Amazing replica Ptolemy I Tet help...

[mihali84]

I purchased this coin knowing it was a replica but when i received it today i was astounded by its quality and detail, almost thinking the seller was wrong! haha.  I took a good look at it and i saw a signature under the Elephant's ear and couldn't decipher it.  I would like to know if the coin was cast or struck, it shows signs of being struck but i am no expert.  Can anyone shed some light on the situation?

[Joe Sermarini]

Appears to be struck with modern dies.  Fake coin report please. 

[mihali84]

Thanks Joe, I'll do that right now.  Any idea what part of the world it came from?

[bpmurphy]

It's a Slavey fakes from about 10 years ago.

http://www.ancients.info/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=96

Barry Murphy

[mihali84]

It's a Slavey fakes from about 10 years ago.

http://www.ancients.info/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=96

Barry Murphy

I can't believe the coin is for sale for 325pounds as a replica!? Im glad i paid a fraction of that! Though the coin isn't ancient, it is a nice looking coin that i will gladly add to my collection.  After all, the coin it represents isn't exactly cheap, so it will have to substitute until i have the funds to purchase the original. 

[areich]

It says 'catalog value', not that it is for sale. It's probably another one of those price guides with idiotic prices.

[Danny S. Jones]

I took a good look at it and i saw a signature under the Elephant's ear and couldn't decipher it. 

It's a little hard to read, but it looks like Greek letters: 

Transliterated: SLAVEY   

[xintaris75]

I took a good look at it and i saw a signature under the Elephant's ear and couldn't decipher it. 

It's a little hard to read, but it looks like Greek letters: 

Transliterated: SLAVEY   

Not Greek - Kyrillic:
СЛАВЕЙ

[Will Hooton]

Not Greek - Kyrillic:
СЛАВЕЙ

Confirmed! Its Mr Petrov's native български език!

[Danny S. Jones]

I believe you are correct.
славей : (slávej - Bulgarian Cyrillic) / Slavey... his signature.

[slokind]

It is no different from owning a 1st edition Becker.  I've never bought one of Slavey's, and I do think they're easy to distinguish from ancient engraving, but it is pride as well as scruples that make him sign his work.  Apart from a fourré Trajan denarius, I don't think I own any fakes, but if I do it's more probably a follis.  Slavey's are, I am told, in the proper grade of the proper metal, which makes me refrain from buying one like that in this thread!
Pat L.
It's like the song in My Fair Lady: too nice (a four-letter n-word).  "Her English is too good, he said, That clearly indicates that she is foreign... I can tell that she was born...Hungarian," says the rival elocution teacher, who is Hungarian.
If you run through the line-up at the link that Barry Murphy supplied, above, you should grasp Slavey's own style immediately.

[dougsmit]

Slavey's are, I am told, in the proper grade of the proper metal, which makes me refrain from buying one like that in this thread!

Is this correct?  I recall once hearing that Slavey obtained metal from old silver coins and could be faulted by all products being too alike in metal.  Part of the problem is we (at least once) used the term 'Slavey' for the product of more than one modern worker so I don't have a grasp on which ones are his and which another Bulgarian.  I never took them seriously because the once in my area of interest were just nowhere close to correct in metal.  There was a series of fake denarii including Pescennius Niger and Augustus struck on exactly the same thin flans with decent metal that Pescennius never imagined using. 

I believe a good part of the problem is that most of us have a familiarity with some issues more than others.  To me, some of the Bulgarian Greeks and early/late Romans look better than the Severans but that is probably because I feel (correctly or not) more comfortable with what to expect from Severans so the fakes don't seem as good to me but I have no familiarity with 4th century silver so I'd be easier to fool than someone with opposite interests.  Obviously we have our dealer members on the Forvm who have handled all varieties and, I assume, feel more comfortable across the span of styles. 

I note that modern fakes offered by Chinese sources on eBay are listed in more than one quality or metal.  The lower end of these are less than melt for silver coins and could be plastic for all I know.  Are the Bulgarian schools' products available in various metals as well?    I see a lot of difference in post-processing but not in flans on any given type.  Have you handled enough of these to have an opinion on this?

[slokind]

Well, one of my sources for the use of previously issued silver coins by Slavey was Doug Smith.  The museum shop merely said that they are good silver, and I had that Naxos, Sicily tetradrachm (Slavey edition) in hand, and the silver seemed to be very fine indeed.  Only the engraving of the hair and the corner of the mouth alerted my eye.  Like this Ptolemy I, that one is among his best efforts.  If you were Slavey, wouldn't you love to try doing that elephant skin?  But if you look at a whole series of his, you do sense his own style.
Bulgaria has plenty of good silver of its own and is proud of it.
Pat L.

[Reid Goldsborough]

Some degrade all copies as junk, or as dangerous, or whatever, but some Slavey replicas are true works of art, flamboyantly evocative. As pointed out here some are signed as any work of art would be, though not all are, and it can sometimes be difficult to find the tiny Cyrillic letters. Sometimes along with, or instead of, the Slavey signature in Cyrillic on the obverse or reverse, Slavey copies are marked with "COPY" in English or in other ways on the edge. Some are neither signed nor marked. Part of this inconsistency no doubt stemmed from Slavey selling his dies at some point and others pressing out copies with them.

I have a page on Slavey replicas here:

http://rg.ancients.info/slavey

[Danny S. Jones]

Though I detest the modern trade of fake coins, many of which are coming out of Bulgaria, (and a few that I have bought from reputable dealers, only later finding that they were fake) you can't help but to admire the artistry and workmanship of the likes that we have seen from Slavey. He could easily have been employed as an ancient celator or a sculptor of renaissance art.

Thankfully, I have never acquired a fake that I could not return. I do have a couple reproduction coins of pieces that I would never be able to afford, but none of the quality and caliber of some of Slavey's work.

[Robert_Brenchley]

One of these days Slavei will be collectible in his own right.

[Danny S. Jones]

I wouldn't mind having a black cabinet of coins of the caliber of that Ptolemy I tetradrachm. Shhhh!!! don't tell anyone!

I wish all my coins were that beautiful, but alas... it takes money to buy money.

[Reid Goldsborough]

I'd say Slaveys are collectable right now. I collect them. Others collect them. And if anyone has a Slavey replica of a classical Owl they can part with, let me know.

[mihali84]

Thanks for all your responses and help guys. Not only do i know more about the coin but i feel a lot better about owning it now.  This is my first black cabinet coin, goldenancients i don't blame you for "not minding"  having some coins like this and Reid Goldsborough i can see why you collect them now and i would also be interested in owning a classical Owl but if one comes my way i'll be sure to let you know.

[commodus]

Some degrade all copies as junk, or as dangerous, or whatever

I am one of these. Fakes are fakes.
One caveat, however: all fourrees should not be considered fakes. The term is used broadly, sometimes too broadly.
All modern fakes are ultimately junk at best and dangerous junk at worst -- quality and artistry notwithstanding.

[Reid Goldsborough]

There are significant differences here. A copy of a coin made as a copy, not to fool collectors, and ... signed by its creator ... a copy that's also sold for what it is, as a copy, is a world of difference between a copy made as a forgery and sold as a forgery ...  to fool collectors. See? The latter is designed to fake others, by presenting as genuine, and the former is not.

There are many absolutely legitimate replica makers of ancient, world, and U.S. coins out there. Among other places replicas are sold at the gift shops of U.S. historical sites and museums, made and sold as a way for people to connect to the past more tangibly than with a photograph and less expensively than with a real coin. Among the many uses are school children incorporating them into school projects.

I'm afraid I have to disagree also with your statement that fourrees aren't fakes. The vast majority of them were made to fake others, to fool people into thinking these gold- or silver-plated coins are solid gold or solid silver. This is the reason test-cutting came into practice, to try to reveal any fakery by exposing the interior of the coin. There are exceptions or possible exceptions, with the emergency issue Owls being the most well known, perhaps the only official fourree, though it's not clear that official fakery wasn't involved here. Fourrees are ancient, yes, but they're still for the most part fakes.

[Joe Sermarini]

...I'm afraid I have to disagree also with your statement that fourrees aren't fakes...

Of course they are fakes, but here on the discussion board, to prevent confusion, we ask that "fake" be used only to describe modern fakes.   

[Reid Goldsborough]

Fascinating subject. The linguistics here is as interesting as the differences in attitudes. Some regard the word "fake" as so pejorative that collecting anything having to do with such pieces, whether modern forgeries or ancient counterfeits, is to be looked down on, describing all such pieces as worthless (despite their market value).

Others feel that ancient fakes -- fourrees as well as others -- are acceptable as collectibles but modern fakes should never be collected. With many, the older the fake, the more it's considered collectable, with Paduan, Becker, and other modern but older fakes somewhere between ancient fourree counterfeits and modern Bulgarian School forgeries. Still others, myself included, feel that anything you collect and learn from is "collectable."

Then there are the other types of copies that aren't "fakes" -- weren't made in ancient or modern times to deceive -- such as ancient restoratives, ancient derivatives, ancient imitatives, modern replicas, and modern coins, medals, tokens, and so on that base their design in whole or part on an earlier coin.

I haven't heard before that "fake" as a word should be used only for modern pieces. Among others Wayne Sayles in his book Classical Deception uses "fake" for ancient as well as modern pieces meant to deceive. But I know some prefer the word "counterfeit" for contemporary fakes designed to fool merchants and consumers and "forgery" for later fakes designed to fool collectors, including the Macmillan Encyclopedic Dictionary of Numismatics. Others use the terms "counterfeit" and "forgery" synonymously, online as well as more formally in the literature. The ISPN's Bulletin on Counterfeits, later renamed the Counterfeit Coin Bulletin, was named what it was despite dealing with fakes designed to fool collectors.

I can see the reasoning behind naming different things differently, "counterfeit" as a contemporary piece and "forgery" as a later piece, but I sometimes myself as well use the words synonymously.

[dougsmit]

I haven't heard before that "fake" as a word should be used only for modern pieces.

I appreciate the need to have a language agreement that allows discussion without wondering what the writer intended.  That is probably why Joe posted this in 2003:
https://www.forumancientcoins.com/board/index.php?topic=1799.0

We all have pet peeves.  Mine is the use of the word 'fourree' to indicate a fake coin of another category.  A fourree is a coin struck on a flan with better metal covering lesser metal in a way that was intended conceal the fact that the core was less than the surface.  A cast can not be fourree.   I go further to separate fourrees of deception from issues that were surface enriched, silver washed (Gallienus and following) and current US sandwich silver substitutes (done openly rather than as deception).  Each of these is application of technology rather than guile.  'Fourree' does not convey by necessity who made that coin.  I realize many deny any official coins made on fourree flans (including the famous Athenian Emergency coins).   There may be no official 'fourrees' but that is a separate question. 

On several ocassions I have expressed the desire to see a modern fake fourree made with the foil technique.  I have not seen one made to deceive collectors rather than the man on the street for face value.  Please, anyone?

[nemo]

On several ocassions I have expressed the desire to see a modern fake fourree made with the foil technique.  I have not seen one made to deceive collectors rather than the man on the street for face value.  Please, anyone?

Here are a couple of examples. I have seen only a very few. So far it seems to be mostly limited to very high value types where even a fourrée might fetch a substantial price (Brutus, Augustus, Germanicus, Otho), though one of the coins shown in the Forum thread linked below is a lowly Gordian III. I believe I have also seen a modern fake fourrée of a Claudius denarius but I could not find reference to any such in a quick Google search. The Brutus below is from http://forgerynetwork.com.



https://www.forumancientcoins.com/board/index.php?topic=41607.0

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/fakes/displayimage.php?album=2&pos=459