I would say that the form of the
reverse lettering, especially R, is impossible for a genuine
Roman coin. I think it shows a misunderstanding of when
Romans allowed slanted uprights such as the M, and when they insisted on vertical uprights. The letter R should always be vertical. In modern
writing, M and N have analogous shapes, but for a
Roman M was like an upside down W (ie slanted sides) whereas N
had vertical uprights. As does R. So that letter alone fails the coin for me. The letter A came in four forms - open such as on the
Berlin piece, closed with a V crossbar such as on the new 40
asses, closed with a slanted crossbar, and closed with a horizontal crossbar. All forms occur at this point in
history, although the open A as
per the
Berlin coin was the most common. The
style of the
Berlin obverse is incidentally akin to the Sicilian
RRC 72
types. Regarding the possibility of it being either struck with transfer dies made from the RBW piece, or
cast and hand finished, I'm uncertain but Joe thinks it looks
cast from its surface. I would say that the adjustments seen to the lettering and
thunderbolt as compared with the RBW coin are plausible given these were near the coin's edge. Overall I tend to conclude the new piece is forged. Before we leave the case we must ask whether doubt is also to be
cast on the RBW coin, given that those very aspects we find suspicious are off
flan. We are dealing with a lower than usual resolution 1999 photo and no one who I personally know has handled the coin since then. So there are limitations on,what we can say. I think we'll have to revert to logic: it's already clear that the new piece might be a product of the,RBW coin. But is it alternately possible that both the new and RBW piece were products of the same workshop sometime during the 1990s? A fatal flaw to that idea is the differing thunderbolts. I can imagine the difference being the result of hand finishing if one piece is made from the other. I cannot imagine that if both were simultaneously made (from a new die or from a third, as yet unknown, genuine coin), there's any plausible reason why or how the thunderbolts may differ. So I tend to think the new piece a likely
fake and the old piece likely its genuine host. More views on the surface of the new piece to reinforce Joe's observations would
help. Is there a higher resolution image we could see from the listing? I also wonder who bought the 1999 piece: someone on
Forum may actually know; evidently were it copied it
had to be in the
hands of a copyist at some point. But on that last point, it is thought that some
good copies were made when the general finds of
Mars Eagle gold were made in the 1980s, and this may be one such, perhaps copied from the RBW at that time. Finally, regarding
style, it's plausible as I explained already to have different styles in this series (due to different minting locations and die cutters) and the
style particularly of the
reverse is in itself
fine and artistic. But I would be curious to see an impression of a
fake made from the modern die in the dead-thread; if the results are as obviously
fake as the antiquanova replicas then we should have little fear of being deceived.
I must say it's a relief in this
thread to be discussing the coin itself!
Fake Coins and Notorious Fake Sellers
