Peckris

Ooohhhh! The Gillick portrait is my favourite (run a close second by the Machin). There's something nobly elegant about the crown-less bust, with only a laurel wreath. And the great thing about those first two portraits is they are true busts, not the truncated heads of later designs. The one I utterly detest, is that awful, shallow, boring, Maklouf design.

Thanks for the info Rob. I'm quite new to all this and I appreciate all the knowledge and expertise my Grey matter can absorb. Got in touch with Allgold Sevenoaks and they said it was worth about £250-£300 and graded it as EF. Quite happy about. They said more or less the same as you. I also have an 1869 sovereign with '1 over 1'. I'll be on the look out for wrong letter over strikes from now on! Just a minor thing Darren - you actually posted this also in Unconfirmed Unlisted Varieties, where I replied to it. I wouldn't have if I'd seen this first. Just a thought. (I'm not getting on your case )

I haven't seen that particular one, but double-punching and over-strikes are actually a very common phenomenon before the 20th Century. Whether or not they are so common for gold, someone else would need to say.

Yes. Modern proofs, even silver proofs, can be picked up at auction for well under book. To give one notorious example : the 1977 silver proof crown has added about 25% - 33% to its price in over 30 years. "Half book" sounds a fair price, don't pay too much more than that. You think 1889 shillings are common? You should see the 1887 - commonest Victorian silver coin of them all!

Just as a matter of interest, this is now a re-listed item as the 1919KN only @ $2299.00, which at today's pound - dollar exchange rate of £1.5372, equates to £1495.58. So rare at that grade, it might just be worth it. I'm still far from convinced by that Unc rating by the seller. It looks no more than EF to me judging by Britannia's fingers on the trident and the hair on the portrait. If it really was Unc I'd be very interested in it, but right now I'm a bit ho hum (though I'd agree it is RARE even in EF).

Talking about shells, has anyone heard the rumour that WWI shell cases were melted down and added to the alloy for bronze coins? I only ever heard about this once, in a Whitman folder of key date pennies I picked up at auction. Among the 'usual suspects', there was a 1920 and 1921 with what looks like brass flecks scattered through the planchet. The previous owner had added a note that this was due to "WWI shell cases". I've still got them and I guess if there is interest I could scan and upload pictures.

I don't know when the £ sign first came in, but it was certainly long before Victoria.

I'll pay £250 for your 1960 british penny scott (I assume we're NOT talking Maundy here? ) True, true!

Yes, I appreciate that forgeries are a real issue for all of us, but speaking personally I think that if third party grading services remove some of the risk, they nonetheless effectively sterilise the hobby. Coins are very tactile things, after all that's what they were designed for and I would much rather run the risk of picking a duff'un or putting a fingerprint across a BU 1926 ME than be reduced to the custodian of a number of anodine chunks of plastic containing things that were once genuine coins. Has the much greater problem of forged artwork persuaded the likes of Christies to encapsulate genuine Monets or Modiglianis in polyethylene or whatever to prevent forgery? Of course we must do all we can to root out these malicious fakes, but it must not be at the expense of turning our great hobby into a branch of the financial establishment with prices quoted in the Financial Times. I for one don't want to hear Robert Peston saying things like, 'Prices of coins slumped today on Wall Street as a report by Standard and Poore's slated the market as being overvalued...'. There are enough boring things out there that people call 'investments' without adding to the whole tedious list. My coin collection is there for my own personal pleasure and for that of anybody else of a like mind. It is not an investment, it exists to satisfy my craving for something which is at one time relatively complete and of genuine historic value. I dare say that there is the odd coin in my collection which isn't all it might seem but hey, c'est la vie. If third party grading services are the answer, then perhaps we asked the wrong question. Hear hear. Well said.

Of course I meant 'come out' not 'come out' if you see what I mean... I'm not remotely interested in your private life, Red No homophobia here

What's even more curious is how they managed such decent copies back then. My feeling is that some dies must have "got out" - it was the early days of the new Mint after all, with Boulton & Watt's machinery having to be installed; must have been a fair amount of chaos going on for a while. Maybe some were smuggled out by employees after a quick buck. Probably security was a bit lax at times, with the management most likely more concerned with preventing the theft of actual coins. Good point - and the management would probably have made the reasonable assumption that without Boulton & Watt's extremely expensive machinery, the dies wouldn't have been much use. Hah!!

. . . . . ."Ok Declan, I'm ready to lay the table now - can you move those bits of metal off? And get the posh cutlery and the red napkins. Declan...? DECLAN!!" "Yes, dear" . . . . . . . . . . Nicely set out though. My cabinets would sit nicely at the far end, I'm thinking

Forgive me Mat. You are probably a nice guy. You don't deserve this. But I've had enough. You're simply the straw that broke the camel's back, so once again, I do beg your forgiveness. * * * * * * LOSE LOSE LOSE!!!!! It's spelled LOSE NOT LOOSE !!!!!! (Gaaaaaaaaah, goes off to find a butt of malmsy to drown in.) EVERYWHERE, it's a damn epidemic, of people who don't know how to spell LOSE LOSE LOSE LOSE LOSE LOSE LOSE !!!!!!!! Stomps off muttering.

What's even more curious is how they managed such decent copies back then. My feeling is that some dies must have "got out" - it was the early days of the new Mint after all, with Boulton & Watt's machinery having to be installed; must have been a fair amount of chaos going on for a while.

That's not a modern fake, it doesn't belong in the category under discussion. It's a silver-washed copper forgery produced in the early 19th century. They are of variable quality, but they are extremely common. Few people are going to be fooled by them. (Oh I see others got there first! Sorry guys)

Ah, glad I didn't stump up the 125 quid then Be even gladder : the replicas aren't very good, and don't much resemble the currency issue. Which is probably why a currency penny cleverly faked with an altered date (very convincing) went on eBay for around £200.

It actually looks remarkably similar to my Philip tetradrachm (obverse Zeus, reverse eagle & prey). Can't quite make out the legend though - you able to shed any light? (I can read Greek, I just can't make out the lettering).

I go along with your grading Red. I would just add though - there's a lot more hair on that obverse than you often see on even EF examples of 1918-19H & KNs. Those dies took a hell of a beating, and sometimes there's very little hair to be seen at all, just a blur, while the rest of the coin looks pristine.

Great to see youngsters still interested in our hobby

Nor the fact that they immediately make your fine set of mahogany coin cabinets redundant and useless.

My daughter's just cancelled her blind date with you

I have an Unc 1934 (Mint toned variety) that I got in a Colin Cooke postal auction some years back. Nice. As for those KNs, the 1919 in that grade is pretty truly rare, so I wouldn't be at all surprised to see it fetch the asking price. I'm not sure I'd want the (inferior) 1918 as part of the deal though.

Sic transit gloria mundi. Oh for the days when W&W were conservative in their grading! I'd grade that 1841 as barely Fair, not a hint of Fine anywhere near it As for the prices - truly shocking. Even a deliberately low estimate (which is normal for auction houses) shouldn't be any less than 1/3 to 1/2 of a confident upper bid.

And how much? Ooooops, it has been answered already :-) Far be it from me to introduce a cynical note (quoth he, introducing a cynical note), but if London Coins are a major advertiser with Coin News, or there is a strong personal connection with the editorial there, then how free from bias would we say that article actually was? I'm sure it is true that the CGS grading standards are high, but are we saying that only a slabbed coin can be accurately graded? That would be a sorry day, if true! There would have to be a whole lot of other advantages to make me give houseroom to ugly slabs.

I think if you go to the very top - Christies, Baldwins, Spink - there is far less likely to be a problem at auction: those places have good experts. But even respectable middle-ranking auction houses simply don't have the professional expertise. I'm speaking after attending many auctions at Warwick&Warwick : the local dealer, Peter Viola, always scrutinised the lots, and he was the one to go to on the morning of the sale and ask "Any problems?" Usually there were. So any provincial auction without a Peter Viola on hand, could contain some (I can't say how many, but I'm prepared to guess it's got worse the last few years) problem lots to snag the unwary. The auction houses act in good faith, but they often fail to spot expert forgeries from China.