Mm, coins. I collect the ones I find interesting, regardless of worth. Mostly foreign. Favorites are usually the ones that drive me mad because I can’t identify them. However, I do have a large 1853 coin from France with a picture of Napoleon III that was one of the first more-than-a-century-old coins in my collection that has a special place in my heart.
Also love cleaning old unidentified Roman coins. I like to think about whether they were used and what they were used to purchase.
I bought a grab bag of unidentfied bronze Roman coins from a catalog. Cleaned the mud off of them, and found one in pretty decent shape. Managed to identify it from a book I checked out of the library. Probably wasn’t worth a great deal, maybe $40-$50. Then it got stolen.
The first Roman coin I ever bought is a really neat conversation piece. On one side is the figure of Sol Invictis, the “unconquered” Sun. The god whose feast day was celebrated on the winter solstice. This very same feast day was appropriated by the early Christians, who had to be seen celebrating on each pagan feast day and therefore assigned Christian themes to each of them. So the feast of Sol Invictis was eventually outshone by the celebration of Christmas. The other side of this coin shows the head of Constantine, the first Christian emperor (though he was only baptized on his death bed). Nice little curiosity there.
I can’t tell if my favorite American coin is the big old pennys before they got shrunk or one of the unusual denominations, 2¢, 3¢ or 20¢. The old Franklin 50¢ pieces ain’t too bad. His head is just so smooth.
My grandfather was in the Navy for years. Had a ton of foreign coins. When I started he gave me a whole handfull. Let’s see what I got.
Guatemala, Barbados, Tonga, Venezuela, Luxembourg, Phillipines (1944 10 centavos), Denmark, Hungary, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore (prettiest coins), Israel, Italy, Korea (they say Bank of Korea on them), France (a few predate revaluation the oldest is 1954), Finland, Mexico (1945 is the earliest. I found some of these when we lived in Texas), Hong Kong (I like the wavy shaped ones), Slovakia (I’m a quarter Slovakian), Belgium, Thailand (My mother’s boyfriend is a skydiver and they do lots of world records there), Czech Republic, Netherlands (they’re so tiny!), The UK (the oldest is a penny from 1901 with Q. Victoria on it), Canada (what American hasn’t gone through a hoard of Canadian coins? The oldest is a 1946 50¢ piece that’s pretty tarnished), New Zealand, Taiwan, Vietnam (10 dong from 1964), Australia, Germany, Austria, Ireland (shame these ones are gone, they’re very nice), Pakistan (remember that McDonald’s promo from the mid 80s? They had coins of the world with their food. I think that’s how I got Honduras as well), China (Pretty old but so common it’s worth is whatever its base metals are), Rome (Good old Emperor Probus), Greece (My oldest coin at over 2300 years old) and lots and lots from the USA (my oldest being an 1809 1/2¢). And bills from Peru, Poland, Canada, Russia, Singapore, Luxembourg, Cambodia, Thailand and Slovakia. I used to have from really old rubels from the Soviet Union but I can’t find them.
Boy there are a lot of countries I’m missing! My Mom used to travel all over but now she’s settled into a routine and I don’t need any more coins from NZ or Thailand or Canada. Ah well, maybe she’ll get the bug when she retires.
If you roll them up, I’ll buy all you have for $20 a roll. In fact, you don’t even have to roll them, just put them in tubes.
I bet they are 1976 $2 bills.
For some strange reason people took $2 bills (the new bicentenial version) to the Post Office and had them postmarked. I have one which has had the stamp removed but the postmark is there. It isn’t worth anything more then $2, but I keep it for fun.
Speaking of coins, I got a really cool one today. A 1946d Jefferson nickel with a MS-60 grade. The best part, it has a printing error on his jaw line. Looks like a blob of oil or something got in the press. It’s a nice error in good shape with gold toning.