Yesterday I stumbled across a coin on
Ebay UK that was being sold by somebody who does obviously not regularly sell coins. It was nothing less than an
Alexander tetradrachm with left-facing
head on the
obv., so I naturally watched it, although it was rather worn, especially on the
reverse. As the end of the
auction drew closer, I looked it up in
Price, found it - no problem, no. 213 - and then decided to browse through all eighteen pages of FORUM's
Fake Reports for "
Alexander".
BINGO!
Now you see how deceptive even a
fake that's quite obvious in
mint state can become when it's somewhat convincingly aged. Compare the picture from the
Ebay auction with the one from the
Fake reports. After I
had found this, I looked further and enlarged the
reverse picture - and there it was, at least the "Y" of the "COPY" punch is
still visible (see
red arrow)! Luckily, the buyer only paid eight point something pounds for the coin, so to most collectors it must have been a more obvious
fake than it was for me. The buyer probably opens a
bottle of champagne tonight, thinking he made the
bargain of the year...
Rupert
Fake Coins and Notorious Fake Sellers
