this post was submitted on 30 Dec 2024
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Ancient Coins
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Any reason you’re touching them with your bare hands? I’d assume with their ages you’d want to minimize additional degradation from oils
Most of these coins spent more than 2000 years in the ground, after which they were cleaned mechanically or chemically, so as long as you have reasonable clean hands they will be fine.
For top grade coins maybe you want to use gloves, but it's not really necessary with the quality of coins I can afford.
It's a contrast from collecting modern coins for sure, most collectors of ancient coins will break them out of slabs. Slabs are almost only used when selling ancients to modern collectors on the American market.
A slab of coins? What exactly does that look like? Not that I could afford such a thing, I just want to know what I should expect.
Coin slabs are little boxes with a coin inside them on display. They're sold by various companies like NGC, and you can send them your coins and pay them to grade and slab them.
This is super popular for modern American coins, but not to the same degree with collectors of ancient coins. Many dedicated collectors will remove the slab/box so they can touch the coin, which horrifies collectors of modern coins as they think the plastic coffin adds value.
Ah, I see. the most “effort” I’ve put into protecting my coins are the cardboard with a hole in the middle with staples and plastic over the hole, mostly to keep the coin grip-able and in one place. I can’t stand slabbing something unless it’s been graded as uncirculated.
I store mine in trays in a coin suitcase, which works fine. I make sure the felt is acid free and so on, but they're not inside slabs or holders. I want to be able to touch them 😂