Detecting forgeries

Part 4: Transfer die forgeries Fakes coming from transfer dies are so dangerous, because these fakes have neither the characteristics of casts nor the characteristics of coins that have been struck with newly cut dies. You neither can...

Giovanni da Cavino was an exceptionally gifted artist and an honoured businessman when he imitated the first Roman coins. As ‘Paduans’, they were destined to achieve world fame later on. He provided the high society with what it looked for and earned good money with it. In those days, nobody would have dreamt co call him a forger...

In March 1788, a police unit of the Westminster community stormed a locked room in London. They had been tipped off that two people committed a crime in that house that was forbidden under penalty of death: false coining...

Part 3: Electrotypes The last two parts on news from the forgery front have dealt with fakes that have been produced by newly cut dies and with cast fakes. This part is dedicated to a third kind of fakes: the electrotypes. You will surely recognize ...

Part 1: Counterfeits from newly cut dies Each collector of coins who doesn’t buy exclusively at coin dealers who guarantee for the authenticity of their sold coins (like for example all members of the IAPN do) has to be concerned about buying fakes. Especially the...

Part 2: Cast counterfeits After having shown how to detect counterfeits from newly cut dies we will deal with those fakes that have been cast. Once again, we see here an old imitation of a Roman coin that was made during the Renaissance period. It is a free imitation of ...