DaveG38

Blimey that's worth over £3K! My father-in-law took to collecting Royal Mint products for a while and subsequently gave them to me. This was one of the purchases. He gave me a good start at a date run of 20thC sovereigns as well. The only trouble is that I now find I need to keep all of them at the bank.

The only Piedfort I have is the 2004 Entente Cordiale crown in platinum - given to me - nice present!!

To me that engraving looks like the dreadnought the King George V, which is fitting given the coin and which side the engraving was done on.

I'd probably agree in most situations and for most coins. However, let's say I've just picked up an uncirculated 1854 sixpence, shilling or florin for a lowish price on account of the bloody great hole some idiot has drilled in it. I can either live with the hole or I can spend a modest amount to bring that coin back to almost newly minted condition. To be honest, I'd be tempted to have it repaired given the quality of the repair.

Would'nt like to lick it though I'm struggling to read the denomination on the Mercury coin. Can't wait for the Uranium and Plutonium. I wonder if you will be able to keep them at home. Probably keep getting EDF knocking on the door to see if they can borrow it. You wouldn't want to keep them in your pocket!

I believe the 2008 Britannia 50p is also difficult to find in change, although obviously no problem from a set. And of the Olympics 50ps there's obviously the underwater swimmer variety.

Love this one and its description.. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/1820-KING-GEORGE-IVS-GREAT-BRITAIN-GOLD-FULL-SOVEREIGN-COIN-Very-Rare-/140874778522?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item20ccca879a Apparently its a 'genuine full sovereign. This coin may value more because might be error in dating. For genuine buyer only.' I'm so reassured by all those 'genuines'. I'm not sure what a non-genuine buyer looks like - any ideas anyone?

Declan, I've seen one or two in no better than fine condition, maybe poorer, so I reckon a few must have done the rounds for a while. One was a 1934!

Well the one on the left is obviously the raised nose wart variety and the one on the right is the cheek and neck tumour variety.

All I can add is that I got a 2011 shield type in change the other day. Are you sure the Edinburgh ones for sale on ebay aren't just recovered from breaking up sets?

How about this one for eye appeal? Reasonable grade though (I think?). http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=280985751106&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:GB:1123

It would be quite fun to 'buy' it on ebay and then fail to pay, leaving the seller with a bill of 10% i.e. £152,100 for the ebay fees. Now that would be adding to the Greek debt crisis!! Joking aside (am I?), it looks to me as if this is either a counterfeit (the Jubilee head looks a bit rough) or this is a marriage of a hollowed out Jubilee head coin with an inserted George V 1918 reverse - looks like the India mintmark to me. Can I see a rather sharp looking line around the inner rim on the reverse? Taking a second look at the close up, there seems to be some white metal showing through in places, which possibly means its a fake, maybe like the ones I found a few years ago, which I reckon were made from depleted Uranium to give the correct weight. The 10% only applies to the 1st 750, so it would only cost $75 £75 Azda, Is that right? Drat and double drat.

It would be quite fun to 'buy' it on ebay and then fail to pay, leaving the seller with a bill of 10% i.e. £152,100 for the ebay fees. Now that would be adding to the Greek debt crisis!! Joking aside (am I?), it looks to me as if this is either a counterfeit (the Jubilee head looks a bit rough) or this is a marriage of a hollowed out Jubilee head coin with an inserted George V 1918 reverse - looks like the India mintmark to me. Can I see a rather sharp looking line around the inner rim on the reverse? Taking a second look at the close up, there seems to be some white metal showing through in places, which possibly means its a fake, maybe like the ones I found a few years ago, which I reckon were made from depleted Uranium to give the correct weight.

Thanks for the elucidation, Dave! I do agree there is a wide 'grey' area between variety and micro-variety which is nicely served by the middling term minor-variety! Can I just ask your own thoughts on the individual hammered dies, which all display clear legend differences (letter rotations, significant gaps, alignments etc), how would you describe them? I'm not sure if you're familiar with the work of BCW, but they have broken up the types into varieties using privy marks, busts, and the punches used for the major components (roses, LIS, lions, etc.), as well as major legend differences (HI/HIB, FR/FRA etc)! Do you think the next stage, moving into die identification, where there are still very clear differences seen easily with the naked eye, crosses into the 'minor' area, or are they a further extension of the major varieties? This could potentially extend the sixpence series into a thousand+ from what I'm seeing? Each would be clearly distinctive in hand, any thoughts? Coinery, When I produced my books I tried very hard to include all the known varieties so that there was a practical record of the various die types of the 20thC. This was made possible by the huge amount of material left from pre-decimal days to study, although even now there are new discoveries being made. To try and do the same for the hammered series would in my view be almost impossible. Maybe for a specific denomination and monarch it can be done, but to do so for the wide range of dies, striking forces, centralisations of flans etc. would be more than my lifetime's work I guess.

Personally, I regard the kind of varieties displayed by the 1957 halfpenny as appropriate to the category of 'minor varieties' as opposed to 'micro'. For what it's worth, I feel that the term 'micro' should be reserved for the genuinely microscopic differences that occur. At the risk of plugging my own book, here's my quote from the 'silver' one, which perfectly illustrates what I mean. 'Whilst researching this book, I came across an extraordinary design issue, which I had never heard of before, but which can be regarded as leading to micro-varieties (as if minor types are not enough!). In the Coin Monthly magazine of December 1977, there is an article by J.C.Rudge entitled ‘The 19 Varieties of the 1949 Shilling’, which talks about the successful prosecution of a Mr. James Steele of Edinburgh. This individual was found guilty of forging excellent quality florins, in part at least, because the Royal Mint were able to show that his coins, whilst superbly forged, had errors in the number of ‘nicks’ in the edge milling. Apparently, the Mint declined to provide information about this means of validating their coins on security grounds, suggesting that the number of nicks could be regarded as a kind of ‘mint mark’ in order to validate the year they were produced. In a feat of truly heroic study, J.C.Rudge set about analysing these nicks for the silver series i.e. the sixpence, shilling, florin and halfcrown (I’m not sure about crowns), publishing his results in the British Numismatic Journal for 1968. The 1977 Coin Monthly article concluded that the 1949 Shilling has at least 19 varieties based on the number of edge nicks. Multiply this typical figure by all the silver coin denominations and dates for the 20th Century and the number of micro-varieties based on the number of ‘nicks’ will be truly staggering.' In my view, the use of the term 'heroic' is entirely appropriate for the work done to establish these micro types, but as I say, I don't think it likely that anybody would want to try and collect them all. Now I've said this, I guess somebody on here will pop up and say that they've got a complete set of 1949 shillings!

looks like a william and mary tin halfpenny You are quite right. It is William and Mary and dates from 1690 to 1692. Sadly it isn't a 1689 as the busts are not the correct ones for this rarity.

its a lesson learnt for sure, but now with that knowledge, your better placed to bid in any future auction. dont dismiss auctions on the basis of 1 bad experience, by bidding on individual coins rather than bulk lots, you may fare better. ive never bought a bulk lot, ive had reasonable success with my bids on individual coins, i have returned 1 coin (in many lots)as i thought it wasnt of the grade the listing suggested and was given a full refund. maybe ask some help here on a piece and take another punt. ski I'd certainly echo what ski says about individual lots. I picked up my EF condition 1934 crown, together with EF examples of the other 1934 coins for £1900 plus fees, which is a hell of a bargain, given the going price for an EF 1934 crown alone. Also, my 1734 halfcrown in VF was well under the book price. So don't give up on general auctions, particularly where individual coins are concerned.

Along with a dozen hubcaps, 4 mobile phones, a sovereign ring and the keys to an Escort XR3. All in a sack marked 'Swag'. Surely the 'swag' bag is inside the XR3?

Anybody got a clue what's going on with the estimates for the next auction on the Croydon Coin Auction web site. There are either consistently incorrect descriptions or weird estimates. I know that estimates are often low and unrealistic, but these are mostly insanely unrealistic. For instance there's a 1937 Unc crown plus later crowns (the usual ones) estimated at £320 and immediately below it a 1683 sixpence in EF estimated at £60!!! Then there's a 1732 crown in AU estimated at £130 (wish I could buy at that price). Also a 1675 halfpenny in AF estimated at £130 following a similar date in AEF at £110. And so on. It's not just the odd coin either - there seem to be lots of inconsistencies throughout. Perhaps they've got a dyslexic typist.

I'm not so sure that the normal rules of bullion value apply here. Unless I misread the Royal Mint website, only 2012 of these soverigns have been struck, making them considerbly rarer than any of the other designs in recent years. That's bound to lead to a premium, rather like the 1989 sovereign. However, the RM price is £450, whilst the bullion value is around £250-260, so the question is whether you will see any 'investment' value on the £450 paid. Personally, I doubt it over the medium term of say 10-20 years. After that maybe, but an awful lot depends on what happens to gold prices. I think you have mis read there are 750,000 for bullion.2012 special boxed with COA etc.Plus 5500 proof Thanks for that. You are quite right. A BU sovereign is 'just' £379, still a premium, but better than the £450. I'm not sure how I misread the site, but obviously I have.

I'm not so sure that the normal rules of bullion value apply here. Unless I misread the Royal Mint website, only 2012 of these soverigns have been struck, making them considerbly rarer than any of the other designs in recent years. That's bound to lead to a premium, rather like the 1989 sovereign. However, the RM price is £450, whilst the bullion value is around £250-260, so the question is whether you will see any 'investment' value on the £450 paid. Personally, I doubt it over the medium term of say 10-20 years. After that maybe, but an awful lot depends on what happens to gold prices.

Let's face it, the Glazers are not fools - they and their money are never parted What was the £60,000 item by the way? It's gone, and no-one's thought to actually mention what it was The 1933 and 1952 reverses are such obvious fakes (replicas?), from the size of the teeth and rims. The obverses appear to be blurry impressions taken from actual coins i.e. unlike the replicas that the reverses may have been taken from. The interesting thing is that the 1966 could well be genuine, i.e. struck on a cupro-nickel planchet in error. It looked like it was cast, since there was something not right about the surface finish. It certainly wasn't anywhere near as good as the Chinese fakes of 1763 shillings. The 1933 and 1952 look like the quite nicely done restrikes sold by the guy in Essex, usually for around £14.99 - nice little earner there!!

Has to be the Elizabeth I crown - 1601-02. Fabulous coin. Wish I had one.

Michael Coins is Michael Gouby in West London, I have been really pleased with his prices and grading, highly recommended. Sometimes a little frustrated with the absence of pics on the low-mid priced coins he has listed, but very friendly and helpful. I bought my first coin from Michael Coins in Ladbroke Grove when he used to sell stamps too (before the internet). Second time I went in there he said he'd got rid of the stamps as they were out of fashion (or words to that effect). He gave me a good piece of advice which has stayed with me which is not to collect date fillers but go for high grade coins. I think that's generally good advice for relatively plentiful and even scarcer coins, because there's always another one round the corner or at the next auction. Even if you are a strict date collector then it may be worth waiting for a better one. Where I beg to differ is where I need a specific coin for either a date or even type run and the likelihood of another turning up is remote. For example, I've got a poor (at best) 1689 halfpenny, which cost a huge amount for what is basically a flat, but attributable piece of tin. I've only ever seen one other come up for sale and that was way beyond my price league. Similarly, I recently bought a 1724 WCC shilling in fair condition - I've never seen this WCC date before in any grade and in top condition it would again be out of my price range. This leaves a dilemma. Do I fill the gap with a poorer coin and hope for a better one somewhere in my lifetime, or do I just accept the gap? I hate the gaps, so I usually opt for the former, especially as I can always shift the rare but lower grade coins without too much, if any, financial loss. I'm sure some of the purists on here would take a different view, but that's my thinking. Finally, to again illustrate the point, I need a 1686 tin halfpenny to complete the date run (excluding varieties) and the gap has been nagging away in there for years now. So, if one comes along I'm liable to go for it regardless of condition even if that is lower than I would normally accept.

Assuming this is a fake, I'd like to see Seuk identify the dies!!! And that's leaving aside the wrong denomination attribution. http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/GEORGE-III-DOLLAR-lot-9-/271022283218?pt=UK_Coins_BritishMilled_RL&hash=item3f1a2fd9d2 I like the idea that a bit of TLC would help improve it. The last rites and a vicar might be more appropriate.