Round 16 - ModernCoinTraitor - Before and After

[ModernCoinTraitor]

My first entry, and I am just realizing none of these get to go to the junk pile. I have to "save" them all. Wish me luck since I'm also quite new at cleaning coins.
It's going to be a lot of fun, but I'll probably take a while so I don't mess them up horrendously.

I can see a bust on three of them, writing exists on two, but the others... well, I've got my work cut out for me.

[ModernCoinTraitor]

Coins are arranged as:
1   2   3
4   5   6

Coin 1:
Claudius II Gothicus, Sept 268 - Sept 270 AD
RIC 5A Rome 52, (Plate 5, #81), Weight: 2.40g, Dim: 21.9mm
O: IMP C CLAU-DIVS AVG,  radiate, cuirassed, bust right
R: IOVIS STATOR,  Jupiter standing facing, head right, holding thunderbolt & scepter
no mint mark in ex.

Observation:
Coin severely covered in malachite nodules. Manually removed, then brushed with soft bristle toothbrush. At this point, determined that coin had no patina (just toned), or very unstable and thin.  Coin left with uneven toning. Only “IVS” and curve of “D” readable on obverse legend, but this ruled out all “NVS” combinations of IOVI STATORI reverse legend.

Coin 2:
Constantius Gallus, Caesar : 28 Sept 351 - Winter 354AD
RIC VIII Sirmium 36, Weight: 3.12g, Dim: 21.09mm, SIRM
O: D N CONSTAN-TINVS IVN NOB C,  Bust right, bare-headed, draped and cuirassed, D left of bust
R: FEL TEMP RE-PARATIO,  Solder attacking fallen horseman, solder's shield on left arm, spear in right, horseman's shield on ground under soldier's left foot, horseman is reaching (FH3a)

Observation:
The mint mark has been lost, but I believe this is SIRM based on: Letter D to left of bust, lack of any other field mark, diameter and weight. Officina is lost... was either A or B.

Coin 3:
I don't know how, but the photo below is showing more detail than I can see by any other means. Believe me, the coin in hand is featureless. So, I'm going to try and attribute this coin by my photo. :-)
(I've included an individual photo of coin three to show what I see when viewed directly.)

Constantius II, 22 May 337 – 3 Nov 361 AD
RIC VIII Sirmium 75/79, Dim. 18.48mm, Weight 2.03g (by this classification, coin is underweight by 0.2g)
O: D N CONSTAN-TIVS PF AVG, Bust right, laureate, draped and cuirassed
R: FEL TEMP RE-PARATIO, Solder attacking fallen horseman, solder's shield on left arm, spear in right, horseman's shield on ground under soldier's left foot, horseman is reaching and bare-headed (FH3b)
M in left field (I couldn't find it.) ●ASIRM- in ex. Cannot determine if dot or asterisk follows 'M' (After holding the coin at a multitude of angles under different loupes and lights, and enough drinks, I'm pretty sure that's what I see.)

Observation:
When all else fails, take a photo of the coin with light from different angles. Suddenly details may appear. I was convinced this was a slug based on what I could see of Coin 3. (See separate photo below. Then, I posted the After photo and saw details.)

Coin 4:
Constantius II, 22 May 337 – 3 Nov 361 AD
RIC (one of four possible, see below), Dim. 17.89mm,  Weight 4.33g
O: (Cs1)   D N CONSTANTIVS P F AVG  (legend is completely missing),   Bust right, laureate, draped and cuirassed (D3)
R: FEL TEMP RE-PARATIO,  Soldier attacking fallen horseman, soldier's shield on left arm, spear in right, horseman's shield on ground under soldier's left foot, horseman is reaching (FH3a)
●S● left field next to spear, only a portion of dividing line exists in exurge

Possible designations:
Mint (Officina)            RIC VIII    Rarity   Type          Obv.
SMK(A B     E S)   102       C2      (FH3b)     (Cs1/D3)
SMN(A B     E S)     92       C2      (FH3b)     (Cs1/D3)

Observation:
Coin is thicker than normal and very circular. Diameter is short by 2mm for any of these designations. Upper right area on reverse is actually flat (no image). This is likely a weak strike failing to flatten and extend coin.

Coin 5:
Valens, 25 Feb 364-24 Aug 367 AD
RIC IX Roma 15(b), Dim. 17.46mm, Weight 2.34g, R
O: D N VALEN-S P F AVG, pearl-diademed, draped and cuirassed, bust right
R: GLORIA RO-MANORVM, emperor moving right, looking left, kneeling slave under emperor's right hand, labarum in emperor's left hand with chi-rho standard
left and right field free of symbols, -?RB in ex.

Observation:
Obverse legend is not readable.  Letter count and shape confirm legend. Only mint mark with RB in ex and no field markings is SMRB, First period of Valens.

Coin 6:
Constantius II, 22 May 337 – 3 Nov 361 AD
RIC VIII Sirmium 48, Dim. 17.17mm, Weight 2.52g, C
O: D N CONSTAN-TIVS P F AVG, pearl-diademed, draped and cuirassed
R: FEL TEMP RE-PARATIO, Soldier attacking fallen horseman, soldier's shield on left arm, spear in right, horseman's shield on ground under soldier's left foot,
here is where it gets shaky... it appears to me, this horseman is clutching the horse (FH4) and not extending the arm (FH3), but that combination doesn't seem to exist in RIC for SIRM, so I picked the closest example... 48.
-SIRM in ex.

Observation:
Could only make out upper half of “S”and the “I” in exurge. “R” is missing and left/right legs of possible “M” are present. Photo below more clearly shows SIRM present. Officina is lost.

[ModernCoinTraitor]

I look forward to your comments!
Positive, or negative. I will not be dismayed since I know that, including these six coins, I have now "cleaned" a total of ten coins and attributed about 15 coins. While I know some will be disappointed with coin 1, I am amazed at the transformation in the amount of malachite removed revealing a treasure beneath. And, coin 3... well, I was convinced it was nothing more than a slug. I just had to see it under a different light. In fact, the After photo's steep angle of light confirmed some of my guessing. For example, Coin 6's mint mark is clearly SIRM in this photo, where all other methods of looking at it left me unsure.

There is still a bit of crud on a couple of the coins, but by the sixth coin I started realizing that removing some of the debris was likely to damage the coin while revealing no details. Not only do you have to have patience when cleaning, but you should try to attribute the coins (mentally, if nothing else) as early as possible so that you are familiar with what details to expect, determine the type of crud you are working with to aid in tool and technique selection, and clean only the areas that reveal more about the coin. Take breaks! And, look at the coins from long angles.

Win, lose, or just moving on to the next round, I thoroughly enjoyed this set. Time to order my next set.  

[Alain B]

Nice work, I like specially the coin number 1, the way you take out the green rust is great. You did a good job on it!  For your first entry in this contest you blow us all. Did you used a special cleaner for it? 

[ModernCoinTraitor]

Thanks for the compliments!!

After a week in distilled water, I was concerned I was seeing BD on one of the coins, so I bathed them all in Gringott's #1. Other than that, there were no chemicals beyond distilled water. I spent a lot of hours with a blade "popping" the nodules off of Coin 1. Toward the end, I was holding the coin under a loupe to get at the nodules. Most of them were tiny, but there were SO many. I found that they could also be "crushed", but this coin is paper thin and I was worried it would snap in half if I did that too much. You can see that it already had two "major" cracks.

[Lee S]

I am very impressed with your skills... You have patience AND skill!! Good work fella!

  And your identification work is deep also.. This is an area I lack the time for.. I feel the bar for this round has been set rather high!! ( and I am also pleased you were not involved in the last round!!!        )

[ModernCoinTraitor]

I happened to review my attribution write-up this morning and looked at the after photos again, only to see that on Coin 4, I could clearly see SM in the exurge. Guess you have to step away for a while sometimes. So, I'm editing my attribution comments to remove the ALE and TS mint marks as possibilities.

[Romanorum]

A very thorough job, both cleaning and attributing. Congratulations!