Any idea of this coin or if it's worth grading? 0

[IrishPrince]

Hello, total newbie here. (I'm a member of CGC and have had Trading Cards Graded, but totally new to NGC).

I have a few coins that I acquired in 1990 near a dig site in Kusadasi, Turkey. I was at the ancient city of Ephesus where I obtained the following coin. It seems to be fairly heavy -- so I'm thinking it's mostly silver.  Two questions, any idea what this coin is and about how old? Secondly, would this be worth sending to NGC for grading purposes?  I apologize in advance if this is not the appropriate place to ask this type of question. 

[JKK]

Weight and diameter, please. I'm assuming you found them in an encrusted state and cleaned them somehow.

You probably don't want to say, but if you don't mind doing so, I'd be interested to know how you got away with that. My understanding is that the Jandarma--which certainly was at Ephesus in 2008, take my word on that--would become very crabby about such things. While the Jandarma were very polite to me, if they had suspected me of carrying off an artifact, I'm not sure how they'd have taken it.

[IrishPrince]

Hi JKK. It seems to be about 20mm x 23mm in size. My kitchen scale says it's 15 grams. 

I didn't find it -- I bought it in it's current state (looks much darker than when I purchased it) from "a guy in a tent". He was selling junk trinkets to tourists that came off of cruise ships. I asked him to show me some "real" things.... so he took me to a room in the back of his tent. The rest is history, so to speak. 

[IrishPrince]

One more photo in case it helps...

[JKK]

We didn't buy anything from those junk dealers, except for the site guide our tour guide wanted us to buy. It wasn't very expensive, and it made him happy for whatever kickback he gets.

In the case you describe, I would regard it as almost certainly counterfeit. The surface looks very off, uncharacteristic of any authentic Athenian tet (the likely denomination based on weight given) I have ever seen.

[IrishPrince]

7 minutes ago, JKK said:

We didn't buy anything from those junk dealers, except for the site guide our tour guide wanted us to buy. It wasn't very expensive, and it made him happy for whatever kickback he gets.

In the case you describe, I would regard it as almost certainly counterfeit. The surface looks very off, uncharacteristic of any authentic Athenian tet (the likely denomination based on weight given) I have ever seen.

Gotcha. I bought this ring off of the same guy so I was hoping it was legit. Oh well, lessoned learned. Thanks for you help!

 

[JKK]

If you'd like to do some comparisons, the search string is "Athens tetradrachm." I would comb auction listings for slabbed examples by major grading services (ANACS, NGC, PCGS), and I'd check Wildwinds. They are heavily counterfeited, but some professionally authenticated examples would show you what real ones look like. If you can find any with a surface like yours, which looks muddy and cast, you might revisit the idea. Also take a good look at the edge, which isn't shown in the photos. If you see a seam circling the coin, or evidence that one was filed off, that's a datum.

[Jeremymundo]

On 5/27/2021 at 11:53 AM, IrishPrince said:

Gotcha. I bought this ring off of the same guy so I was hoping it was legit. Oh well, lessoned learned. Thanks for you help!

 

I have one kinda like that one. 

[Conder101]

Don't know anything about the ring but the tetradrachm definitely looks like a "tourist" fake. and as such if the ring came from the same source it is most likely a fake as well.

[IrishPrince]

On 8/26/2021 at 9:25 AM, Conder101 said:

Don't know anything about the ring but the tetradrachm definitely looks like a "tourist" fake. and as such if the ring came from the same source it is most likely a fake as well.

Yep, the coin was fake. I'm thinking the ring was fake also. I'll only buy from legit sources from now on.... that mistake was over 30 years ago, so I've wised up (somewhat) since then. 

Edited August 26, 2021 by IrishPrince