Very few Guides offer an understanding of Buying and Grading uncleaned coins & the sellers. We will guide you along in understanding what you should expect from your purchases and what to avoid from sellers.
First off, the Romans did not have modern coin making machines and every coin was hand struck. They weren't always struck on perfect pieces of round metal and the coins you may find can have jagged edges, be oval in shape, concave, convex, badly misshapen, or just plain odd looking! Remember these coins have been buried for nearly 2000 years and will have some slight deformities not normally seen with modern coins.

Standard Uncleaned Coins

You will often find these on sites such as eBay being sold as varying grades, sometimes by sellers out to make a quick buck and overgrading them, or selling them as "gold found". These are your bottom end  coins. These are sorted by the diggers on the basis of being very dirty and little detail showing. Sometimes these are often the best coins to get to find rare and unique coins. Because they are very dirty the diggers often cant see what's underneath so what may be revealed by your cleaning will often be a surprise.

At this level you may find many culls (reject coins). For every 10 coins purchased you can expect the cull rate to be anywhere from 4 to 10 coins. Some batches are horrendous with few coins being keeper coins. You take the risks buying these coins but you also reap the rewards when you find a rare coin. These are the fun end of uncleaned coins because what you are revealing has been buried for 1600+ years and you're the first person to sell what's underneath!

Caveat Emptor (buyer beware) many sellers on ebay grade these coins as premium, to make a quick buck from those who do not know better. Always try to buy coins that are actually pictured in the auction.

Premium Grade Uncleaned Coins

These used to be the apex of uncleaned coins. Premiums generally have better flans (less ragged) and have some detail before cleaning, so that you are guaranteed to have a coin with some detail after cleaning. This is not to say you will have a coin perfectly centred, with FDC graded images on them. Every single coin may be low grade after cleaning but your coins should have detail on them. Premium is used to describe coins with some detail on them to high levels of detail on them. Just because a seller says their coins are Premium coins does not mean they are premium coins.

High Grade Uncleaned Coins

These generally have a lot of detail on them before cleaning. They will generally be far easier to clean than the standard or premium coins. These coins generally have zero culls in them. This is not to say that you will have FDC graded coins after cleaning. High Grade coins are an indication of better quality uncleaned coins, coins with lots of details, better flans. These also have the lowest amount of surprises in them. These have been sorted on the basis of detail before cleaning so you can buy a higher quality uncleaned coin. These are great for people with very little patience to clean coins or
people with short attention spans or people that just want more keeper coins for their hard earned dollars spent!

Culls

These have been removed by some sellers from their uncleaned coin lots and are sold as practice coins, culls, low grade, rubbish. Always keep in mind that some sellers culls are better than other sellers uncleaned coins! But, for the most part they are good to just practice your experimental coin cleaning techniques on.

Crusty

These coins are encrusted and can reveal a rare nicely detailed coin, or simply nothing but a slug. Crusty coins have becoming very popular among the Serious coin cleaners. They are not for the beginner as alot of elbow grease is involved.

Additional Important Notes

-It is useful to note that many sellers of uncleaned coins will not grade their coins and leave it up to the buyer to make a determination of the coins grade by looking at the pictures.

- SHOW ME THE MONEY! See the coins before you buy. Always try to buy from sellers that show you actual coins on auction. If its a large offering - dutch type auction, check their feedback. Some sellers put all the best ones on top and all the junk which you will receive is underneath.

- GOLD FOUND! Want to know what seller to avoid? If the seller states "Gold Found" in the title or in the auctions avoid them like the plague. Nemesiscoins on ebay has sold over 500,000 uncleaned coins and never once has Gold coin EVER been found. Silver is very very rare but happens.

- THE GOLD FANNAM TRICK! Some unscrupulous sellers have been using Indian gold fannams (circa 17th century India) to add to their uncleaned coins lots (the process of seeding), in hope of you leaving gold found feedback. As a buyer you should know that you can pick these up for 10-20$USA each. More disturbing is that some buyers have reported that these fannams (which are usually about 7mm in size) have been cut into 4 pieces so your only getting a quarter of a 7mm coin! The unsuspecting buyer thinks they discovered an ancient Gold coin.

-FEEDBACK or FLEABACK! Remember to always check a sellers feedback. Avoid sellers whose feedback is mainly made up of buyers with very little feedback (0-5) or a seller with alot of gold found claims they usually consist of the sellers friends, relatives or one of their alter ID's.

-PICTURE THIS! Some sellers steal pictures or description from other sellers or websites. What do you think you'll get from this type of seller?

While there are many unscrupulous sellers, there are just as many Great sellers. Follow our guideline and you will be sure to enjoy this intoxicating hobby safely!

Nemesis Ancients & Antiquities, Inc.

Authored by Cerberus Coins &  Nemesis Ancients & Antiquities

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