Coins of the world

Uncleaned Roman coins legit?

I see “lots” of uncleaned Roman coins for bid on Ebay all of the time. I’m fascinated by history, and I’ve boughten some of these coins before and cleaned them up. They look real enough, and it was a long process to get them cleaned up well enough to make out details. However, I’m always skeptical of artifacts you buy on Ebay. Are these lots of uncleaned coins legit? They are real, aren’t they? I know they may not be worth as much as certain specific coins, and sometimes you get blanks, but it’s not about their monetary value for me…it’s more about owning pieces of history. If they are legit, how are they able to sell these great pieces of history so cheap? I would think all of these coins should be in museums.

They are very legit! I buy uncleaned Roman coins from Ebay all the time. Typically, the sellers who sell in large lots (50+ coins) do not do a very good job of sorting out obvious blanks, which is a service the sellers of the smaller lots generally offer. I would also strictly avoid any seller that claims that gold coins have been found in their lots–this is certainly BS; density tests are run on the coins to sort out the gold ones, and gold doesn’t oxidize the way that bronze does, so gold coins are usually easily identifiable to the naked eye even prior to cleaning. It is possible, though uncommon, to find a silver coin in a lot.

Another way to make sure you’re getting your money’s worth is to only buy lots that feature front-and-back photos of the actual coins you will receive. Many bulk sellers will sneak broken coins and fragments into lots that are not photographed, as well as the aforementioned blanks.

One seller that I would recommend is “oldcoinman” on Ebay. Generally, he doesn’t photograph the individual lots, but he always sorts out the blanks (I’ve never found even one in all the lots I’ve purchased from him), and never ships broken or obviously sub-par coins. Best of all, his coins come with excellent cleaning instructions, and a link to his website which has a coin recognition program built-in. You type in whatever letters you can make out on the coin, and it will return a full list of possible matches, all with pictorial and historical descriptions, and often with photos also. A really helpful tool.

I’m with you: I like the historical aspect of the coins. For me, it’s like a 2,000-year-old treasure hunt, and it’s a thrill to be the first one in two milennia to see what’s under all the dirt. The coins are so cheap because they’re unearthed en masse. Deep-detection metal detectors find buried caches of valuables, which is how Romans kept their goods safe before banks became popular. The metal detectors find the coins faster than they can be sold. Hundreds of thousands of uncleaned coins are already out there, so they’re relatively cheap, and there are far too many for them to be expensive museum-sought items.

Rare Roman Coin Found While Metal Detecting

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