Crispina denarius - VENVS FELIX - Please help.

[Steve Minnoch]

Reid, can you at least post images of coins from the same seller that can be conclusively shown to be false, for comparison?

It's not really that helpful to say "bad seller" = fake, both because on occasion genuine coins and forgeries are mixed by such sellers, and also because forgeries can always enter the marketplace through other channels.

Steve

[Aarmale]

I think you should just give the coin to an expert to see if it's actually fake.  These pictures will never confirmits status.

[Reid Goldsborough]

I don't consider the coin to be either definitely fake or definitely authentic:

I completely agree with this. Nothing definitive. Again, this is often the case with ancient numismatics.

its status, at the moment, is unknown to me.

I completely disagree with this. Your use of the word "unknown" implies we know nothing about this piece or its context when in fact we know some very pertinent things.

Here's another way of looking at this. In law there are different burdens or standards of proof required, depending, such as preponderance of the evidence, clear and convincing evidence, and beyond reasonable doubt. I think with this particular coin, the relevant standard is preponderance of the evidence, not one of the other more stringent standards.

But I have information you don't. I've been following this particular seller for some time, seeing photos of a large number of his offerings. I've been collecting ancients for ten years now and don't consider myself in the same league as others doing this far longer or who have handled far more coins, but I haven't seen any of this seller's offerings that looked to me like an authentic coin salted in or that slipped in by mistake.

Steve asked for photos of other items this seller has offered. Here are two other pieces, the fifth (Bulgarian School struck/pressed counterfeit, 16.4g) and sixth (Bulgarian School struck/pressed counterfeit, 16.5g) on this page:

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[Heliodromus]

That is circular reasoning : "I think he's selling nothing but fakes, ergo I think everything he's selling is fake".

It's your right of course to feel completely differently. I earlier mentioned that anyone disagreeing can feel free to buy as authentic any future coins of this seller. Here's something else: If you or anyone thinks there's nothing wrong with the coin that started this thread because its photo looks good, and you choose to discount the new information revealed about the seller, why not offer Mario what he paid for the piece.

You're confusing two things :

1) The statistical chance of buying a fake from a known fake seller if you don't have the expertise to guage authenticity for yourself.

2) The authenticity of an individual coin.

Your argument of the coin being fake is a statistical one given the source, and says nothing about whether this individual coin is in fact fake or not.

In general there's no reason to buy a coin unless you are 100% sure it's genuine, and buying a coin by photo alone from a known fake seller introduces enough doubt that it probably doesn't make any sense... which is entirely unrelated to the factual matter of whether the coin is in fact genuine or not.

Ben

[commodus]

This coin's seller and the company it keeps place serious doubts in my mind, as they should in anyone's, and thus I would not buy it myself. However to say that it is without a doubt fake is leaping to a conclusion that the photographic evidence does not support. It may be a fake, and the circumstantial evidence certainly weighs strongly towards that possibility, but without examining it in hand it really is impossible to make a definitive pronouncement as there is reasonable doubt in both directions.

[Reid Goldsborough]

This coin's seller and the company it keeps place serious doubts in my mind, as they should in anyone's, and thus I would not buy it myself. However to say that it is without a doubt fake is leaping to a conclusion that the photographic evidence does not support.

I don't think anybody said what you're arguing against. I said I personally believed the coin that opened this thread was a fake given the seller's history and location but that this wasn't ironclad proof or definitive evidence.

Somebody suggested showing this coin to an expert in person. One person (at the other authenticity group) has argued that photo authentication is better than authenticating a coin in hand, but no expert would argue that. Still, even an expert offering an opinion at seeing a coin in person isn't ironclad or definitive.

A Bulgarian guy I've bought coin books from, knowing of my interest in forgeries and authentication, sent me as a little gift a Julian II bull bronze that he said he picked up from one of the forgery workshops there. I posted a photo of it online, and several people argued that there was nothing about it that indicated it was modern. To see if it might in fact be authentic, I showed it to several ancient coin dealers in person, and everybody said it was authentic.

I tried thinking through this. Could this Bulgarian bookseller have been lying to me or pulling a little practical joke? That's a possibility, but I concluded it was unlikely. There was nothing about the actions of this Bulgarian bookseller over the several years I have dealt with him that indicated he was anything other than completely trustworthy and straightforward, neither a liar nor a practical joker. Further, this coin if authentic would have had some value, and in light of this bookseller's previous behavior, I found it highly unlikely that he would have given it away. I believe that this Julian II bull was simply a very deceptive forgery.

As with the current coin, I believe, context trumps all. Here's that Julian II fake:

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[maridvnvm]

There aren't any coins from the same dies in the fake reports as far as I am aware. There is the usual Lipanoff of this type in there but from very different dies.

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/fakes/displayimage.php?pos=-6315

Martin

[commodus]

No need to get testy. I am not arguing against you or your hypothesis, Reid. I respect your opinion. However, it was you who authored the quote I referred to: "That this coin is a forgery is beyond question in my mind..."
I am merely saying that it is NOT beyond question in mine. There is reasonable doubt. I agree with you, based on who the seller is, that this fact makes it very questionable. However, compelling as that may be, it is merely circumstantial evidence. Nothing about the coin itself suggests that it fake, at least not based on the photographs. Indeed, the opposite is rather the case. ONLY the seller and his other past offerings call the coin into doubt. As I said above, I would not buy it myself because of this. However, were it offered by a reputable source I would not have been inclined to question it.

[Reid Goldsborough]

No need to get testy. I am not arguing against you or your hypothesis, Reid. I respect your

I don't think I'm testy. We're just talking, debating, and you argued against something that I didn't say. You just corrected yourself, which is good. Distinctions are important, here, in various ways, as I'll try to illustrate. Saying "It's definitely fake" is different from saying "In my view it's definitely fake." It's fact vs. opinion.

I agree that the evidence against the piece that opened this thread is circumstantial. Same with the Julian II bull I just illustrated. But as I tried to point out, sometimes circumstantial evidence is enough. Sure, it would be best if someone would do as Frank Kovacs did with the "Black Sea Hoard" forgeries of Apollonia Pontika and Mesembria diobols -- travel to Bulgaria and find die links to pieces sold there as replicas. This would be definitive proof. But just about everybody in the ancient numismatic world knew before this that they were fake, despite Heritage, one of the buyers of the fakes, hiring a scientist who claimed they were ancient (and still does).

You say, regarding the coin that started this thread, that nothing about the coin itself suggests that it's fake. That, again, is my point. Sometimes you don't know from seeing a photo of a coin. And, as I pointed out also, sometimes you don't know from examining a coin in hand. Sometimes you *have* to factor in the context in which the coin was brought to market. Sometimes no one factor is conclusive, but instead you have to weigh all the evidence available.