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 Replies: 39 / Views: 5,008 |
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
4911 Posts |
They were a peice of history and should have been preserved as such.
Feel free to call me Will.
Edited by thedollarman
04/17/2015 5:35 pm
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
7096 Posts |
In 1942 the "Quit India Movement" started so I imagine that the Brits simply decided to take some of its removable assets out of India. I doubt very much that these coins were earmarked for melting because they were worn or damaged and there would have been some exceptional coins in this hoard. 100 tones is 8,576,329 coins that is a heck of a lot of coins to take out of the mintage numbers. It is a shame because these are very attractive coins and I enjoy collecting them.     |
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Valued Member
United States
216 Posts |
I so want to find sunken treasure.....
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Valued Member
United States
216 Posts |
Trout - I feel for you. This breaks all of our hearts, but it no doubt kills those specifically collecting these.
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Pillar of the Community
 Canada
5395 Posts |
The crying and wailing over what are 20 dollar coins at best mystifies. The Pittman act did more damage to the numismatic community by far. Not one in a hundred on this forum would pay even fifty bucks for a gem mint state Indian silver rupee.
Randy Weir who is the worlds expert on these will sell you all you want at 22 bucks each Canadian......fill his mail box with orders folks. These coins needed to be melted!
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Pillar of the Community
Canada
5417 Posts |
Pacific,
You are right, most of the indian rupees are worth around the $20. However, I am sure that in that hoard several of the key dates such as the 1880 1/4 rupee, (worth several thousand even in F) or 1876 1/2 rupee worth tens of thousands?
Yes, members of this forum will likely not pay more than $50 for a gem UNC rupee but that's only because the majority of our members are from Europe and NA and do not collect these coins.
Regardless of whether or not they were very valuable, it's a shame that they had to be melted.
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Moderator
United States
188952 Posts |
They may be common, but they are still coins and I prefer them to remain coins.  |
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Pillar of the Community
United Kingdom
2885 Posts |
Quote:
but that's only because the majority of our members are from Europe and NA and do not collect these coins I would disagree here. In the UK I know of a lot of collectors of British Empire coins - which these were. On saying that - I do suspect 99% of them were never going to be wanted as collectable coins. Perhaps someone did cherry pick them first. |
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Pillar of the Community
Australia
7096 Posts |
Quote:
Not one in a hundred on this forum would pay even fifty bucks for a gem mint state Indian silver rupee.
Randy Weir who is the worlds expert on these will sell you all you want at 22 bucks each Canadian......fill his mail box with orders folks PM me this guys email please. I will pay $22 for Gem Uncirculated/MS64 upwards Silver Rupees in a heartbeat  These coins over 100 years old are pretty "Tough" to get hold of in Aus. According to the Antiquities and Art Treasures Act, 1972 (Act No. 52 of 1972), items (including coins) over 100 years old, cannot be exported out of India except with the permission of the Director General, Archaeological Survey of India, Janpath, New Delhi. |
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Valued Member
Finland
294 Posts |
I think in the treasure hunting they must think big and get the big money out of one case as fast as possible. Searching key dates would take a lot of time and prices would immediately go down if a lot of coins are flooding to market. That happened in the 1990's when the central bank of Norway sold off their hoard of Finnish gold coins.
Edited by Eurocoin
04/18/2015 04:07 am
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Bedrock of the Community
 United States
12841 Posts |
In fairness, those salvage operations aren't free.
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Pillar of the Community
United States
7390 Posts |
@pacificoin... the pitman act, imo, was one of the best things that could have happened in numismatics for it created today's marketplace and elevated morgans to the ethereal status they now enjoy amongst collectors. Without it we would be trading them like ASE's With this rupee find however I think it would have been awesome to be able to buy an huge bag of shipwreck silver coins, concretions and all, and play with it. |
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Moderator
 United States
23522 Posts |
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The Pittman act did more damage to the numismatic community by far. So killing someone who's small is somehow "better" than killing someone who's big? Are you also OK with the people we're discussing in another thread who are sinking computer chips into 300 year old coins and selling them on ebay? Yes, these were minted in huge quantity - the lost coins were from an era which saw close to 3 billion minted in 30 years - but that's not stopping our Lincoln Cent collectors from prizing their work. At what point is numismatic history no longer worth preserving? There were a whole bunch minted with Victoria's effigy, as well. OK to destroy them? How about British Trade dollars? They minted lots of those too. Quote:
In fairness, those salvage operations aren't free.
Absolutely true, and they deserve to profit from their efforts. Would you rather take melt value, or retail even if that retail only multiplied your gross by a factor of ten? |
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Pillar of the Community
United States
1949 Posts |
I think the British Govt. could have marketed this well, made much more money numismatically, and if marketed the right way, could have boosted interest in coins in general...
Unfortunately, nothing that can be done now...
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Moderator
United States
23522 Posts |
That, more than anything else, is my objection, jdmern. Even if they only got $5 each, or even sold them in batches, they left a ton of profit on the table.
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Replies: 39 / Views: 5,008 |
First Page
Posted 04/17/2015 6:11 pm
