Here is my latest plan for my coin collection.

MrBreeze

After years of set building, I broke out of that mold and started buying whatever I thought was interesting, affordable and available. As you can probably guess, this direction created what most would consider an accumulation and not a collection. Unfortunately for me, I seem to love something from nearly every country and time period available. I am really stuck on coins as art, history, etc. But, I still have a need for some tie between the coins. My thought is that I will create a one per year collection. It will actually be two collections as there will be one raw and one certified collection. This, for me, allows the most flexibility in choosing coins while still maintaining the framework of a collection. At this stage, I assume that this collection will be 2,014 coins. That should keep me busy. As for the certified collection, I will probably limit that to one per year 1800-2014 at first, then maybe cover ten years or twenty years or whatever period the coins were minted.

Do any of you collect one per year?

What are your thoughts on this type of collection?

What do you see as problems/hurdles/etc.?

Thanks, in advance for any input.

Stork

The problem I had with the 'one per' concept (though I was doing the country thing, which has it's own problems...) is that I'd end up wanting 'several per'. HOWEVER, this is YOUR collection and you get to define it! It's a cool idea and the slabbed and raw versions will allow for even more flexibility.

Cathy

STLNATS

A couple of thoughts. Maybe the biggest issue is that before 1500, dated coins are the exception and not the rule, can be wickedly expensive and are a collecting theme on their own. There probably are some non-western dated coins whose dates can be translated into the AD dates and some Roman coins have reign dates which can also be roughly translated into the AD dates. There are also a other ancient cultures that explicitly dated some of their coins - the one I'm most familiar with is Parthia - which have coins that can be translated into BC dates so the potential number of years > 2014, at least in theory.

A while ago, someone on the board got around this issue by suggesting a one per century (or even decade) for some periods which seems a reasonable workaround. Also, I'm not clear why you feel compelled to have some of the coins certified, but that's a personal call. Also, are you going to do only circulating coins or include NCLT, specimens, essais, etc etc issues as well?

Slightly off topic, I'm slowly assembling a one per country for my birthyear just for fun. Seems pretty easy, there's < 50 countries that issued coins that year. Its pretty rewarding to see what was issued and there were relatively few NCLTs (except for proofs, essais, or specimen issues which i usually avoid preferring circulation issues) but like Stork I almost immediately decided that I really wanted more than one per and found that the hardest coins to locate are the low value/low denomination circulating issues for some countries.

Just a couple of random thoughts - be sure to have fun with your efforts and good luck!

Pokermandude

I collect whatever is aesthetically pleasing to me. Lately that is ancient coins, and some late hammered/early milled British coins. I am a sucker for anything with a nice portrait and/or with great toning.

desslok

I don't think you can assemble a "one per year" coin with 2014 coins. Coins of the first millennium and the better part of the second millennium just did not have dates on them, and they are usually impossible to date to within a single year.

Yorkshireman

<< <i>I collect whatever is aesthetically pleasing to me. Lately that is ancient coins, and some late hammered/early milled British coins. I am a sucker for anything with a nice portrait and/or with great toning. >>



These are words to live by.
I, too, love a nice portrait and great toning. The coins in my slab box are really in four distinct categories.
The latest and the one of those that is from the International side of the coin world is the beginnings of a monarch portrait set from the start of the current British royal house, which gets its start with George I in 1714.
All have great toning:
George II (LIMA)- 1746
George III (Bull Head) - 1817
Victoria (Old Head) - 1897

I want to complete this set going forward.

Nap

I think a collection with that large a scope is going to be hard to assemble (and as others have said, presumably impossible due to a lack of coins with dates from the first millennium). I would set your goals a little more modestly. You don't want to be overwhelmed and give up in frustration.

MrBreeze

I agree with all points made. I am planning on adjusting for early stuff by picking anything from a mintage range to account for a date. For instance, I collect Chinese cash. Many of these have specific years of mintage, but I could use let's say, a Northern Song coin for any date that it was minted, between 960 and 1127. Heck, I practically already have all of those years done in the raw collection. As for certified, I would use the entire date range to cover the years before 1800. I have a NGC Byzantine coin that was minted between 491-50something. I would count all of those years as done. So, I guess as this morphs before my eyes, I guess I am trying to cover every year from 0-2014 and then go back and fill in as much as I can.


Edited to add - I also have coins with same date. I still keep them, but only use one for the collection.

MrEureka

Frankly, I hate this idea. I'll add a couple more reasons to those already mentioned.

First, part of the fun of building a set is chasing down the rarest coins. But if you can avoid a rare coin by choosing a less rare coin from another country, you've lost the thrill of the chase, at least to some extent.

Second, part of the fun of building a set is building something definitive. But the collection you've described defines nothing. It's just a silly, almost random game.

Naturally, I'm showing my biases. And, also naturally, all collecting is silly, so who am I to say what is more silly than anything else? But you asked for an opinion, so you got it!

MrBreeze

Andy,

I am not sure how you feel...You've sugar coated your opinion too much.

A couple of points of rebuttal, if you will...

I am not sure where the idea of avoiding nicer rare coins to get common dreck ones came from, but that is definitely not the plan. Also, I don't know how one could say it is random when the single premise behind this whole idea is that I am buying a coin that I want, first and foremost or using coins that I collect to fill holes. Maybe I haven't been clear enough, but that is the point of asking the forum. The ideas I get here may help shape the parameters of what the "set" looks like. If you think big picture, there are going to be some hard to find years/coins/etc., that will be the key dates, so to speak. I am just looking for a fun(silly, maybe) way of connecting my 1947 Panamanian Balboa to my 1792 Venetian Tallero to my 1275 Triopli(ian) Gros to my 491 Byzantine Solidus. That was a lot of "to mys," but hopefully it shows the possibilities of what this OPY(as opposed to OFEC) set could be.

And, thank you for being frank, I would have it no other way.

Tibor

If I might suggest that you buy Robert Levinson's book on dated coins:
The Early Dated Coins of Europe 1234-1500. You will find that this book
is easy to read and plan your collection with. The Byzantine era will have
regnal dates and there maybe some "empty " years and decades.

Tibor

One other suggestion is Edward E. Cohen's book:
Dated Coins of Antiquity. This along with Levinson's
book would be essential for your new collection.
I have always bought the books to make the hobby
more enjoyable. Good luck

PBRat

I like this idea, though it seems like it would by tough to get "one per year" during medieval and ancient times.

I could do a similar thing, though starting at maybe 1600, by reorganizing my type set by year ... a quick check shows I may have the 20th century covered, are missing maybe 20 years from the 19th century, and have about 40 18th century years.

Here's a 12 year date run I can put together ...
1749 Netherlands - Holland 10 Stuiver
1750 Regensburg (German State) 1/32 Ducat
1751 Zurich (Swiss Canton) Schilling
1752 Regensburg (German State) Kreuzer
1753 Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg (German State) 1/24 Thaler
1754 Saxony (German State) Pfennig
1755 Nurnberg (German State) 4 Pfennig
1756 Regensburg (German State) Pfennig
1757 Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg (German State) 6 Pfennig
1758 Regensburg (German State) Kreuzer
1759 Netherlands - Holland 1/4 Gulden
1760 Netherlands - Holland Stuiver

Happy collecting.

MrBreeze

I like your start. I am starting to think that finding a coin I would love from 1970-2000 (other than bullion) is going to be more difficult than I thought.



Edited to mention that I have Levinson's book and I will look into the other book. Thanks for the recommendations.

Swampboy

<< <i>One other suggestion is Edward E. Cohen's book:
Dated Coins of Antiquity. >>



That sounds like an interesting read.

Tibor

Shop Numismaster has a book on sale for 50% off that might be of
interest; it is about reading dates on coins of the Middle East
and regions East of there. The sale ends at midnight on
Jan. 21. It might be necessary and an interesting addition
to use coins from this area of the world to fill in some empty
spots in your date runs, especially 650AD forward.
Good luck, Louie

MrBreeze

10 years in…and this is what it has become. There are more, but I don't add them until I get a true view.

https://www.pcgs.com/setregistry/collectors-showcase/world-coins/one-coin-per-year-1583-2024/2422

RSP

The "glue" that holds my collection together could most easily defined as "coins I still enjoy looking at." There could be any number of reasons for this such as art, history, beauty, toning, rarity, how I acquired it, what country minted it, etc. I know this may sound stupid to many of you, but that's just me.

Sapyx

"One coin per year" going all the way back to Year AD 1 would be a challenge. There are now seven threads over on the CCF forum where the entire forum's been attempting to collectively post a one-coin-per-year series; all the threads keep getting stuck in the 1400s. Coins with AD dates actually written on them effectively don't exist back then, and just about the only people consistently putting dates on coins were the Indians and Muslims. And practically nobody collects Indian and Islamic coins by date. So you've got to become an expert (or at least an educated amateur) in mediaeval Indian and/or Islamic coins to progress the unbroken date run back through to Byzantine and Sassanian times.

My own personal unbroken date run only goes back to 1771.

OnlyGoldIsMoney

Apart from my $2.50 Liberty set, I am working on a one per century set going back to the 7th Century BC. The only rule is that each coin must be Gold or Electrum. Below is a NEWP for the 18th Century.