Gary

Thanks very much to the two of you, particulary to Red for taking the time and effort. After your tip about the Harp Strings I got myself a picture of a real Gothic Crown and compared the two. Something that may be helpfull in the future.... If you look behind the Shield at the background you see a pattern (Diagonal lines). On the real one this is orientated from bottom left running up to top right. On the fake it runs the other way, bottom left to top right...... Also the Harp its self is much finer on the real coin. Once again thank you for your opinions. Gary

hello everyone, I have not been here for a while so happy new year to you all. A german collector has asked for my opinion on this gothic crown that he has obtained. My first reaction was forgery.... However I thought I would just check with you lot as I am certainly no expert when it comes to crowns. The coin weighs and measures as it should do, 28,3 grams in weight and 39mm in diameter. The edge is plain. Colour looks to be ok. However on the rim of the coin you can see small cracks running around the edge, I have included a close up. the obv. looks very worn and to my eyes it is not natural wear and tear, looks almost like a worn die or weak strike. I know there is a white metal plain edge version but as all strikings of this coin were supposed to have been near enough Proofs then the cracking around the rim would suggest forgery? anyway have a look at the pics and I would be interested in your opinions, thanks, Gary.

I agree, F-67 Obv 6, Rev H. Heres mine, anyone want to give me a hundred plus?

I have just recieved my copy of the 2007 edition and after a quick glance through it, I must say I am impressed. I think this book is definitley going in the right direction. Colour Photos, and good ones at that. I have not looked too close for mistakes yet and do not expect to find any (many :-)). Well done Chris. What`s planned for the next edition? Listings from from the beginning of the milled series?

Unfortunatly my truck is governed, max 90kmh so it could´nt have been me but yes I know what you mean.... It seems no matter how fast you go there´s always some joker who wants to overtake.... It`s even a tourist trade over here with the japenese and others, actualy booking holidays here in germany just to speed up and down the motorways in hired Merc´s. There are even firms that do package holidays with this in mind.... Germany is the only country with no speed limit for the motorway so if you want to race down the motorway in your sports car at 160 plus mph then take a holiday in germany.... just watch out for me in my truck though! As for "re-building the old knackered infrastructure in the East" the normal west german and anyone paying tax in the west is still paying the bill in the form of extra tax and thats nearly 20 years after reunification!! just a bit of useless info for you guys.

Unfortunatly cleaning of coins is rather commen place here in germany. I have bought many coins from the german Ebay site only to find that they have been cleaned. I once visited a local dealer and enquired about british coins, he dug out an album containing a collection of coins from Vic onwards. All the bronze and copper coins had been rubbed resulting in the high points being bright and shiny. When asked, he said he did it himself as they looked better that way..... needless to say I have not been back. I once had an old 5 Mark silver coin which I put up for sale on a german coin site. The coin was nicely toned, not tarnished. It did not sell, not even when I reduced the price to well below cat value. After months I got fed up and dipped it, relisted it, and it was gone within a week, strange.... Do not get me wrong, there are some good auction rooms and dealers in germany who do know what they are doing and believe it or not there are many good coins to be had. The problem with ebay is the majority of people selling coins are perhaps not in the know and believe it better, or more appealing to sell a shiny coin. Geordie, by the way Oldenburgh is spellt Oldenburg and we probably passed each other on the autobahn as thats my neck of the woods.......

Just a bit of additional info. The coins exhibiting the missing serifs also are missing the left hand foot of the X in REX. See Scans. 1st Scan- 1834, 2nd- 1837 and last Normal X As I mentioned before, the 1834 without the faults seems to be rarer of the two where as for the 1837 this is the other way round. Not that any 1837`s are commen.

Several yeaes ago I purchased an 1834 Penny for my collection. On recieving this coin I noticed that it was flawed ( or is it?) . the "T" and both "N`s" of BRITTANNIAR on the reverse are missing the lower Serif`s. There is a very very faint impression of them only just noticable with a x10 magnifiying glass. I have since been looking for an example with complete Serif`s and have so far been unsuccessful. Are all 1834 pennies flawed or does anyone have an example with full Serif`s?

Hi Josie, interesting! Does not look like a die fault to me. Too rounded and deliberate in my view. Unfortunatly I have no explaination as to the cause. If it were an overstrike ie. D over an O, then the crescent below the D would be larger (see photo). Perhaps I am wrong and it is just a fluke Die fault.

Thanks Bob, Thanks B&CC, for the info. On further study it seems that just the last two digits are more widely spaced. As you say Dracott (have now dug the article out), mentions this occurence for other early 70`s halfpenny. Could it be assumed that a large quantity of 70`s Die was produced with just the 18 being punched and the other two digits being entered as and when needed? Cheers Gary

I seem to remember reading or seeing somewhere of the mention, that for the 1870 halfpenny there are in fact narrow and wide date varieties. Can anyone confirm this? I am not talking of just the 0 being miss punched rather all date numerals being closer or wider apart. Cheers, Gary

Have to agree with you there. funnily enough, all them years ago I did`nt find Monty Python that funny, these days!

If you saw this coin for sale on , say ebay, what would your opinion be of it?

It seems the french are not spared either, Ebay Forgeries In fact all three coins offered by this seller are forgeries. A new one now being the 1937 Crown.

Ok, most people were suspicious and rightly so. It is a fake. Maybe I should have worded the question different or just enquired under a guest entry as it seems the question alone made you suspicious. Point I was trying to make is that it is easy to be fooled by a picture. This fake was bought by a collector in good faith who after recieving it got in contact with me because the coin was not quite right..... I now have it here and the details are as follows- Dia 38,14mm Weight 18,8g and the thickness measured on the rim is 2,47mm. Should be Dia 38,9mm, Weight 28,2g and thickness 2,8mm. Alone the weight is a dead give away. Another is the colour, looks more like aluminium. Another oddity is who ever created this piece put a milled edge on it......... If you look at the scan of the obverse, you can actually see the milled edge, above the head. None of you spotted it. The legend is blurred and the surface is grainy and the design lacks the sharpness of the real thing. I have it from a reliable source that these things can be bought on the easten borders in bundles of 50 for a very little money. How long before they move on to other coins and whats more, get better at it? I do not think this is the last fake to fool the unsuspecting collector. My advice- Weight is a dead give away and very difficult to reproduce.

Hi german, thats a new term for me, what is a galvanocopy? and by the way I´ll let this run a little longer before explaining.....

Hi German, welcome to the forum. Rob, are you saying that all 1799 currency halfpennies have the three raised dots on the Obv? or have I misunderstood? I have a currency 1799 halfpenny on which I can find no dots at all, Obv or Rev. Cheers.

Hi Josie, thanks for that. I have now got my copy of the CCGB and have seen the entry however I`m not letting it go too my head

The spot of verdigris seen on the reverse looks to be dried out. It could be removed but will still leave a pitted surface, the damage is permanent. Light attacks of verdigris can be tackled with Contact Spray. This is a cleaning agent for electrical contacts. It is more effective on copper coins than bronze, probably due to the fact that electrical contacts are made from copper. It does not affect the patina of the coin. If you are going to try this then please try on worthless coins first and if you dont like the results then you know what not to do........ As for the O in Oarolvs, I am not convinced that it is an "O" . If you look at the O`s in CAROLO these are more oval in shape, where as the O in Oarolvs is almost perfectly round. How about a misaligned C being overpunched with a correctly aligned C with no attempt to correct the underlying misaligned C? If you closed the gap in the C in CAROLO then it would be as good as round!

would agree with Peter on this one, VG maybe slightly better but pitted and very dirty, looks like loads of gunk between the legend, not helping to preserve the coin at all. The light areas may just be the result of flash photograhy, the actual coin could be darker. I have never heard of this seller so cannot comment on his or her`s reputation.

I have over the last few months been watching with concern the increasing number of counterfeit crown sized coins being offered for sale on ebay. Here is one seller registered in germany who has no fewer than 7 items running at the moment. These range from hong kong dollars to 1935 crown. seller I have also seen real coins of good grades and years being bought by buyers from far easten countries and suspect that the counterfeit problem will get worse. At the moment they are easy to spot and poorly made, probably cast. Even though, these coins are being bought by unsuspecting collectors and I know of one who was dupped and refused a refund even though the seller worked in a well known bank here in germany. I have only been watching the german ebay, maybe similar coins are being offered on the british site! Watch out......

I´m sorry Hussulo but I totally disagree with you here. I have a 100% Feedback with over 600 unique sellers/buyers and I see absolutly no problem with with holding back my feedback after I have sold something. Firstly if the buyer has paid for the item then he has no reason to be afraid of recieving Neg feedback! Secondly, when feedback is left for me, I then have confirmation that the item has been recieved and then and only then is the transaction completed. Things can go wrong, lost in the post and all that, it happens. For this reason I only post feedback after a buyer has posted thiers, if something does go wrong then the Buyer is more likely to contact me before posting Neg feedback. The other way around, if I have bought something then I leave feedback after recieving it, regardless of wether the seller has already done so or not. In my opinion, like Chris said earlier, its a question of communications, if the comms are good then usualy there is no problem, whatever happens. I have had deals where problems have occured but due to good comms they have been sorted without resorting to Neg Feedback. The problem with comms as I see it is a problem that has only occured since the introduction of the ebay checkout system and the fact that most E-Mil providers, programms now use Spam filters. Firstly the Ebay checkout system reduces the communications (direct via E-Mail) and the spam filters filter out mails that should get through. The inexperienced user, more often than not, does not understand the workings off the spam filter and does not realise that they have to look in the spam folder to check that good e-mails are not being classed as spam and to tell the spam filter that this address is not spam. When I started on ebay you had to write directly to the email address given by the seller or buyer and in this way had direct comms as the person knew to expect an Email from you. Communcations is the Key. Cheers, Gary.

Same here, lack of time but also lack of expertise to create an interactive site. You can use any pictures from my homepage and if you require originals just drop me a line. It would probably be better to list the pictures required when and as needed, I am sure between us (Forum members) we can put together a pretty impressive collection! Cheers, Gary A link to my Site would be nice when you are up and running, I know there are many german collectors who would also be interested in your intended site.

This story even reached the german papers. While having a break at a wayside inn today a workmate gave me his daily paper in which was a report about a British Squaddie, had to be did`nt it, no one else would be stupid enough, who blew his bum up with a rocket on the 5th nov. Now the whole world knows how strange we Britts are..........

I have on my homepage, a small picture guide, not brilliant and it is in german but you dont need to be fluent in german to look at the pictures. The problem with pictures is that they are only 2 dimensional and lack depth. If you are new to the game than it is always advicable to buy coins from a good Dealer, study them and the grades given first hand. This way you get a feel for grading. I am sure that the members of this forum can recommend some good dealers. wybritt also has a nice homepage, in english. You may find something helpfull here.