Beitrag
von pfennig-cowboy » Do 11.07.24 00:56
Hello,
I am sorry that I can only post in English. Of course I am happy to receive your replies in German, translate works quite well for reading.
I am an accidental coin collector. My father brought a coin collection when he moved from Germany in 1949. He dies a while ago and we thought it was lost. But the collection arrived at my house in a box after my mother died, with a note that it was for my son. I have put the coins in safe holders and identified most of them. My purpose as a collector is to learn about the coins and keep them safe for my son to have when he is old enough. I have no plans to sell any or buy coins to add to the collection.
The first thing I learned about the collection is that it was not my father's. He was born in 1926 and the collection mostly stops in about 1920. I think my father would put in coins from his travels, but most of the collection is German coins from the middle ages to the early 20th century. So my grandfather, who lived in Berlin from 1870 to 1935 must have been the collector. I would love to learn more about the life of a coin collector in 1800s Berlin.
The coins are all silver, if there was any gold, I think those must have been sold during hard times. Most of the coins are smaller amounts, pfennig and fractions of a thaler. I am not an expert, but I think most of the coins are not valuable because they are worn and damaged.
There are about 200 coins, most from 1700 and 1800s, with about 30 from before 1700. The largest groups are from Brandenburg, Prussia, Silesia, and Austria. Our family moved to Berlin from the Polish border area. And there are smaller numbers from other regions of Germany and other countries.
I find identification to be an exciting challenge. I mostly used numista.com but recently I working on the older coins, without dates and writing, and many of them are not on that website. So I have been learning about the old books that are online, like saurma.info and Bahrfeldt. But I may ask for some help as well.
I have two questions. First, how do people organize old German coins? I have been putting them into groups of the modern German states, except I am keeping Prussia and Silesia separate. Is there a better way?
And I see separate forums for Altdeutschland and Deutsches Mittelalter, is there a year that separates those categories?
thank you, Michael
