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Author Topic: Badly Tooled Coins Here  (Read 160777 times)

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Offline Will Hooton

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #300 on: January 02, 2012, 04:42:46 am »
I just wonder who buys this crap? Yet another of life's mysteries!

There must be demand, because the garbage keeps on coming, but who and where are the buyers who must exist in significant numbers to support the machine that churns out these tooled monstrosities? Imagine what the rest of their life must be like if they think this garbage is good stuff!  I know it sounds arrogant (and feel free to call me such), but my mind boggles at the thought of such indiscriminate taste and and an intellect that believes this stuff is in any sense authentic.


No Lloyd, you are not arrogant. I don't think it's a question of taste in general but because most people don't know any better. Perhaps they don't see the tooling. There are so many people with little understanding of their own hobby.  This is why FORVM is an absolute blessing.

Then again there are people who don't mind the tooling, and dealers that cater to them buy selling tooled coins with the declaration that they are tooled. And some are still quite expensive. Why would people knowingly buy a tooled coin? I don't get that. A tooled coin would never have a place in my collection. I might use it to see how many skips I could get out of it over the surface of a lake.......

Offline Reid Goldsborough

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #301 on: January 02, 2012, 10:20:53 am »
This to me isn't all that difficult to understand. These particular coins are simply targeted toward relative newcomers, those without the experience and sophistication to know better. That creating these and selling them as they are is a violation of the norms of the numismatic community doesn't seem to matter to those creating and selling them. It's all about, well, money.

Doing this is no different in kind than making up stories about a coin's history or provenance, which at least one well-known dealer, that I know of anyway, has a reputation for doing. I once again feel obligated, for the sake of fairness and accuracy, to say that I don't believe that all or most or even many ancient coin dealers engage in such behavior. Just that some do. From this perspective, spotting such actions ... and gaining the knowledge to do so ... is part of the fun of being a collector.
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Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #302 on: January 05, 2012, 09:24:55 am »
Another assault and battery perpetrated upon an ancient coin.


Offline areich

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #303 on: January 05, 2012, 09:35:11 am »
For these reasons the word 'lanzed' has been suggested to describe these coins.
Andreas Reich

Offline byzcoll

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #304 on: January 05, 2012, 01:27:15 pm »
Hi,

I have bought a few Byzantine AE pieces from that seller via Fbay, none of themwere tooled. He has definitely failed to label a number tool-destroyed coins as such, but normally the coins are labelled as tooled and smoothed.

It is just amazing that these essentially destroyed pieces, which just represent a synthetic fantasy encarved on an ancient lump of bronze, are fetching such high sums. Obviously a lot of people like these pieces which cannot even be called coins anymore OR a lot of people try to resell them fraudulently. The latter possibility represents the real problem for me.

The other problem is that the number of badly tooled coins which are up for auction at a given auction house without the tooling being declared probably gives a clue to the number of unrecognized fake coins in these auctions.

byzcoll

Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #305 on: January 09, 2012, 09:19:13 am »
Flattened and gouged, er, smoothed and tooled.

Offline Randygeki(h2)

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #306 on: January 09, 2012, 12:39:50 pm »
 :(

Offline Andrew McCabe

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #307 on: January 17, 2012, 05:45:56 pm »
Cartoon and an untooled comparison example below.

The cartoon is from the usual source (the nice example is my coin). Quite apart from the wonderful nose (rather looks like the dwarves in Snow White) the managed to alter the shape of the prowstem to something that never would appear on a Republican coin.

Condition described as Very Fine, tooled.

Lloyd Taylor

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #308 on: January 17, 2012, 06:52:51 pm »
Condition described as Very Fine, tooled.
.... which is I guess better than describing it as very finely tooled!

Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #309 on: January 18, 2012, 08:49:38 am »
Ugh.

Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #310 on: February 05, 2012, 05:47:51 pm »
A centerpiece for any advanced collection...

Offline Aarmale

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #311 on: February 05, 2012, 06:00:54 pm »
Awful.  Another coin ruined.
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Offline Andrew McCabe

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Unknown round metal modern sculpture, perhaps a large button.
« Reply #312 on: February 08, 2012, 04:58:48 pm »
I have no idea what this is supposed to be. It does not resemble any real coin type.

Offline areich

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #313 on: February 08, 2012, 05:20:47 pm »
There will still be idiots fighting for it. I really wouldn't mind it so much if most of these hadn't started out as genuine ancient coins.
Andreas Reich

Offline Aarmale

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #314 on: February 08, 2012, 07:54:51 pm »
I have no idea what this is supposed to be. It does not resemble any real coin type.

This one is particularly terrible.  Those faces are awful.
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Offline Andrew McCabe

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #315 on: February 09, 2012, 02:22:24 am »
I have no idea what this is supposed to be. It does not resemble any real coin type.

This one is particularly terrible.  Those faces are awful.

The reverse is also an invented non-existent type. No such shape of prow has ever been engraved by a Roman engraver, and no anonymous (no symbol) Republican As exists with a flat-topped prow and the denomination mark before the prow. It is a complete invention.

On another list someone shared pictures of four other recent bronzes (we all know which German firm these objects come from). Two were essentially genuine - limited cleaning, perhaps some minor strengthening, but not so awful, and in near VF condition. Two were charactertures like this - complete inventions and no longer Roman coins, and totally worthless. All four sold at about the same price (100 to 150 euros or so).

This tells me that
(a) ignorant collectors are being dreadfully deceived when they bid for these objects. They don't realise that some are carved lumps of bronzes and others are coins. They can't tell the difference
(b) wise collectors have an opportunity to still find some real coins between the cracks, but they need to look very carefully for signs of tooling
(c) if you are not sure whether you are a wise or ignorant collector then you should not be bidding

Oddly, this is a good basis for behaviour for eBay in general.

Lloyd Taylor

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Re: Unknown round metal modern sculpture, perhaps a large button.
« Reply #316 on: February 09, 2012, 02:48:15 am »
I have no idea what this is supposed to be. It does not resemble any real coin type.

Truly a tragic piece!


This tells me that
(a) ignorant collectors are being dreadfully deceived when they bid for these objects.

Not quite true... rather it must be blind, ignorant collectors. But even for a reader of Braille, I don't think this one would feel right.

I guess it just comes down to the natural order of things... fools and their money being easily separated.

Offline areich

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #317 on: February 09, 2012, 04:11:54 am »
Most coins are described as tooled. Frequently the people listing them just can't tell, many of them know nothing about coins. They do usually change the description when you tell them. The problem is that now this seller (or rather this selling platform within Ebay) is causing such tooled coins to be produced. If they really cared about and respected ancient coins they would stop, think and change something but obviously they don't.
Andreas Reich

Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #318 on: February 09, 2012, 08:11:03 am »
I wonder what caused such a change in the seller.   Went from decent dealer to purveyor of mangled money.  Years ago I bought a few coins (from them) that I'm quite happy with.  But none in the last several years due to both philosophic and resulting trust issues.  The namesake is still there so it can't be a change of management.  Maybe its purely economics, prices achieved exceed the cost of mutilation.

Offline areich

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #319 on: February 09, 2012, 08:29:51 am »
It's now just a sales platform within Ebay. You pay a percentage for the privilege to sell under the account. I don't know who is responsible for the floor auctions but the last one was pretty much the same as the Ebay offers. Slightly less obviously tooled but still very obvious to any advanced collector.
Andreas Reich

Offline areich

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #320 on: February 11, 2012, 01:57:14 pm »
Just came across this one:

http://www.acsearch.info/record.html?id=463465

Horrible!
Andreas Reich

Offline Optimo Principi

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #321 on: February 15, 2012, 03:32:39 pm »
Described as "lightly tooled". Yuck.

Offline mwilson603

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #322 on: February 15, 2012, 05:31:52 pm »
Described as "lightly tooled". Yuck.
I think it was "lightly tooled"......with a pneumatic road drill!   ;D
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Offline Randygeki(h2)

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Re: Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #323 on: February 15, 2012, 07:22:58 pm »
Described as "lightly tooled". Yuck.

LOL Thats awesome

Ghengis_Jon

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Badly Tooled Coins Here
« Reply #324 on: February 22, 2012, 08:11:00 am »
A fearsome foursome for all to enjoy:


 

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