Numismatics / Coin Collecting - The coin collecting hub for kiwifarms

[ChampFantana]

From what I've heard, even the faintest whiff of cleaning on a coin tanks it's worth to face/melt value, but if it's just for your own collection an ultrasonic bath or an old toothbroosh and baking-soda

Thanks for the info. The pennies in question are all several decades old and have been circulated endlessly, so they're no where near gradeable quality.

I do enjoy speculating on where those coins have been across nearly a century though.

 

[.iota.]

Ah dollar coins. the thing the government tried everything to get Americans to adopt except something sensible like widespread effort to distribute them to retailers to then give out as change (or if they did they certainly didn't do a good job of it). Instead they were supposed to adopted nationwide purely through the power of numismatic nerds asking for them at the bank.

they were also distributed through the u.s. postal service. there used to be self-service stamp kiosks at every post office that gave change in the form of dollar coins. so if you bought a stamp with a twenty dollar bill, you would receive nineteen sba's and/or sacagaweas and some change. most of the post offices have since removed those kiosks, though.

 

[RiceofSkywalker]

Here's some of my favorites in my collection:

• 1 Florin, 1859, silver - Franz Joseph of Austro-Hungary
• 10 centimes, 1863, bronze - Napoleon III (from when he decided that "Emperor" would sound better than "President" next to his name)

 

[Waff]

Ah dollar coins. the thing the government tried everything to get Americans to adopt except something sensible like widespread effort to distribute them to retailers to then give out as change (or if they did they certainly didn't do a good job of it). Instead they were supposed to adopted nationwide purely through the power of numismatic nerds asking for them at the bank. Wish I had as chill a job as the overpaid armies of consultants and specialists they probably hired to try to figure this out.

I remember back when I was in high school my school had all of our food in vending machines and every time you bought anything you would get change in dollar coins. Sad though cause I didn't save a single one. Their material composition isnt that impressive but they personally look pretty beautiful. I especially liked the idea of adding the date to the rim though its sad for collectors as the sides cannot be seen if you get it graded.

I recently picked up an owl

View attachment 7044725

You seem like a hoot and a holler. Plz share if its not a repro and it actually arrives.

In addition I found the link that one guy shared on mati this week or last (i forget) and I really hope more pop up at an affordable price. The designs are incredibly unique... I never would have thought of mixing hebrew and swedish.

Numista

 

[Ravier Xavenblood]

Another productive coin store run this morning. From top down:
Shekel (for the lulz)
2 Imperial Japanese 1 Sen coins minted between 1916-1924
Weimar German 50 pfennig, 1921
Tolerance windmill era 2 reichspfennig, 1938
Some Polish coin, minted 1939
The Swedish 10 Ore coins on the side have silver in them.

 

[Jimmy Hopkins]

Some of my recent PCGS pickups
Not sure why I can't upload in higher resolution but you can search the cert numbers for HD images.

 

[acme]

Some of my recent PCGS pickupsView attachment 7227131View attachment 7227138View attachment 7227139View attachment 7227140
Not sure why I can't upload in higher resolution but you can search the cert numbers for HD images.

The toning on that nickel is amazing. My most recent pickup is a Greek tetradrachm of Side. The Corinthian helmet is definitely my favorite ancient symbol/object but the reverse has alot of charm with a little pomegranate.

 

[Jimmy Hopkins]

The toning on that nickel is amazing

My main area i collect right now is toned nickels. I've got a bunch of other nice examples but most don't have nice TrueView photos. Should I drop some more pictures in this thread? If I upload the images without thumbnailing them will the image quality be better?

I love the crazy high relief on Tetradrachms. That's one of the types I've been wanting to save up for

 

[acme]

My main area i collect right now is toned nickels. I've got a bunch of other nice examples but most don't have nice TrueView photos. Should I drop some more pictures in this thread?

Definitely post more. I dont know much about American numismatics so seeing some of yours would be cool. IDK about high quality images, I thumbnail all my pictures.
Since you like high relief heres my Tetradrachm of Lysimachos with the bust of Alexander.

​

 

[PandaChai]

Definitely post more. I dont know much about American numismatics so seeing some of yours would be cool. IDK about high quality images, I thumbnail all my pictures.
Since you like high relief heres my Tetradrachm of Lysimachos with the bust of Alexander.

View attachment 7253596View attachment 7253597View attachment 7253598​

I'm absolutely terrified of being ripped off with ancient coins, especially ones that look so good, any tips you can share for making sure they're the real deal?

 

[poss master]

i have found my home fellow coiners i bring thee a sight for the eyes (edit removed the double image)

 

[Jimmy Hopkins]

I'm absolutely terrified of being ripped off with ancient coins, especially ones that look so good, any tips you can share for making sure they're the real deal?

If you're not confident you can identify fakes than buy them certified aka graded from either NGC or ANACs. Preferably NGC. That way you can be sure they're genuine, they're well protected, and you'll also know the grade.

 

[acme]

I'm absolutely terrified of being ripped off with ancient coins, especially ones that look so good, any tips you can share for making sure they're the real deal?

I would suggest you check out Vcoins. Its the largest online numismatic retailer so all the shops are competitive with their prices, and Vcoins offers a lifetime guarantee of authenticity for all coins.
You can just browse through categories and subcategories to get an idea of prices and what different grades look like.

Some things to keep in mind are that retail prices can be higher than auction prices but this is usually negligible with more common coins like imperial denari. With more specialized coins like Greek tetradrachms or staters its good to be aware of recent hammer prices from auctions. On sites like CoinArchive you can paste the reference number and see recent auctions of that coin.

Another great tool for learning about ancient coins is the YouTube channel Classical Numismatics. He has a lot of videos that offer tips for beginners and other videos which highlight certain types of coins.

 

[Waff]

Man its great to see so much new activity in this thread again, especially since this is now one of my favorite autistic fascinations. Anyways recently I've gotten a very large interest in both the circulated and uncirculated mintage of the commonwealth of the bahamas. The coins tend to have a very beachy theme and some of the silver designs that did not go into circulation are just beautiful. As of now here is my current collection of uncicrulateds and almost uncirculateds;




Perhaps of all the designs I own right now I would say I probably adore my 1974 .800 silver dollar coin the most (catalogued as km65a). Its actually interesting, the image they use on numista is actually significantly worse condition compared to the one I own:
Numista Listing

One of the ones used in their actual currency didn't show up as well as I wanted to so I took a close up shot:


There still are some designs I want to add to my collection, however the information and/or listings of these even existing is hard to find if not non-existiant.
The first one is a special edition 1993 edward teach (blackbeard) five dollar coin (.925 silver). Something like this I would presume would be something of a fantasy coin but the fact this was a legitimate mintage fascinates me immensely;
Numista Listing


The other one is a tad more common but I find the design of the whale to look beautiful. This is an 100 dollar coin also minted in 1993 made of .999 silver known as Cetacea-Blue Whale or its catalog number KM# 163. From the information provided, it only had 750 minted;
Numista Listing

I'm absolutely terrified of being ripped off with ancient coins, especially ones that look so good, any tips you can share for making sure they're the real deal?

I think if you go for obscure ancient coins and not the ones that everyone seeks out then you may have a better time at finding ancients. Think of it like counterfitters for paper money. Sure there is the exception like that one guy who duplicated two dollar bills as people kept them as momentos but it is more likely than not they are going to mainly go for shit like dollar to five dollar bills since they are the most common. In the case of coinage I would expect most to try and replicate greek/roman issue coins but not something like swedish/dutch for instance. I don't own ancients but if I start collecting them thats probably how I am going to start.

 

[Jimmy Hopkins]

The Bahamas 1 Dollar conch shell is one of the first coins i bought after getting into collecting. Most of the other Caribbean islands have coins with cool aquatic themes. Especially from the 60s-90s. Most of the caribbean countries dont have their own reliable mints so they relied on the San Francisco Mint or the Royal Mint in Britain. It's a very fun area to collect for very cheap.

I think my favorite from the Bahamas is the massive 5 dollar made from sterling silver.

And another similar favorite

 

[Waff]

The Bahamas 1 Dollar conch shell is one of the first coins i bought after getting into collecting. Most of the other Caribbean islands have coins with cool aquatic themes. Especially from the 60s-90s. Most of the caribbean countries dont have their own reliable mints so they relied on the San Francisco Mint or the Royal Mint in Britain. It's a very fun area to collect for very cheap.

I think my favorite from the Bahamas is the massive 5 dollar made from sterling silver.View attachment 7259072View attachment 7259074

And another similar favorite
View attachment 7259353View attachment 7259356

Man I didn't know barbados had such a beautiful coin with poseidon. I wish that 5 Dollar coin had a better image of it. I'd love to see it in AU or UNC. The details on the ship would definitely be an interesting thing to see. I am curious as to which carribean countries used san fran and which used the royal mint in britan...something about a british claim using our mint is especially ironic in my mind. From some of the minimal research I have done though I thought I did see that the bahamas had their own mint now? I could be wrong though.

Edit; did a quick search on ebay and that coin is beautiful in even MS65

 

[Jimmy Hopkins]

Man I didn't know barbados had such a beautiful coin with poseidon. I wish that 5 Dollar coin had a better image of it. I'd love to see it in AU or UNC. The details on the ship would definitely be an interesting thing to see. I am curious as to which carribean countries used san fran and which used the royal mint in britan...something about a british claim using our mint is especially ironic in my mind. From some of the minimal research I have done though I thought I did see that the bahamas had their own mint now? I could be wrong though.

Edit; did a quick search on ebay and that coin is beautiful in even MS65


View attachment 7259895

This is a list of all the known foreign coins minted by official US mints. I was wrong about Bahamas coins being struck in San Francisco. A lot of the modern series' were actually struck at The Franklin Mint, a private non government mint based in the US.

 

[Waff]

This is a list of all the known foreign coins minted by official US mints. I was wrong about Bahamas coins being struck in San Francisco. A lot of the modern series' were actually struck at The Franklin Mint, a private non government mint based in the US.

Wow over 1k coins. America ftw... Now if we just brought back the gold standard again....

 

[Sandnigger Mudhut]

How could you determine the year of minting for a buffalo nickel, given that almost all of them have rubbed-off years? My oldest coin that I know the date of is a 1923 German Mark from the Weimar Republic; I have quite a few Buffalo Nickels that are probably older than the Mark, but ofc I don't know!

 

[PandaChai]

How could you determine the year of minting for a buffalo nickel, given that almost all of them have rubbed-off years?

Acid. Not sure how much that effects the value though.