Where you get your ancient coins?

I collect non-U.S. coins. I have a couple of random "ancient" coins that I picked up because my coin dealers had them in the shop for a reasonable price. I just thought they were cool. 99% of my collection is from the last 200 years. The oldest is from around 300AD.

My question is: Where do you purchase ancient coins? Does anyone have any recommendation for what to look for if I were to expand into these types? Keep in mind that I am mostly interested in finding coins that are interesting to look at or have an interesting history. The value of the coin is only important to determine if I can afford it...

Thanks to anyone who responds. I appreciate it.

From the following places:

www.vcoins.com
ma-shops.de <=== bit expensive though, unless you are looking for some filler
stevealbum.com
mrbcoins.com
augustuscoins.com/inexpensive.html

All of those vendors are extremely trustworthy..

In my case I buy them mostly at coin fairs.

Mainly in flea markets.

Quote: "Quant-Geek"​All of those vendors are extremely trustworthy..​
​

​Thank you. As far as I can judge from your other posts, you're knowledgeable and trustworthy as well.

Are there any known dealers who sell coins obtained in transparent and ethical way? I mean concerns about where, when, how and why the coins were excavated at all.
(It goes without saying that trustworthy dealers do not sell counterfeits and stolen items.)

+1 for Steve Album. One of the most transparent and helpful auction houses in the USA.

Quote: "numinis"​

Quote: "Quant-Geek"​All of those vendors are extremely trustworthy..​
​​

​​Thank you. As far as I can judge from your other posts, you're knowledgeable and trustworthy as well.
​
​Are there any known dealers who sell coins obtained in transparent and ethical way? I mean concerns about where, when, how and why the coins were excavated at all.
​(It goes without saying that trustworthy dealers do not sell counterfeits and stolen items.)

​Thanks for those kind words! vcoins and ma-shops.de are storefronts from multiple vendors. While most of the vendors are quite helpful and trustworthy, the source of the coins can always be problematic as the provenance is usually not known. For known provenances, I would stick with the last three. There are several more than those I listed! When I mean trustworthy, I mean not intentionally selling counterfeits and stolen items. The three vendors I mentioned will quickly rectify any situation that becomes known.

Quote: "Quant-Geek"​

Quote: "numinis"​
​

Quote: "Quant-Geek"​All of those vendors are extremely trustworthy..​
​​​

​​​Thank you. As far as I can judge from your other posts, you're knowledgeable and trustworthy as well.
​​
​​Are there any known dealers who sell coins obtained in transparent and ethical way? I mean concerns about where, when, how and why the coins were excavated at all.
​​(It goes without saying that trustworthy dealers do not sell counterfeits and stolen items.)

​​Thanks for those kind words! vcoins and ma-shops.de are storefronts from multiple vendors. While most of the vendors are quite helpful and trustworthy, the source of the coins can always be problematic as the provenance is usually not known. For known provenances, I would stick with the last three. There are several more than those I listed! When I mean trustworthy, I mean not intentionally selling counterfeits and stolen items. The three vendors I mentioned will quickly rectify any situation that becomes known.

​Good websites - loads of amazing stuff

Thanks for all the responses. Some good options here. I will be checking them out in the coming days / weeks.

There was some talk of provenances. Do any dealers actually give a written provenance / documentation with the coins? I mean, I have seen it with coins being sold from known shipwrecks, but that is the only place I have seen it. I have only been collecting for about 5 years; so maybe I have missed this since I have mainly focused on modern coins.

It's rather rare that you have a long provenance on coins. It's usually existing only for extremely rare ones where the provenance matters.

Eg. this one, the 'other' Juxon medal. (cng are also good for ancients)

https://cngcoins.com/Coin.aspx?CoinID=191430

I got most of my ancients from friends or ebay even though it is kind of expensive.

Quote: "oggy"​It's rather rare that you have a long provenance on coins. It's usually existing only for extremely rare ones where the provenance matters.
​
​Eg. this one, the 'other' Juxon medal. (cng are also good for ancients)
​
​https://cngcoins.com/Coin.aspx?CoinID=191430

​Cool medal. Thanks for sharing that.

I thought that was the case because I hadn't heard about that much at all, but I also thought maybe I was ignorant to something. Thanks for helping.

Quote: "numinis"​

Quote: "Quant-Geek"​All of those vendors are extremely trustworthy..​
​​

​​Thank you. As far as I can judge from your other posts, you're knowledgeable and trustworthy as well.
​
​Are there any known dealers who sell coins obtained in transparent and ethical way? I mean concerns about where, when, how and why the coins were excavated at all.
​(It goes without saying that trustworthy dealers do not sell counterfeits and stolen items.)

​...Um, the problem is whether a "transparent and ethical way" to obtain/excavate ancient coins actually exists, outside of circumstances where the coin is probably going to end up in a museum anyway.


I might be missing some other corner cases, but offhand I can only think of two realistic options to buy coins obtained in a (realistically) transparent and ethical way:

1) deal directly, or almost directly, with the finder, in countries where metal detecting is legal but highly regulated (with detecting sites recorded, etc.) and the finder gets to keep, and sell, the coin (not sure if there are any such places other than the UK)
2) look out for museums selling their backlog from old archaeological digs, and hope the documentation hadn't been lost in the meantime

Option 1 is going to be by far the most practical scenario for any coin types commonly found in the UK. With everything else... good luck.


...On second thought, in principle, it's possible that there are "ethical" dealers who buy coins from finders via option 1 and then resell them with the associated provenances.
I'm not aware of any such dealers, but it's not like I had any reason to search for them, and it would not especially surprise me if they do exist.

Quote: "January First-of-May"​I'm not aware of any such dealers, but it's not like I had any reason to search for them, and it would not especially surprise me if they do exist.

​The only one that I know that sells finds directly and is also trustworthy and well-know is York Coins.

https://www.vcoins.com/en/stores/york_coins-170/ancient-coins/Default.aspx?

They are well known in selling legal finds and thus are consigned coins by the finder. Their direct website is:

http://www.yorkcoins.com/

January First-of-May: thank you for your considered answer.
​