An Owl for Anka

Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

--

Consumer: http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur: http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit: http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

Reid Goldsborough wrote:
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

SNG Cop 31ff. Classical owl. It seems a couple grams light, but I can't
really see anything that jumps out at me. I'm stumped on the "interesting"
characteristic. Hmm....

On Mar 11, 11:16�pm, "Matthew" wrote:
Reid Goldsborough wrote:
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

SNG Cop 31ff. �Classical owl. �It seems a couple grams light, but I can't
really see anything that jumps out at me. �I'm stumped on the "interesting"
characteristic. �Hmm....- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's a fouree, of course. These are usually ascribed to the emergency
issue mentioned in Aristophanes' play The Frogs, but they could be
private forgeries too. It is because of the danger of plated coins
like these that coins were frequently tested by chopping them with a
chisel.

Bob wrote:
On Mar 11, 11:16?pm, "Matthew" wrote:
Reid Goldsborough wrote:
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a
bit, but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be
educational, and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with
sarcasm or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my
feelings might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It
could be interesting to get something going here about ancient
coins to show the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If
this works, I'll do the same with another.

SNG Cop 31ff. ?Classical owl. ?It seems a couple grams light, but I
can't really see anything that jumps out at me. ?I'm stumped on the
"interesting" characteristic. ?Hmm....- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's a fouree, of course. These are usually ascribed to the emergency
issue mentioned in Aristophanes' play The Frogs, but they could be
private forgeries too. It is because of the danger of plated coins
like these that coins were frequently tested by chopping them with a
chisel.

Is it because of the rust-colored areas of damage that it's a fouree? How
can you tell that is not dirt or other staining on such a worn coin?

On Mar 11, 11:01�pm, Reid Goldsborough
wrote:
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

--

Consumer:http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur:http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit:http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

Please refer to The Celator, Vol. 19, No. 10, October 2005; "Copper
Owls: The Emergency Coinage of Athens 406 BC" by Michael E. Marotta

Nyuk nyuk nyuk....

~Anka

On Mar 11, 11:01�pm, Reid Goldsborough
wrote:
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

--

Consumer:http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur:http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit:http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

As long as we're showing of...

http://www.vcoins.com/ancient/sayles...idProduct=7126

Dum dee dum dum.....

~Anka

Dare I mention the c word? Billy


"Reid Goldsborough" wrote in message
...
Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

--

Consumer: http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur: http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit: http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

On Mar 12, 3:38�pm, "note.boy" wrote:
Dare I mention the c word? �Billy

"Reid Goldsborough" wrote in message

...



Things are a mess around here, in a funny kind of way. Here's my own
little contribution to substance. I'm going to have to show off a bit,
but unapologetically, and unavoidably. This could also be educational,
and fun. Or not.

OK, Anka, and anybody else who'd like to respond. I know you collect
Owls, or have at least one. I know others collect them too, have
studied them, or have a more casual interest. Up for a challenge? I
promise to be nice.

Here's an Owl, recently acquired, weighing 12.98g and measuring 22mm
in diameter:

http://rg.ancients.info/misc/Owl1.jpg

Can you further identify it? What's interesting, or uninteresting,
about it?

No problem if you don't feel up to responding or respond with sarcasm
or abstruseness, in English or any other language. Well, my feelings
might be hurt a little, but I probably deserve it. It could be
interesting to get something going here about ancient coins to show
the uninitiated what the excitement is all about. If this works, I'll
do the same with another.

--

Consumer:http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur:http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit:http://rg.ancients.info/bogos- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

You better mean "counterfeit," buddy. ;-)

~Anka

Another long post...

Everybody who has responded thus far is correct, more or less. This
coin is, or purports to be, a classical Athenian Owl issued c. 449-413
BC that can be attributed among other ways as SNG Cop 31ff. However,
the rust- or brown-colored areas on the coin's surfaces indicate the
coin isn't as it purports to be, that it instead is a fourree, or
plated coin, in this case silver-plated copper. The light weight is
another diagnostic, with authentic Owls typically weighing between
16.0 and the official weight of 17.2 grams.

Here's one interesting part. Classical Owls, having this design, are
one of the few coin types in history in which there were official
plated specimens, meaning this coin isn't *necessarily* an ancient
counterfeit. These official plated Owls are typically termed Emergency
Issue Owls. They were issued at the end of the Peloponnesian War,
which Athens was losing to Sparta, as revealed in Aristophanes' c. 405
BC play The Frogs and by numismatic evidence. Anka points to a 2005
Celator article about these, but this article's thesis is that the
only coins that should be called Emergency Issue Owls are those that
can be linked to just one hoard, the Eleusis/Piraeus Hoard of 1902.
This doesn't make sense numismatically or logically -- there have been
many other hoards uncovered before and since then that included
Emergency Issue Owls -- and this thesis has been ignored.

On the other hand, too many plated Owls are called Emergency Issues,
with some dealers trying to sell up their coins in this way. The
majority of plated Owls in all probability are simply ancient
counterfeits, and not as desirable, rather than official coins issued
in desperation by one of history's greatest cities and having appeal
for this reason. How experts distinguish unofficial ancient
counterfeit Owls and official Emergency Issue Owls, right now, is
through stylistic analysis. Die analysis would be a more accurate
method, but as yet no one has attempted this. Still, stylistic
analysis is on fairly firm ground here. The style of classical Owls
evolved during the half century of so in which they were issued,
though the stylistic variation wasn't nearly as great as the jump from
those Owls that preceded them as well as those Owls that followed
them. J.N. Svoronos in his posthumously published 1924 book Corpus of
the Ancient Coins of Athens (translated in English in 1975) does a
good job of illustrating Emergency Issue Owls and placing them within
the context of other late classical Owls.

The style of my coin indicates it's not an official Emergency Issue
silver-plated copper Owl but an unofficial counterfeit. Athena's eye
is symmetrical and closed at the right corner in the style of early
classical Owls, not asymmetrical and open in the style of late
classical Owls that the Emergency Issues were part of. Also, Athena's
nose is overlarge and totally un-Athenian, styled much like the noses
on many tribal or "barbarous" ancient coins that copied classical
designs.

With this particular piece, and this is another interesting part, the
dealer didn't try to sell up the coin by calling it an Emergency Issue
but recognized it for what it is, simply an ancient counterfeit. The
seller was Joe Sermarini of FORVM Ancient Coins (http://
forumancientcoins.com), which also hosts the most active online
discussion of ancient coins on the Internet. I should point out that I
have no financial interest in what he does -- just giving credit where
credit is due.

Other interesting parts: Unlike many Owl fourrees, this one hasn't
been test cut, which was a commonly used method in ancient times to
uncover silver-plated coins of this and other types by taking a chisel
or other blade to the surfaces to reveal the interior. In this case
the interior has been revealed only over the course of many centuries
of the coin being buried underground, with corrosion eroding the
silver plating in parts. The brown is the underlying copper. The green
is the intermediate area separating the copper interior from the
silver plating, sometimes called the eutectic layer. Metallurgical
analyses on other fourrees indicates that this layer consists of 72
percent silver and 28 percent bronze. It's unclear whether the
eutectic layer was a copper-silver solder applied to help bond the
silver plating to the copper core or was formed when the silver-plated
planchet was heated, partially melting and interdiffusing the silver
and copper.

Not all fourrees display silver, brown, and green areas, though among
people who collect fourrees those that do are deemed more attractive
and desirable. Some fourrees reveal only a brown interior. Some have
plating that's entirely intact and are revealed for what they are
through their low weight and sometimes as well by stylistic anomalies.
And some have plating that's entirely corroded away.

Fourrees have their own history and consequence and are valued for
this by historians, numismatists, and the marketplace. It's not known
whether Owl fourrees were used by Athens' enemies as weapons of war,
but peoples and countries throughout history have counterfeited the
coins and paper money of their enemies during wartime. The same
happens today. What has also happened throughout history is that coins
have been faked by common criminals trying to make an obol, or a buck.
With Owls, as has been pointed out, the widespread existence of
ancient Owl fourree counterfeits, along with official plated Emergency
Issues Owls, is the reason so many good-metal Owls were test cut in
ancient times and why we see so many test-cut Owls in the numismatic
marketplace today.

--

Consumer:http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur:http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit:http://rg.ancients.info/bogos

On Mar 12, 1:20*pm, "Matthew" wrote:

Is it because of the rust-colored areas of damage that it's a fouree? *How
can you tell that is not dirt or other staining on such a worn coin?

See how the rust- and green-colored areas appears dug out, in a rut or
depression? That indicates they're lower than the silver surface of
the coin, a result of corrosion that removed the silver above them. If
this was dirt or corrosion, it would appear raised, higher than the
silver surface.

--

Consumer: http://rg.ancients.info/guide
Connoisseur: http://rg.ancients.info/glom
Counterfeit: http://rg.ancients.info/bogos