Numismatic Profits

A rare variety, famous provenance, or high grade can change a coin's story. How much of that story can you prove? Numismatic Profits shows you how to build an evidence file for one physical coin: observe its features, verify issue and variety diagnostics, read certification data carefully, trace ownership claims, and photograph the object without altering it.

A reusable dossier brings your findings and unanswered questions together for another collector or specialist. The reward is a better-supported attribution and clearer understanding, whatever the eventual sale price.

• Examine variety diagnostics and certification data without asking a label to prove more than it can.
• Trace provenance claims and make photographs that preserve the coin's observable details.
• Build a reusable specimen dossier with sources, uncertainties, and questions for a specialist.

Give an unusual coin the careful investigation its story deserves.

See what is inside

The revised edition covers these chapters and reader resources:

• Chapter 1. Start a Numismatic Evidence File
• Chapter 2. Read the Coin as an Object
• Chapter 3. Verify the Issue and Variety
• Chapter 4. Read Grade and Certification Evidence
• Chapter 5. Test a Rarity Claim
• Chapter 6. Build a Provenance Trail
• Chapter 7. Use Archives and Specialist Communities
• Chapter 8. Photograph and Describe Without Altering
• Chapter 9. Write a Defensible Coin Dossier
• Chapter 10. What the Evidence Changes
• Chapter 11. Reconcile a Conflicting Dossier
• Chapter 12. A Small Population Is Not a Survival Census
• Chapter 13. The Number Matches. Does the Coin?
• Chapter 14. A Date on the Coin Is Not a Complete Chronology
• Chapter 15. The Envelope and the Two-Coin Lot
• Chapter 16. Search the Catalog, Not Only Its Text
• Chapter 17. A Measurement Needs a Method
• Chapter 18. Four Listings, One Source
• Chapter 19. The Diagnostic Outside the Photograph
• Chapter 20. The Sale Record Is a Bundle of Conditions
• Chapter 21. Two Reviewers Answer Different Questions
• Chapter 22. The Coin Changes Holder. The Record Keeps Its History.
• Chapter 23. A Complete Dossier with an Open Question
• Dossier Template and References