TomGoodheart

I would never bid in a 'private listing' bidding on ebay. I think it's just asking to be shilled and I have no idea why ebay ever went down that route. With the 'old' system you could see who you were bidding against and it was easy to identify sellers that bidded up their own items with fake accounts. Now, it's impossible. Oops. I digress. Nice bit of tinfoil there. I've one exactly like it, only instead of being ruined by being wrapped around a coin, it's perfectly flat. Shall we start the bidding at £200?

Very good that! Nice voice!

Mine are covered under my household insurance. Only one coin cost more than the limit per individual item and so is specified in the schedule. The rest are just 'a collection'. I can't remember how much it added to the insurance - not much I imagine. They asked if they were kept under lock and key, but little else. I did have a valuation done a while back but I wasn't asked for one. I expect it would only be an issue if I wanted to make a claim.

Quite. Carry on Hello17. As for me, I'm afraid your choices are a bit .. mild to my taste. Nickelback and Green Day are what I'd maybe listen to when driving the car. I'm more of a metal man mesself, but I won't spoil your day with my favourite Lamb of God. Here's a bit of Gibraltarian metal you might like instead plus a spot of the more melodic side of Rammstein.

I noticed a few more spam(bot?) posts from 'guests'. Now I'm sure that "in the past" there was a moderator for each board with supervisor privileges that could delete such things. Plus Chris used to regularly weed out both posts and URLs. But now I'm not sure it's happening. Has anyone heard from Chris since the last "Where is he" post?

Hi and welcome! I'm not familiar with the product you mention. All I'd say is that collector's expectations differ. An enthusiast in 16th century silver might well expect his tea pot to be polished. Whereas I would not expect my 16th century coins to be cleaned other than as Peter mentions. Coins will pick up tiny scratches which the blade of a sword will not. And those scratches will effect value. As to online dealers the good ones will often prove much cheaper than auction houses. While it is possible to pick up a bargain at auction, gold is always in demand for its intrinsic (bullion) value. You will also have to pay around 20% buyer's premium on the hammer price. More importantly dealers will check 'wants lists' for you, alerting you to when a particular coin might be available and also on the bredth of your collection as well as market trends.

Unfortunately i'd rather not say Tom, due to the fact that in Germany they have the American mentality where they will sue if you look at them the wrong way. Here's one scenario for you, they now have lawyers who scour ebay for anyone who's used someone elses pictures or text in their ebay listing. There was a case when someone had resold something but used the previous ebay text and pix, he was sucessfully sued for 700 euros. Thats the downside of living in Germany unfortunately I wasn't (totally) serious about the naming and shaming really. But this 'sue at the drop of a hat' mentality is causing problems. Particularly coupled with the apparent German interpretation of image copyright rules. It means that auction sites and other search engines are being more careful about the images that they post. Which in turn makes it more difficult for researchers and for those wishing to find out about the provenance of their coins because either images are removed after the listings or only available at cost. The internet should make it easier to learn about a subject like coins because of the huge quantity of different images of the same basic coin being made available. It should be easier to find whether a coin usually appears in Fine or EF, whether your example is typical and so on. It should also make discussing the pros and cons of buying from a particular source easier. But if everyone is going to sue if you say you weren't best pleased with a transaction, the less well served we all will be. I wonder how long it will be before say, the Greek or Italian governments hire people to scan the internet for artifacts and say "Yup, that's a Greek/Roman coin. We'll have it back now thanks"? Or you'll have lawyers contacting you for printing out the details of a coin you bought on ebay. "One image in colour is it? That'll be 20€ please"

And what's the name of this *ahem* recommended dealer?

Another near classic. Tiny pic that's not much clearer on enlarging and a vague description "BRITISH SILVER HAMMERED COIN RARE" Thing is, how can you know it's rare if you are, as he says, "UNSURE OF TYPE OR CAT NUMBER"? Honestly, I think a lot of ebayers think 'Rare' means, "I've not seen one of these before" Ah well, at least it's only a 99p start.

Mmm .. well if you don't get this resolved satisfactorily I wonder if it's time for a 'name and shame'? After all, if an online forum can work to someone's advantage then it can also work against it, no? Of course, furious though I'd be, it could be a genuine mistake. Presumably if he's any good as a dealer, his records will tell him where the pictured coin has gone in a moment. Then it's a matter of whether he can get it back again. Out of interest I wonder what I'd do if a dealer sent me something I liked more than what I thought I'd bought and then asked for it back ....

Auction houses work bidding in increments. Normally below £100 bids go up in £5 jumps, then £10 and so on (though the auctioneer has some discretion I believe). Which means that if you were the top bidder and bid against yourself the most you're likely to end up paying is £55 (+ the 200000% buyer's commission or whatever the current rate is!) Of course if there are no other bidders you might have got the coin for £35. If you are there in person I'd cancel the earlier bid to make sure.

As far as I know yes, you could bid against yourself. The auction house don't know if someone who has put in a prior bid also attends on the day. In fact I imagine they would probably not expect this to happen. So the only way to ensure that you only bid once is to cancel your earlier bid. What happens if you do win the coin and then find out that the 'second bidder' is yourself? I guess you could ask the auction house whether you can pay the lower bid. They might be sympathetic in the circumstances.

While it's very nice of someone getting their 3 year old to design a coin actually making it has to be the stupidest idea out. Surely this is the ugliest 'coin' in existence? Makes the Maklouf portrait look like the Mona Lisa. Or do we need an Ugly Coin thread?

Like perhaps most here, I tend to follow coin sales whether through auction or dealer. And occasionally I've noticed an odd phenomenon and wondered if anyone else had seen it too. It's where a coin appears to be constantly 'doing the rounds'. In other words, it never seems to find an actual buyer (collector) but instead just moves from one auction (and presumably dealer) to another. Primarily in the US market, though I'm sure we've all seen the odd coin move from one dealer's list to another in the UK, these seem to eventually find buyers. I suspect it's basically a sign the coin was vastly overpriced in the first place! Anyone else notice this? For example, the following coin has as far as I can work out appeared in the following auctions (and in a variety of hues from grey to rainbow coloured, depending on photography!):. Nov 2009 Ponterio 151 Lot #9375 (£785 $1150), May 2008 Goldberg Auction 47 ($750), Sept 2007 ebay ($466), Sept 2006 Goldberg PreLongbeach Lot 103798 (£560 $950). There may be other appearances but I just gave up in confusion!

Hmn. Makes me feel old. I know that few coins nowadays are likely to have been owned by anyone well known. The sheer number of coins and sources of coins available to us today is astronomical compared with the collectors of even the 1960's- 1970's. And maybe such things haven't been part of collecting tradition for many years, but to me it feels as if part of the hobby is becoming lost in the past. There's a great feeling to receiving a coin with a ticket and seeing who owned or stocked that coin in the past. I know it doesn't change the actual coin itself. But knowing that my coin has appeared in a catalogue, article or that a particular collector has owned it makes me feel differently about it somehow. Gives me a sense of .. history. Bah. I'm obviously feeling nostalgic. Too many late nights! Sorry guys!

Coindex envelopes? Now you've confused me! In the 'olden' days (or present; as people like me still do) collectors usually stored their coins in coin trays (ideally in cabinets). The trays had round holes for the coin and so round pieces of paper (tickets) were used to record details of the coin. These were of a similar size to the tray holes and so could sit neatly under the coin described. Old tickets from known collectors are of interest because they show with certainty part of the provenance of the coin. Obviously with newer means of storing coins (flips/slabs) coin tickets aren't so handy. And I guess most collectors now probably keep a computer record of their collection. But tickets are a way of keeping continuity between one collector and another. Below is one from a coin owned by Peter Seaby as an example of what I mean.

Do you use them for your coins? Do you pass them on if you sell a coin (I know one dealer who seems to keep his). Would having an old ticket make you more likely to buy a coin if you had a choice of two identical ones; one with a ticket, one without? Discuss! And to start, I like to know a bit about the history of my coins. So I appreciate tickets. I was irritated to see one of my earlier possessions for sale with a vague description and emailed the seller and told him all the information about the coin was on the ticket. From the reply it was clear that the person I sold the coin to hadn't passed on my ticket. What's the point of that I wondered? Oh and I make my own. I get some cream heavyweight paper, print my initials on it then cut out the disks by hand. Cheaper than getting them printed for me and nicer than plain white ones you can buy ready cut.

Um .. that seems to be a sixpence of 1572. Whether it's a contemporary fake isn't too clear. Certainly some Charles I fakes are very good, suggesting that some (?ex) mint workers turned their hand to counterfeiting. If it wasn't for the fact that that issue (fourth) was in decent silver I'd say it has the look of a 'base' issue coin. Anyone else any strong feelings about it?

Haven't a clue. But this one looks early milled, not hammered. Appears to be a coin of Cleve; an important dutchy in medieval Germany. Possibly a stuber. See here: 1 Stüber 1670, Cleve And no, I don't know anything about them. I just googled the legend!

I picked up what I presume is the 'presentation' Brunel bridge coin in change. The bridge part on the reverse and Queen's head on obverse are frosted which I don't think is the case for 'regular' issue coins. I wonder if someone wasn't desperate for a Kitkat one day and cracked open a RM set for the change? I suspect a few coins get into circulation that way. Edit. Possibly it's a coin from the proof set. Odd someone would split a set. But clearly it's been in circulation.

I'm not sure I've ever had a bargain. But I'm reasonably pleased with this. A shilling of Charles I of course. Sharp D1/1. Spink 2789. This portcullis mint mark only normally occurs with the later busts of this group (D3(rare), D4, D5 and D6). I only know of one other example of a D1 with this mark and none were listed by Brooker or Sharp. D1/1 coins are quite tricky to find anyway, so I was happy enough to pay £50 for it.

I collect from change too. Not just £2s. Though I have to say that for those I tend to concentrate on the different designs rather than just aiming for a year run. I don't keep a specific record of what I have really, just when I receive a coin in decent condition I slip it into an envelope (I have a load of those little white ones from Colin Cooke). When I get home I compare to what I already have and if it's nicer or I don't have an example I add it. If it's a duplicate or the one I have already is better it goes back into circulation. It's easy, 'costs' only the face value of the coin and it's a traditional method of collecting. All good fun!

Yes, it's definitely the nicer coin. But to be honest I would struggle to persuade myself that the improvement on my current example is really worth the difference in price to me. Since it wasn't difficult to find these three coins once I started looking, I might just see if I can find a few more and keep a track of them. It must have been a much used die combination or possibly a few examples were found in a hoard; my records don't show that. What a shame nobody has come up with a time machine. What fun it would be to drop into the mint and pick out the best example of a coin to compare all the others to. That's what's often missing I find in hammered coins; a really decent example I can find pictures of to use as a benchmark.

My coin 'in the hand' Shows how a photo can make a difference.

Browsing through my records earlier I came across these three coins struck from the same dies and was interested to see the differences in price. I bought mine (bottom) in 2005. The middle one was sold in 2007 and the top one 2008. I'm not sure what point I'm making here. I just found it interesting!