. Taman Imitations are coins from the Russian Taman peninsula at the Sea of Azov. The coins imitate a certain denarius type with a walking Mars reverse. The design of these coins has ventured very far away from the original model during the 150 or 200 years of their production. Auction houses like to attribute these coins to the Goths, but I think I have shown in my article, that this attribution is wrong.

Taman-Imitation of unknown people

 

Indeed, Russian and Ukrainian numismatists refer to these coins as “moneti neizvestnogo naroda”, i.e., coins of the unknown people. From what I said before, you will not be surprised that a name like this was more than enough to pique my interest.

On the Sirmium Group, I invite you to consult my article, which I’m happy to say is regularly cited by some auction houses to describe such coins in their auction catalogs.

 

Do you have a numismatic goal for the next year?

In terms of new acquisition, no. As mentioned before I buy what I like (within my means). I have a list of coins that I look out for, but ever the economist, I keep this list to myself. However, I would like to continue cataloging my collection.

What numismatic books to you own /consult most often?

There are collectors who own 100 coins and as many numismatic books. I suppose, these are the professional collectors I talked about before. However, I’m an interested amateur. I probably own too little literature compared to the size of my collection, but I do have hundreds of copied articles. My favourite numismatic book is Medieal EC by Grierson and Blackburn.

 

In what part of history are you interested in?

I have answered that question before to some extent. My main interest is the migration age period, i.e., the time from around AD 370 to AD 570, which includes the fall of the Western Roman Empire and the end of Antiquity. As a German I am very interested in the history of the Germanic peoples, such as Goths and Vandals, Burgundians and Saxons. However, having said that, my interest is much wider as well. For example, I love ancient Egyptian history. Having travelled to around 60 different countries, I hardly ever fail to read up on the history of the particular country I’m in. Indeed, as a result of holiday related travel, I have small collections of medieval Georgian and Armenian coins.

 

I like to add one question to the list of questions that Dominic provided. Why coins – what do you like about coins as opposed to other collectors’ items?

I like coins and coin collecting, because coins bring history to life, at least for me. More often than not, historical events and characters are just abstract names and numbers. An exception is ancient Egypt. If you go to the Egyptian Museum in Cairo, you can look straight into the faces of the greatest rulers of their times. You can experience the person Ramses the Great and Seti I when you stand in front of their dead and mummified bodies. Elsewhere, however, even the most famous people, are really just names, not persons to us. This is true for Caesar and Charlegmagne and it is even more true for figures like the last Gothic kings Totila and Tejas. However, through their coins they become real to us. My Halfsiliqua of Tejas was struck during the final months of the Gothic kingdom. The crude and makeshift nature of the coin bears witness to their desperate struggle for survival.

 

Rev.: DN THELA REX

Tejas, which is also my pseudonym on this forum is a good point to close this interview. Thanks all for reading my musings and thanks for Dominic for running these interviews. For me this was a great opportunity to reflect on my collecting activity which after all is an important part of my life.

 

Many thanks Dirk for sharing a part of your life with us and for your participation in the interview series. If you have some free time soon, please sit in your most comfortable armchair and admire some of his coin collection with the link at the bottom. And don’t forget to share your comments here !

 

https://www.colleconline.com/fr/collections/2281/tejas552

 

Edited December 23, 2023 by Ocatarinetabellatchitchix

[CPK]

Thanks for sharing your collecting thoughts and interests with us, @Tejas! I enjoyed the interview. 

Thanks as well to @Ocatarinetabellatchitchix for continuing to provide us with fascinating and insightful member interviews!

[Orange Julius]

Great interview and an interesting read. Thank you @Tejas for sharing!

I follow your threads with interest and always enjoy them, as my interest and wallet align with later imperial (and after) coins as well. You have a great eye for interesting and nice coins, thank you for your contributions here!

[Di Nomos]

These are always fun to read and yours was no exception. Very interesting stories.

[Rand]

@TejasThank you for the interview. The collection is magnificent. I suppose if a professional collector adds another area to their collecting journey, they do not stop being professional collectors. 

This morning, I was going through the online part of your collection and enjoyed it a lot. It is a pity it must sit in the vault. I found some of the most beautiful Burgundian Gundobad and Sigismund coins that exist. Congratulations. I have crossed them from my wish list.

I have been looking for a nice teutonic coin for some time. It would be a hard area to collect for a perfectionist. While many are not rare, finding a perfect one is not easy. Victors write histories - it would be interesting to know what life within the order truly was like during its expansion period. 

The borders of Europe are being re-drawn once again. Who knows, the language of Immanuel Kant may one day return to his home city. His people knew how to build to last. Kant may well have had your first thaler in his purse.

@Ocatarinetabellatchitchix Thank for the great idea and persuing it.

[DonnaML]

Thanks to both of you for another wonderful interview. I continue to be so impressed, not only by our members' collections, but by their many talents and accomplishments. Anyone who thinks coin collectors are just a bunch of elderly recluses living in their mothers' basements -- not that there's anything wrong with that! -- needs to read this series.

I'm curious, @Tejas: where in East Prussia did your family come from? Parts of mine came from nearby provinces like Westpreussen and Hinterpommern, as well as across the border in Lithuania (then part of Russia, of course.)

 

 

Edited December 23, 2023 by DonnaML

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

Very interesting thank you. 

[Prieure de Sion]

Interesting Interview, interesting infos and cool coins... thanks again!

[Qcumbor]

Another great interview with a most revered collectors out there. Thanks !

Q

[Tejas]

Thank you all for your kind words and the interest in my story. I greatly enjoyed doing the interview, because it gave me an opportunity to reflect on my collecting activities.

@DonnaML My family is from the eastern and south eastern parts of former East Prussia, including some forgotten names like Nikolaiken, Goldap, Angerburg and Marggrabowa. The area was once called Masuren and until the 17th or 18th century it was called "the great Wilderness" which gives you a good idea regarding its physical characteristics and its cultural offerings. However, some parts of my family also from Western Prussia, including towns like Thorn, Elbing and Danzig.

@Rand Getting an attractive Shilling of the Teutonic order is not particularly difficult if you don't focus on the rarer Grand masters, but instead go for Winrich of Kniprode or Konrad III of Jungingen. My Teutonic Order collection has yet to be catalogued.

 

[Salomons Cat]

Great interview, thank you!

I must admit that I have always read your name with a Spanish accent... One "teja" is a brick and I thought that "tejas" means bricks. 
Now, I found out that you're German and I believe that your name is not Spanish and does not mean "bricks"... Could you possibly tell me how I should pronounce your name in my head when I read it? 😄

[Rand]

@Tejas Another provenance for your Sigismund's tremissis (may be known to you, but not listed in the online collection catalogue).

This is certainly the best example in private hands, and probably the best overall. 

Etienne Bourgey. Collection G. 27/10/1913.

[DonnaML]

24 minutes ago, Tejas said:

Thank you all for your kind words and the interest in my story. I greatly enjoyed doing the interview, because it gave me an opportunity to reflect on my collecting activities.

@DonnaML My family is from the eastern and south eastern parts of former East Prussia, including some forgotten names like Nikolaiken, Goldap, Angerburg and Marggrabowa. The area was once called Masuren and until the 17th or 18th century it was called "the great Wilderness" which gives you a good idea regarding its physical characteristics and its cultural offerings. However, some parts of my family also from Western Prussia, including towns like Thorn, Elbing and Danzig.

 

Thanks. I've heard of Goldap -- it had a Jewish community with not one but two Jewish cemeteries, a lot for such a small place. Towards the east my father's family came from Jurbarkas (Georgenburg), between the Prussian border and Kovno (Kaunas). In other directions my ancestors in my maternal grandfather's family came from towns and villages like Schlochau in West Prussia, and all the other places marked with red dots on this map (including the "other" Königsberg, i.d. Neumark, now Chojna), back to at least the 1700s and in some cases the 1600s (including being among the 50 families the Great Elector invited in 1671 after the 1670 expulsion from Vienna), before most of them moved to Berlin in the 1870s. None of these locations is in Germany anymore.

 

Edited December 23, 2023 by DonnaML

[panzerman]

I am from the opposite end of Germany (Jülich)😇 I really enjoyed your interview/ fantastic story for sure. Really sorry about the nasty people that stole your coins. I also like all the coins from Germanic peoples that came after fall of Rome. I still do not have any coins from the Teutonic Order. My Mother's side originally came from East Prussia/ then moved to Köln/ Archbishopric. A big round of applause to Ocat for another fine interview. The history these coins tell/ truly astounding.

John

I have this AV Tremissis/ in name of Marcian/ unpublished?

[lordmarcovan]

Thanks for another great interview, @Ocatarinetabellatchitchix!

@Tejas - I went and had a look at your galleries on CollecOnline.  Wow!  You have more collection galleries than I do individual coins in my primary collection!  (But at 100 pieces, mine is a relatively small collection.)

I'm agreed with you on Bach as the all-time favorite composer.

PS- I hope more of your stolen coins are returned to you some day. 😞

Edited December 24, 2023 by lordmarcovan

[lordmarcovan]

 

12 minutes ago, panzerman said:

I still do not have any coins from the Teutonic Order.

Teutonic Order?  I have one coin.  Relatively "modern".

[lordmarcovan]

Quote

I've always been interested in history and prehistory. As a child, all I could think about were knights, castles, and dinosaurs. Indeed, I recall an incident in which I collected "dinosaur bones" from the remains of earthworks outside our local church. Not knowing that the area had once been a cemetery, I took the bones home, and to my mother's horror, stored them under my bed for further investigation.

With sympathy for your mother, I think that's a great anecdote.  I can imagine something like that happening in my own over-imaginative childhood.

[panzerman]

4 hours ago, lordmarcovan said:

With sympathy for your mother, I think that's a great anecdote.  I can imagine something like that happening in my own over-imaginative childhood.

Me too! My parents read Grimm's Tales to me before bedtime! Thus I had wild dreams about Witches/ Robber barons/ Demons/ Gold coins!

Your 1/4 Thaler is beautifull! The 1596 AV 10 Dukaten is to die for....

[JeandAcre]

Huge thanks to @Ocatarinetabellatchitchix for keeping up this invaluable, endlessly entertaining project --at an inexhaustibly consistent level!

@Tejas, ...too many things to say at once!  Your areas of concentration (and, false modesty gets you No Points here, expertise) are remarkable in themselves.  Arcane, by any 'ordinary' standards ...and no less unjustly so, as you so eloquently demonstrate.  But what else leaps out at me is how they combine breadth with unmistakable thematic unity --including your modern Prussian emphases.  Not something you (Edit:) Don't see every day!

Your article on the Gepid coins is fantastic (following you now)!  The introduction is a concise but, for some of us, invaluable 'crash course' on the historical context.  And your catalogue is phenomenal.  I never expected to see anything remotely as comprehensive as this for any part of the series.  (An American numismatist was trying to nudge me toward getting a representative example, but I never did, solely because of my wholesale ignorance of the Gepids!  Now I might look for one --assuming prices haven't already spiked.)

And the range of your other interests is kind of amazing.  To paraphrase Henry VIII (according to A Man for All Seasons), 'Your taste is excellent --exactly like my own!'  I have to resonate with your combining numismatics and history with genealogy (other edit:) and heraldry.  I never guessed that your avatar was your real coat of arms --the arrow through the crest always threw me off!  Now I like the humor only more.  ...One more thing along these lines, and it'll be time to shut up.  For years now, my favorite Bach has been the later stuff, especially the Musikalische Opfer and Kunst der Fuge.  The way that you can just kind of get lost in the sheer density of the counterpoint is really compelling.  ...But whenever I rediscover the Brandenburgs, for instance, I find out how great they are, all over again.

It's looking as if, along with taking me too long to stumble onto this interview, I need to find more of your posts!  Have you posted a lot of the ones on the Migration Period under Roman?  That might have been why it's taken me so long to notice them.

...Anyway, Bravo!!!

Edited December 25, 2023 by JeandAcre

[Tejas]

On 12/23/2023 at 9:36 PM, Salomons Cat said:

Great interview, thank you!

I must admit that I have always read your name with a Spanish accent... One "teja" is a brick and I thought that "tejas" means bricks. 
Now, I found out that you're German and I believe that your name is not Spanish and does not mean "bricks"... Could you possibly tell me how I should pronounce your name in my head when I read it? 

I chose the name Tejas (Theia) for the last Gothic king, who fought and died in the battle of Mons Lactarius in late 552. 

[Tejas]

On 12/23/2023 at 9:37 PM, DonnaML said:

Thanks. I've heard of Goldap -- it had a Jewish community with not one but two Jewish cemeteries, a lot for such a small place. Towards the east my father's family came from Jurbarkas (Georgenburg), between the Prussian border and Kovno (Kaunas). In other directions my ancestors in my maternal grandfather's family came from towns and villages like Schlochau in West Prussia, and all the other places marked with red dots on this map (including the "other" Königsberg, i.d. Neumark, now Chojna), back to at least the 1700s and in some cases the 1600s (including being among the 50 families the Great Elector invited in 1671 after the 1670 expulsion from Vienna), before most of them moved to Berlin in the 1870s. None of these locations is in Germany anymore.

This is a great family history. My family are all Lutheran Christians (with a few who converted to Russian Orthodoxy). Prussia is mostly known for its militarism, but another aspect of Prussia was its religious tolerance. The Prussian kings invited religious refugees from different regions, including French Hugonottes and Austrians, especially from the Salzburg area. Friedrich the Great famously said "In my kingdom everybody can find salvation in their own way" and the motto of his grandfather Friedrich I, which can also be found on Prussian coins of the time, is "Suum cuique", which is "to each their own". 

I've recently taken some interest in coins of the Polish Division, ie. territories that came to Prussia, Russia and Austria.

Here is a 3-Groschen piece of South Prussia, which was the region just west and north of Warsaw. These coins are common, but quite rare in decent conditions. Below is a 3 Groschen piece of the Grossherzogtum Posen (Grand Duchy of Posen), which was the are south of West Prussia. Both coins were minted at Breslau for these newly created Prussian regions.

Edited December 29, 2023 by Tejas

[Tejas]

On 12/23/2023 at 9:37 PM, Rand said:

@Tejas Another provenance for your Sigismund's tremissis (may be known to you, but not listed in the online collection catalogue).

This is certainly the best example in private hands, and probably the best overall. 

Etienne Bourgey. Collection G. 27/10/1913.

This is fantastic. Many thanks for the reference. 

[Tejas]

On 12/24/2023 at 10:17 PM, JeandAcre said:

Your article on the Gepid coins is fantastic (following you now)!  The introduction is a concise but, for some of us, invaluable 'crash course' on the historical context.  And your catalogue is phenomenal.  I never expected to see anything remotely as comprehensive as this for any part of the series.  (An American numismatist was trying to nudge me toward getting a representative example, but I never did, solely because of my wholesale ignorance of the Gepids!  Now I might look for one --assuming prices haven't already spiked.)

Thanks for your kind words on this article. I'm glad to say that I just managed to finish another article on a unique Ostrogothic silve coin in my collection. I submitted the article yesterday to KOINON and hope that they find it interesting enough for publication.

On the coins of Sirmium (i.e. Goths and Gepids), these are really very affordable now, as so many have been found in recent years. It looks, however, that the supply is drying up now. If that area of history is of interest to you I recommend "Justinian's Balkan Wars" by Alexander Sarantis.

Edited December 29, 2023 by Tejas

[Tejas]

On 12/24/2023 at 6:20 AM, panzerman said:

I am from the opposite end of Germany (Jülich)😇 I really enjoyed your interview/ fantastic story for sure. Really sorry about the nasty people that stole your coins. I also like all the coins from Germanic peoples that came after fall of Rome. I still do not have any coins from the Teutonic Order. My Mother's side originally came from East Prussia/ then moved to Köln/ Archbishopric. A big round of applause to Ocat for another fine interview. The history these coins tell/ truly astounding.

John

I have this AV Tremissis/ in name of Marcian/ unpublished?

This is a great coin. It is clearly not an official issue, but who exactly made these coins remains a mystery. 

[Tejas]

On 12/24/2023 at 10:17 PM, JeandAcre said:

...One more thing along these lines, and it'll be time to shut up.  For years now, my favorite Bach has been the later stuff, especially the Musikalische Opfer and Kunst der Fuge.  The way that you can just kind of get lost in the sheer density of the counterpoint is really compelling.  ...But whenever I rediscover the Brandenburgs, for instance, I find out how great they are, all over again.

That is the same for me. I actually think that Bach is not only the greates composer/musician of all times, but his Mass in D Minor may very well be the greatest piece of art of all times.