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Author Topic: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?  (Read 1377 times)

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Offline Mark J2

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Roman Imperial Silver Coin Tiberius AR Denarius "Tribute Penny". 14-37 AD

This was purchased on Ebay.  I should be able to return it if somethings shady here.
I bought this months ago BEFORE I knew about this site and it finally arrived from Germany.
It weighs 3grams on my cheap scale.
Thanks!
-mark


Offline djmacdo

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #1 on: September 01, 2021, 09:32:11 pm »
It has the softness, most notable on the reverse, that indicates a cast.  Have we not seen a coin just like this recently?

Offline Ron C2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #2 on: September 01, 2021, 11:49:20 pm »
Let me guess... Paid way below typical market value on "that auction website"?
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline Mark J2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #3 on: September 02, 2021, 01:33:53 am »
Yes, posted the Ebay photos previously.
However, I'm learning what is posted in an Ebay ad is often NOT what shows up in the mail!
This was an auction, unverified I had the highest bid... around $200 bucks.
Again, I'm new at this.  I wasn't aware of all the shadiness.
Hoping to get definitive perspective on this site so I can respond to the seller if this indeed appears to be a forgery?

Offline antoninus1

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #4 on: September 02, 2021, 03:05:44 am »
I think it´s the same coin and in my opinion a modern product as the style is strange. The fotos on Ebay had been edited.

Offline dwarf

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #5 on: September 02, 2021, 04:38:58 am »
It is a disgustful coin and as clear a forgery as ever can be.
Definitely cast and horrible style

Regards
Klaus

Offline Mark J2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #6 on: September 02, 2021, 10:12:44 am »
So to the "know the seller" point.
I looked at all the items for bid from this seller.
https://www.ebay.com/sch/merd29/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_ipg=&_from=

For an untrained eye for forgery... a case could be drawn that his coins have a consistency: all very clean, all opening bid very low, has multiples, similar same coins  that you could make a circumstantial deduction that these coins are being created.
Was just watching Pawn Stars where ancient coins have come up on a number of episodes... but a guy had 5 Pete Rose baseball cards from the 80s all looking the same.  The owner said they were certainly forgeries.

Wish I had something definitive/concrete to tell the seller other than... my best guys believe these are fake.
But planning to ask for a refund very soon.

Offline Ron C2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #7 on: September 02, 2021, 10:19:18 am »
Bottom line. Unless you are adeot at identifying fakes, buy from reputable sources with authenticity guarantees. E-pay is not such a place.
My Ancient Coin Gallery: Click here

R. Cormier, Ottawa

Offline dwarf

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #8 on: September 02, 2021, 11:16:37 am »
Quote
Wish I had something definitive/concrete to tell the seller other than... my best guys believe these are fake.
You got answers from combined approximately 80 to 100 years of numismatic knowledge.
Should be sufficient.

Offline Mark J2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #9 on: September 02, 2021, 02:59:55 pm »
Thanks for all the input folks!

I'm going to object to the Seller that:
(1) This is NOT the same coin advertised in the photo
(2) I engaged experts who the believe the received coin as well as the one in the Ebay photo are fraudulent.

Hopefully just have to pay to send back.
-mark

Offline Virgil H

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #10 on: September 02, 2021, 09:00:11 pm »
I learned very early on to never buy anything that is "ancient" from Ebay. That may hurt legitimate sellers, but there are so many fakes of all kinds there and Ebay doesn't care a bit. I have told the story before about my pottery purchase on Ebay. I knew without a doubt it was a fake although it was listed as genuine. The price was so low, I didn't care (like $30), it is quite beautiful. But authentic? Never in a million years. I never tell anyone that it is real. A vase like that made by a potter today would cost far more than I paid for this "ancient Greek vase." There are no ancient coin fakes I would buy even at a low price (some people collect fakes, but I don't). There are plenty of reputable sellers elsewhere, including right here in the Forum Ancient Coins Shop where I buy 80% of my coins. I have only recently branched out into a few auctions that I trust. But Forum is beyond repute.

I hope you can get your money back, but I would say it is a fake and not play games with other arguments such as it wasn't as the photos, etc. Just the fact it is fake is all you should need. But, I am pretty sure they already know it is fake and it is a matter of whether they will willingly give a refund after being questioned. Hopefully they will give you a refund so as to not have issues with Ebay.

Virgil

Online Dominic T

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #11 on: September 02, 2021, 09:45:53 pm »
I agree with opinions about the fact that ebay can be dangerous if you don't choose your seller carefully. And by the way, FORVM is on ebay...
DT
https://www.ebay.com/str/forvmancientcoins

Offline traveler

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #12 on: September 02, 2021, 09:48:41 pm »
I learned very early on to never buy anything that is "ancient" from Ebay. That may hurt legitimate sellers, but there are so many fakes of all kinds there and Ebay doesn't care a bit. I have told the story before about my pottery purchase on Ebay. I knew without a doubt it was a fake although it was listed as genuine. The price was so low, I didn't care (like $30), it is quite beautiful. But authentic? Never in a million years. I never tell anyone that it is real. A vase like that made by a potter today would cost far more than I paid for this "ancient Greek vase." There are no ancient coin fakes I would buy even at a low price (some people collect fakes, but I don't). There are plenty of reputable sellers elsewhere, including right here in the Forum Ancient Coins Shop where I buy 80% of my coins. I have only recently branched out into a few auctions that I trust. But Forum is beyond repute.

Virgil

Beyond reproach is what you mean, I think.

Online Pharsalos

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #13 on: September 03, 2021, 12:09:19 am »
The seller will not be surprised when you question the authenticity. Without a doubt the seller already knows this coin is fake. The below are pressed fakes from their sales in the past few months, they are all very obvious (the Vespasian was sold twice in a month to two different happy buyers):

Offline Virgil H

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #14 on: September 03, 2021, 12:10:45 am »
Yes, reproach. OOPs. I know they are on Ebay, I just buy from the shop here and have never even looked at Forum's Ebay shop. I guess I would buy from there, but I figure if I buy on the shop here, I save them all the fees. Ebay even charges a fee on postage, whether you include it in the price (free shipping) or have it as an add-on. I sell some things on Ebay from time to time, but over the years, the fees and all that have become ridiculous to the point that it becomes unprofitable to use them, depending on what you are selling.

Virgil

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #15 on: September 03, 2021, 08:38:44 pm »
Never buy from FORVM on eBay. Our prices are higher there. We may be dropping eBay soon. They just deleted all our expensive coin listings and said we should send them to NGC. We asked what was the price limit for coins that are not certified. Well, they don't actually have a policy. Someone just decided they couldn't be sure the coins were genuine. Also, we hardly sell anything there.
Joseph Sermarini
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Offline Virgil H

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #16 on: September 03, 2021, 08:46:19 pm »
Given that most ancient coins on Ebay are fake, I am laughing at their suggestion for you to send them to NCG. What the heck? The Forum Shop is much easier to use than Ebay, in any case. I buy and sell stuff on Ebay, but never coins or antiquities.

Virgil

Offline Tomaseus

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #17 on: September 04, 2021, 03:58:38 pm »
The pros on this board will probably scoff at my analysis- they say you should judge and evaluate the coin, not the seller. That’s the real way to do it (after all, even an honest seller might let something slip through the cracks).

I don’t have the expertise for that, so I have to do it the hack way:

*  that seller has only been a member of Ebay for about 7 months
*  the seller has only around 253 feedbacks- not very many
*  a huge number of his reviews are from the same buyers and are “private listings”
*  the lots that are listed are also “private listings”- those are red flags. Not sure why anyone would set up a listing on Ebay that way.
*  the seller is from Bulgaria — you can sue me for nationalistic profiling, but I won’t buy anything from an Ebay seller in eastern Europe, including (especially) Ukraine and Russia.

There used to be a sticky on Forum’s site that gave a great description/ profile of a fake Ebay seller.

There are some legit sellers on Ebay, but don’t forget that even a big-time, veteran seller might sell a fake without realizing it.

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #18 on: September 04, 2021, 10:05:42 pm »
The pros on this board will probably scoff at my analysis- they say you should judge and evaluate the coin, not the seller. That’s the real way to do it (after all, even an honest seller might let

Nonsense. The "pros" on this board should never say that. What we say here is, know the coin or know the dealer. If you do not have the expertise to know the coin is genuine, then know the dealer has the expertise, along with reliability and a guarantee.

You do not need expertise to collect ancient coins. You need to know a dealer you can trust. Everyone here knows at least one.

As for your analysis, it is OK, but the real standard should be that you KNOW the seller has the expertise, along with reliability and guarantee. Your analysis identifies the seller as a likely problem but will not identify if an inexperienced collector should buy from the seller.
Joseph Sermarini
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Offline Kevin D

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #19 on: September 04, 2021, 11:36:41 pm »
Given that most ancient coins on Ebay are fake, I am laughing at their suggestion for you to send them to NCG. What the heck? The Forum Shop is much easier to use than Ebay, in any case. I buy and sell stuff on Ebay, but never coins or antiquities.

Virgil

That gave me a chuckle as well.

Fake NGC and PCGS slabs are nothing new, with numerous reports of them online over the years.

Offline Virgil H

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #20 on: September 05, 2021, 12:05:04 am »
I was thinking about that, too, it would be super easy to do a fake NCG tag if one were so inclined. It is a shame that people do these things and Ebay is full of them.

Virgil

Offline Kevin D

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #21 on: September 05, 2021, 12:16:52 am »
A fake tag can be made that will even check out good with NGC and PCGS certificate verification. A sophisticated forger, selling online, can beat most if not all of the slab security features, at least well enough to place the fake slab in a buyers hands after having collected payment.

Offline Mark J2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #22 on: September 05, 2021, 12:36:43 am »
True.
The coins I received on EBay were NOT what was in the photos.
I think this happens on dating sites to, she was a beauty in the photos until you receive her in real life.  Yep definitely something to be said for know the seller, the coin photos might not tell the truth. 😳

Offline Mark J2

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #23 on: September 08, 2021, 04:17:49 pm »
Speaking of Tiberius and the tribute penny Joe really good article in your nimuswiki!
Well analyzed!
-mark

Offline Joe Sermarini

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Re: "Tiberius" arrived today - please let me know why or why not authentic?
« Reply #24 on: September 08, 2021, 09:42:07 pm »
Thanks, but most of the work was done by others. I just put it together in an orderly way.
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