Rob

I won't bother, They constantly fail to meet deadlines and don't even get it printed in the UK. It took them years to even attempt to catch up with Peck/Freeman..far better info is out there. If Rotographic sorted the milled series prior to 1797 job done. The perennial problem is always going to be trying to be all things to all men. The more focussed the material covered, the more accurate it is likely to be. If you only cover a limited range you had better be good at it otherwise there's no point doing anything. By definition, many of the rarities don't come round very often, so any price quoted is bound to be a stab in the dark. People moan when a coin is listed as extremely rare because there is no price given, yet moan if there is a figure quoted because it is too high or too low. Every single price guide is just that. e.g. I notice the groats have had an upward revision following the Brady sale. On the only coin where I had any input, the S2989, it has gone up just under 50%, but given no example has been on the market since the same coin was sold by Spink for £450 in 1995 and the previous price in the tome was £850, a revision up to its new value of £1250 seems reasonable. Neither me nor the person responsible for revaluing this section know of another example other than the BM piece, so should the price be what is quoted in the latest book or what I paid which was £500 higher? Arguably it could be what I paid, but we both know another example could come to light tomorrow and in any case I had to pay more than I would have liked because I had to see off the underbidder in what was a strongly priced sale overall. However, if that bidder was also aware that the coin may well be the only example available, who knows where the price could have gone to? If two people refuse to stop bidding, that doesn't make the same coin worth as much the next time it comes round. I think people are too set in their thinking when it comes to price guide accuracy. All of them have prices listed that are all over the place and should be treated with a pinch of salt.

I had my box of them delivered first thing last Monday.

Not without a better picture. Ed.VII is difficult at the best of times because the hair detail is very low relief and so difficult to tell what is worn unless well lit or in the hand.

I do, but I am not sure how to grade it or the best way to sell it, I am only just starting to take this hobby seriously and have a lot to learn! It was sold to me as aVF but I think I would grade it as something like 'GF+ and probably dipped' I would value your opinion(s)! (It is much more 'shiny' than the photos show) It is short of VF, but not that far away because there is still a degree of hair detail and based on the image nVF would probably be more appropriate, but it has been polished which is a no-no and as they are not rare won't help the cause. Selling on ebay, honestly described as cleaned is probably the best way because on there, people see what they want to see. A dealer will knock it down for being polished unless it is a Hobson's Choice piece (which it isn't).

If you want a 1933 penny, let it be known to the main dealers and, depending on who else has said they are looking for one, you may find that one is offered to you when it becomes available. You will have demonstrate a capability and willingness to spend the amounts required by building up a reputation with other purchases, but there is no reason why you should be excluded. Life always works this way. The choicest pieces will first be offered to the most likely buyer(s). Time is money and it works well for both parties. Experienced collectors have relatively short wants lists, expensive coins have relatively few homes to go to in reality compared to the whole market, so anything that avoids the time and effort of marketing a coin is preferable. There are always a few coins that are more desirable than others, the 1933 penny being one of them. But if you consider the whole coinage, there are many rarities that slip under the radar. The market for the series may be very small and so the demand negligible, but that doesn't make a choice or rare piece any less desirable. There are many unique or nearly so pieces out there if you care to look and do the research for very little money. Within both hammered and milled are types known only from a handful of examples that can be bought for peanuts or a couple thousand at the most. Not everything has to be too costly or permanently unavailable if you do your homework. When the time comes for coins to be sold post-mortem, you will still get caught up in the stampede. The choicest of the choice will go for a stellar amount, but every collection has its dogs, some of which may not even sell. Best advice is to stop worrying about whether you will ever get a 1933 penny, do some (or even a lot of) reading and give yourself that edge enabling you to buy that rarity on the cheap. Another thing worth remembering is that all the money in the world can not force a poorer collector to sell that unique item. We all get opportunities that are unrelated to physical wealth, and where the only correlation is between knowledge and hard work.

No, or at least not to my knowledge. I suspect that the authors almost certainly have a database of the dies, but I'm not aware of a list that has been published. As far as the BNJ is concerned, most articles on Elizabeth I have been written by either B, C or W. The most useful is probably that in the 1957 issue by I D Brown,(vol.28, pt.3) as there is a large section on hoard finds with references to each article given, which presumably means there is otherwise unpublished info to be extracted. There are later papers by the same authors in the 1983, 1988 & 1989 BNJs.

My collecting habits were first stimulated around the age of 4 when my father asked me if I wanted a New Zealand 8d red export NZ lamb stamp – I still have it. Like many collectors, my first foray into coins was the jar of worn pennies given by my parents or grandmother to keep me quiet on a rainy day - no internet or games consoles in those days, in fact we didn't even have a TV. Date runs followed with the obligatory spaces left in the rows for dates that nobody thought to tell me didn’t exist, though I remember being told that a 1933 was very rare and that only 6 existed. Like every other person, I checked each penny carefully in case I found one. Some hope. Nobody told me they were all accounted for and that I was wasting my time looking!! Herein lies a useful lesson because novices pick up information, but usually only half the story, hence the rare 20p undated mule, or the Queen's necklace, or the unbelievably rare £2 coins that can only be found on eBay. All mythical "facts" that can be easily disproved with a modicum of research, but no kid of 6 or 7 does research. Collecting stamps and coins ran in parallel throughout my time at school. The first coin I actually bought was a high grade 1946 sixpence. I hesitate to say uncirculated, as I still have it and it certainly isn't, but was described at the time as such. Stamps took up much time because I had a neighbour who had the best collection of British and Australian stamps I have seen to this day with less than half a dozen gaps for both countries. He also had sufficient duplicates to run a business had he wanted and so one or two visits every month to look at the collection were rewarded with industrial quantities of cast-offs. This rather favourable arrangement was pursued with enthusiasm because there was no way I could afford the quantities given to me. When I left home, I donated my coins to my father as he was in a better position to do something with them and the stamps were far more significant due to the above, but I got them all back with interest when he died 20 years ago. Indecision reigned for a short time, but knew I had to make a decision and so knowing a good friend of mine had a serious collection of halfcrowns and pennies in high grade, decided to expand my collection (which now lagged the stamps by an even wider margin) and I settled on shillings and halfpennies as denominations. At the same time I made the conscious decision not to collect low grade material without a very good reason because I liked proofs and patterns as well as currency pieces and clearly there was no point having near uniformly FDC proofs alongside uniformly worn currency pieces. Trays of legible high grade material had considerably more eye-appeal than the grotty pennies of my youth. By this time I also appreciated the question of provenance because the best pieces are frequently well documented and so the library was born. The stamps went into hibernation. About 3 years ago I became disillusioned with the denomination collections because it was proving difficult to add pieces in a suitable grade, particularly hammered halfpennies, and the fact that full flan examples are difficult to find, let alone read, made me reconsider my aims. The serried ranks of full lustre or nearly so halfpennies and shillings also began to look monotonous and so I decided to expand the sundries department of the collection and go for a completely new set of targets encompassing the entire history of British coins with an example in the name of each monarch or (arch)bishop, every denomination produced, an example in each metal used, of every minting technique, from every mint location, by all the attributed designers and with every initial mark used. This eclectic list should ensure that there is always something available to add to the collection. More than a few coins are unaffordable, but there is sufficient scope to add to the collection for many years to come as the above list gives upwards of a thousand boxes to tick. By avoiding type duplication wherever possible, it means that I should end up with a broadly representative sample of British numismatics. I guess that makes me a mad, sad eccentric.

For Charles I shillings you want Michael Sharp's article in the BNJ 1977. BCW is the best reference for Elizabeth I silver as it differentiates the dies with reference to the punches used for the various components. What it does not do is list all the individual dies within a type, so different legend readings such as ELIZAB, LEIZAB, ELIZB for the samemark and issue are not noted - and there are a lot of different readings. Still worth getting, though I would recommend a hardback copy as the paperback cover soon becomes a bit distressed with use, certainly if it gets as much use as mine has.

Send Seuk a PM. He's about fairly often.

There aren't any obviously wrong indicators. How much bigger is it? Could it be struck on a flan designed for something else? If so, is it silver?

Don't get too worried about what could happen. Take simple precautions like good locks and an alarm and don't leave your front door open! Burglars tend to be opportunists and always choose the easy option unless they are aware of rich pickings to be had and have a means of disposal. They are unlikely ever to be stealing to order unless you have a collection of known, publicised desirable pieces, and the scrap value is minimal given the low weight of metal involved (gold excluded). Business premises are obvious targets simply because they have to have stock for sale, so that is usually a case of the burglar taking a punt on likely pickings. Society gets too paranoid about risk, as a few simple precautions will ensure most potential problems are unlikely ever to arise.

Hide them in a wall safe behind the calendar hanging next to the Picasso Then you only lose the picture.

I'm assuming the 'pearliness' is a result of the gilding and how the photo was taken. However, I agree it does look more like a replica than the real thing, due to the depth of the strike, it's ... too perfect. Without seeing it in real life it's impossible to be certain however. I concur re the depth of strike, though note that the reverse is slightly off-centre which does add a bit of credibility. Definitely needs to be seen in the hand though. If genuine, you tend to get an uneven strike on most hammered coins, so when you see a consistently well struck coin you tend to smell a rat. If it then proves to be genuine, it's a case of drinks all round, though gilding doesn't help.

You might have a buyer in seuk because he collects forgeries.

I can sense a plague of verdigris about to descend upon the bronze and cupro-nickel in your collection. Putting them anywhere like the above would be foolish.

I don't use ebay for selling.

At the lowest cost for a box, the break even point for a collection's value is about £20K. i.e.0.5% of £20K sum insured is £100, say £50 for the cheapest bank storage option and a reduction in premium of £50 arising from a reduced rate of 0.25% compared to 0.5%. With a collection value above this you are spending less money with the bank storage option subject to the price of the chosen box size.

It depends on size and can be anything from £50-300 a year, but the biggest problem is that most banks have stopped offering the service and so you have to find somewhere else such as a secure storage facility.

Fine reverse, the obverse nearly fine. Difficult to live with unless it's a hole that has to be filled.

And a real benefit of keeping them in a bank is that the insurance premium drops from 0.5% of the sum insured to 0.25%. That's another coin or two.

I think that's a fair assessment. Most of us are in 3. but working and dreaming for 2. I am in that camp as well!!! Ditto Rob, I definitely mentally placed you in 2. All those rare patterns and proofs... Maybe, but is it a definitive collection? - emphatically not. I might have a few hundred of the above, but I've also got a few hundred four letter expletives to counteract the quality.

I think that's a fair assessment. Most of us are in 3. but working and dreaming for 2. I am in that camp as well!!! Ditto

A collector is one who acquires items, coins or otherwise, for the pleasure of doing so. In the case of coins, most will settle on a given field and pursue it, picking up items where and when they can either by finds or by actively seeking out specifics on dealers' lists or at auction. Some will want to delve deeper and research a subject, and there are a few on this forum that do just that. Others take little interest in the history or background of their chosen field and collect simply because they like them. There is no right or wrong to collecting, but it helps if you have an appreciation of the items in your hands because knowledge is power and by using that you enable yourself to improve the quality of the collection and to recognise a bargain when you see one.

Don't do it. Everybody will hold you in contempt and treat you for the slimy, hand wringing and avaricious person you are. I for one shall lock up my 1959 dated coins - so there.

Insurance! That'd be funny wouldn't it. "and how do you secure your collection, Mr Magee?" "erm...in my bus..." Yeh, but have you ever tried getting onto a bus? Difficult, isn't it.