Rob

A contemporary forgery of a G3 halfcrown. Originally the copper core would have been covered with a silver wash to pass it off as the real thing.

http://www.rpcoins.co.uk/c7%20pics/03338.jpg The 3rd bust variety has the hair at the back of the head in sweeping roughly parallel curves. This is fairly obvious in Spink. The 3rd bust curls are not so near parallel as the variety, with 2 or 3 markedly more curved. The upper tie ribbon also points slightly up on the 3rd compared to the variety.

The detail I have pointed out is clear enough in Spink, just that people probably don't accept that it is reasonably accurate because it is a drawing as opposed to an image. Another useful tip is that the 3rd busts weren't used until 1696, so any 1695 shilling must be 1st bust

This is a 3rd bust. Although a mistrike, the difference in hair detail is clear. The curls forward at the top of the back of the head are markedly different, and the ties are different too.

First of all, the 1st bust is the easy one to identify. At the back of the head, the hair forms a circle as opposed to a lot of roughly parallel strands found on the 3rd bust and variety. 4 x 1st bust shillings in varying grades in the first image and a better detail worn 1st bust example in the second showing how easy it is to see the variety even when badly worn such as this one.

That's 3rd bust variety. Refer to the current Spink catalogue, p.374. I'll dig out some images too.

Probably been told 'old pennies' are rare and has plucked a figure out of the air. Hilarious. Very honest. Says it belongs to the right person. Correct. If the grandfather looks after it for a few more years, no collector will have to suffer ownership.

Ah, just saw this. OK, on the plus side, as I've mentioned before it's a difficult privy mark to find on nicer coins. Trouble is, despite the crispness of the strike, it's not a very nice coin ... I'd have guessed it would have sold in the £60 range myself. But then this is eBay we're talking about, so pretty much all sense and predictability goes out the window! Someone obviously rated it ... rather too much IMHO. But then I suspect I've shown off coins I've bought that you've all been polite enough not to go WTF at! Hammered coinage, .. well, it's perhaps an acquired taste. And what appeals to one may well not appeal to anyone else! Either that or there's more to this shilling than meets the eye... . Rather disturbingly, Saxbys has 1184 followers. Hopefully the majority of these are people looking to see what the next misattributed item will be, but I fear not.

Because if you go to Tony Clayton's site, the first copper halfpenny illustrated with a right facing single bust is William III. There are three imaged, the first is in the author's collection and the second courtesy of Spink, but neither has any reference to rarity. The third is the DEI GRATIA, listed as three known and ipso facto is guaranteed to be more appealing to the money grabbing/rip-off merchant mindset. It has us talking about it for a start.

I see in the blurb that they are going to add 3% for those bidding via The Saleroom. Using Spink Live doesn't incur this additonal charge. Do we have any assurances that Spink Live is going to work properly? 3 or 4 years ago it was a total disaster which meant that if you wanted something in Spink it was necessary to attend in person, or put in a commission bid. I've been using The Saleroom on account of it being a working system. Alternatively, I suppose that 3% on top of an already extortionate fee is neither here nor there if it means you are able to participate. Just adjust the bids down to compensate.

Gothic crown, 1860 coppers and 1831 crown

Nope....I'm working on the basis that I wont get more than one or two at those very low estimates...if I get more than two then I'm screwed ! I'd Hate to think what would happen if you got the 12 of them then lol That's why you need to keep your powder dry. Do as I say, not as I do.

Looks for all the world like a 54 over 54 and not anything else. Just a refurbished die I would think.

I couldn't possibly comment.

Yes funny how the valuable pieces tend to be treated more leniently. I've seen a lot better rejected for less.

Looking for a listing of either of Hamilton-Smith's W/SA sixpences. They were sold as a pair in his 1927 sale lot 399, with one boar's head rev mark and the other a tower rev. mark. They will be listed as Weymouth sixpences and not Worcester. They were listed in the October 1927 circular item nos. 72071 (boar's head) @ £6 and 72072 (tower) @ £5/10/-. Both were graded VF with the boar's head noted as having a fine tone. I want to know if they sold, or remained in stock for a while as they would most likely be listed again in the Circular within a year or so if not sold. Thanks.

The portrait is double struck. The second strike is the bit including the i.m , the displaced inner circle and the head.

Looks like it. It is Saxby's, so don't hold your breath for a sensible outcome. I also note that he has changed his advertised address from Devon back to the Midlands. His address could be as accurate as his listings though.

Might be a silly question, but as I don't have it, how did you end up finding something obscure like this on Facebook. Do you have to actively set up a search for idiots and mousetraps, or does it come under some other setting such as 'Normal for Nempnett Thrubwell'?

Never seen one with the defective lettering on either the real thing or a copy. Anyone else noted this previously?

A symptom of the striking method I'm afraid. The dies may or may not be flat enough to strike the full design in one go. The blow with the hammer may or may not be perpendicular to the face leading to more force applied to the edge of the die in one area or another, The top and bottom dies may or may not be aligned such as to give a well centred coin on both sides. The amount of force used may or may not be sufficient to imprint all the design in one go to both sides. Successive blows with the hammer may or may not be aligned with the previous strike, being either rotated or displaced. Every so often, all these things come together in perfect alignment and the price of the resulting coin rockets. What you have is a more typical result. It looks to have been further abused by gilding.

Stuart is correct. S2655 and not 2656. The easiest way to differentiate is by the hair behind the head. Wavy inward lines on the 4th bust as seen in the o/p, Sticky out and thicker hair on the 5th, as per image attached.

It looks from the reverse that it has been copper plated and then gilt in the past? This is not a very nice example of a common coin. If you want one, get another piece and bin this one

I thought we were talking the other way around, for milled it's fine but for hammered not Because as Nicholas pointed out, there are no prices for hammered above VF Plus the rarer variations of hammered coins which it does'nt go into depth onCompared to all the others, Spink is an encyclopedia of useful information for hammered. It still only covers maybe 20-25% of the varieties in terms of meaningful pricing, but this is way, way better than the alternatives. To expand on the 10 examples I looked at, The ratio of price paid to CYB was just under 1 in three cases, the other 7 started at over 2x, with a couple of double digit multiples. Taking Saxon coins as an example, a single figure for the 15 types of Edward the Confessor is of no practical use apart from giving a guide to the minimum price you can expect to pay - but you could establish that by viewing a few tables at a fair or perusing a few websites. Then you also have to consider the relative rarities of different mints. Only Spink lists these together with a rough cost in VF. I would say that cheap and cheerful price guides are predominantly used by people who are looking at the budget end of the market in any case, so the numbers for unc coins to a large extent serve little purpose. Spink are unquestionably overpriced for some of the milled, and for many coins in lower grades prices are effectively set by eBay, whatever the books say.

It doesn't appear to be in 2 or 3. Haven't looked elsewhere. Prices in catalogues can be completely misleading. I ran the last 10 purchases made in the open market and compared Spink pricing & CYB to the price I paid. There is is so much variation that it is impossible to conclude anything other than a simple price list such as CYB is virtually useless. Comparing the price paid to Spink gave results from 0.6x book up to 1.8x. The lowest price paid relative to CYB book price was 0.83x. The highest was 33x, but that is because they supply a single figure to the entire reign of Charles I including the Civil War coinage. Similarly unhelpful were the figures for most hammered, with Saxon and Norman coins also having a single price. In fact, if you have anything other than the most common type of hammered coin for a given reign, you have to use Spink as they are the only chance you have of being able to identify it and put an approx. value to it. The rest are chocolate teapots to varying degrees.