MMV Coin Cleaning Contest
I belonged to coin groups on Yahoo. (Yahoo Groups are mainly closed down now) UncleanedAncientCoins and UncleanedCoins had an ancient coin cleaning contest every couple of years. The MMV (2005) coin cleaning contest was the first one that I have participated in. There were 50 paid participants and each was given 5 months to clean a total of 19 dirty coins. You then chose your best Greek coin, Byzantine Trachy Cup, large Roman coin and small Roman coin and sent them in for judging. The following are the before and after pictures of the coins that I cleaned and sent in.
This coin is from PTOLEMAIS-AKE, PHOENICIA- AE15. (2.4g). Obv: Jugate heads of Dioskuroi right. Rev: Cornucopia. Reference for this coin is Lindgren 2311; SG 6046. Ptolemais-Ake was a small ancient port city in Phoenicia to the south of Tyre. Minted 174-165 BC. This coin won first prize in the Greek portion of the contest. My prize for winning was a pair of Julius Caesar coins, one an authentic coin, another a modern fake of the same coin.
Alexius III Billion Trachy Byzantine 1195-1203 AD Sear Byzantine 2012 Christ’s bust facing, beardless, wearing nimbus cr., pallium & colobium, blessing w/r. hand, scroll in left Reverse: Alexius III on left. & Saint Constantine on right, standing. facing, holding gl. cr. Between; each w/ crown, division & loros & holding a labarum.
Constantius II after cleaning D N CONSTANTIVS P F AVG, / FEL TEMP REPARATIO. November 6, 355 - November 3, 361 A.D.