I recently made a trade that I think you’ll find quite interesting!
Some years back, when I first started collecting coins, I picked up an 1835 “Classic Head” half cent without fully understanding what I was doing (the old “buy the book before the coin” advice, right?). Finally, after several attempts, I managed to find it a new home. Success!
I’m not sure about you, but holding onto coins that remind me of my past mistakes really drives me nuts. So, even though I took a loss of about $90, I was quite happy to let go of this one.
In return, I acquired a fascinating gold “Fanam” coin from 18th century India, something I’d never seen before, along with some extra cash to boost my “coin fund”!
Here are some pictures and details to check out:
The obverse (front) of the coin is stunning and detailed, which is what caught my eye three years ago. I ended up ignoring the obvious cleaning on the reverse — oops. The picture doesn’t do it justice, but it shines brighter than the sun, which unfortunately reduces its value significantly. But hey, you live and learn, right?
Still, it’s a nice piece of 1800s American coinage, and I’d love to eventually replace it with a better, uncleaned version for my collection. Our coins were so beautiful back in the day, don’t you think? And isn’t it cool that we used to have half-cents?
(Here’s a link to our posts about unusual denominations if you want to see other interesting ones: https://cointhrill.com/category/odderror/)
(Excuse the markings, haha… I’ve since moved the coin to a clear plastic Air-Tite holder, my preferred storage method.)
As I mentioned earlier, I didn’t know much about these coins, but when I saw them in my friend’s collection, I knew I had to have one.
Most of his were flatter and rounder, but this one stood out because it was more detailed and *concave*, which I thought was unique. I later did some research and found this nugget in the American Journal of Numismatics, Volume 50:
“Fanam. Likely a corruption of Panam by Europeans. A term for both gold and silver coins commonly used in southern India. The gold Fanam is a small coin that circulated in Travancore and the Malabar Coast.”
Isn’t that fascinating? And this coin is tiny! You can see in the pictures that it’s smaller than that 1 1/2 pence coin from Great Britain we wrote about last year.
Here’s a close-up of the sides so you can see the symbols:
These beautiful coins come from… just kidding! You know what it is – cold hard cash!
If the picture looks a bit odd or “digital,” it’s because I took a picture of the bills on my computer to outsmart Photoshop. They’re getting better at spotting money images, but they’re not foolproof yet! Always a workaround, right?
Hope you enjoyed the story!
Has anyone else made any interesting trades recently? Or want to share any early collecting blunders?
