Lot of 4 Counterfeit Coins from China

trozau

I bid and won a lot of 4 counterfeit coins from China (previous subject of a darkside thread) and they arrived yesterday. On hand they look real nice and you can tell that there is something strange about them when you examine them closely (especially with a loop). Here's the pics from the auction of the lot.

Yunan 7 Mace and 2 Candareens



Flying Dragon Dollar



Chinese Junk Dollar (no birds variety)



British Trade Dollar

danglen

Can you tell me whether they are running these pieces regularly on eBay? They would make a nice addition to my counterfeit collection

JohnZ

I wonder if anyone lost their head for making those.

Wasn't counterfeiting punishable by death in China for many years?

JohnZ

Here's something slightly OT to this thread. The British Trade Dollar reminded me of a US Trade Dollar that I own. These were occasionally smuggled out of Japan in junks transporting barrels of tar. They would dump the coins in the tar, and then clean them up later. Sometimes you come across one that received this rather ignominious treatment.

CIVITAS

Interesting pieces. Looks like they might actually be made from silver too. They all have a funky look to them in these high quality photographs, but you take the typical chump eBay seller with bad scans, and these could easily be passed to the unsuspecting, especially the British trade dollar.

Speaking of fakes, this came in over the counter a few days ago:

spoon

Ah, so someone did get a lot They do look pretty good
to the counterfeiters

Who was the seller again? I forgot. Is he still selling these?


I never knew about the tar.. I've got an old Prussian coin that probably suffered through the days of Napoleon with tar stuck in the details.. I never thought that's what it could be until now but it's gotta be. Odd.

CIVITAS

John, that tar story is interesting. Do you have a reference for that? I'd be interested to read it.

291fifth

I know many if not most darkside collectors hate slabs. My prediction is that these Chinese counterfeits will become such a plague on the market that slabbing of darkside material will become commonplace in the very near future.

1jester

I agree with 2915th on both accounts: Chinese (and other) counterfeits are so well done (in some cases), and prolific, that it's going to change our hobby drastically. And Darkside coins will fall prey to the sl*bbing disease partially as a result of this.

On the brighter side, the increase in business will keep the forums open and free for a while longer!

Nice to see you over here, New Yorker!



edit: John, I believe these fakes are very modern productions.

historygeek

Seller:

wattwat

linky

trozau

danglen and spoon,

Not sure if he is selling anymore. I know some of the counterfeit lots did not sell so he may re-list them. All the counterfeit sycees sold (I think) and so did all the trial strikes and dies. He did not have duplicates as he said he bought them for a study and was done with it so he was selling them. Ebay id is wattwat. Just send an inquiry email via ebay (in case you want to inquire about any other counterfeits that he may still have). The coins are actually more lustrous on hand than in the pictures.