Many, many decades ago I was a young
numismatist and loved collecting coins (actually, I liked collecting coin books even more than I liked collecting coins). Then college happened.
About 10 or 15 years ago I wanted to get back into collecting but everything was slabbed and that was just depressing. Since I
had flown out to the
coin show I decided to at least walk around and stumbled onto ancients. I loved the
history and I loved that I can hold the coins. I've taken great
joy in reading about all these wonderful ancient civilizations.
I got involved with a well known southern California dealer and learned a lot but probably spent more than I should have
buying these wonderful 2000 year old coins. Then that well known dealer got himself into some real trouble and I lost a lot of sleep wondering how much trouble I was in. Fortunately prices for ancients
had increased so much I came out pretty much ok. But it left me with a bad feeling and I drifted away from the hobby again.
In the last few months I've found myself getting really interested in ancient and
medieval coins again. I've been reading this
forum obsessively and I've read the last 20 years of Numismatists.
Between the shady dealers stories, the new and proposed laws on
antiquities and the crazy prices
ancient coins have been getting am I dumb to be putting real
money back into coins? I don't care about the investment aspect but I can't afford to stupidly lose
money (either to a shady dealer, a market collapse or an
antiquities repatriation push).
Theoretically I could buy less expensive coins but lets be honest - we all get tempted and buy the best we can afford (or more likely better than we can afford!).
I realize I'm asking a very biased audience but I'd
still love to hear your thoughts. Thanks!