Roman Coin - Attempt At Cleaning/Restore

I'm with echizento on this one. It looked better uncleaned.

The difficulty with removal of surface material on this type of coin is while soaking and "brushing" will remove much of it very safely it will almost certainly take off all the remaining silver wash. Choices need to be made. Personally I feel a small improvement was made by revealing the silvering. The patina remains intact albeit now a lighter coloration which does not show well in the pics. The real test is how it looks "in hand".

Pish you are much braver than I !
I have heard Ben say he has used 'sharp' pins to pick away encrustation.
Personally I never use any tool sharper than a bamboo skewer or a finger nail to rub the surfaces.


I have adjusted the contrast somewhat and otherwise darkened the shadows. I think it looks better and the silvering is more widespread than I thought.




But ...... to each his own !

I do indeed use a sharp steel pin to clean coins. They start a bit too sharp for an application like this - I usually dull them a bit before Id try having a go at that.

It looks like a fairly alright job - you could do more on it. Id take a toothpick and work at the darker encrustation behind the head. YOu might have luck fracturing it - sometimes it will just fall off in clumps.

I only use an illuminated stereo microscope when using a scalpel to clean coins.

Thanks for all the replies .. positive and negative.

I purchased a couple of these coins cheap .. knowing
I wanted to see what it was like trying to get the green off. I did not want to hurt the coins .. and do know I was
being more aggressive than I should for just starting out with ancient coins. I have cleaned many modern coins

I do think I am getting to the point where I don't want to do any more to this coin .. that might hurt it more.

Will olive oil have any negative effect on the coin?

You never really know what a toothpick is made of. I recently bought some bamboo canes, the ones I thought we had turned out to be willow and no good for coins.

I have a stereo microscope, like binoculars on a long stem, and I use a halogen lamp to light from the side. It works well enough for me. I also recently got a USB microscope, very handy for identifying coins but not for much else. Any beginner, I would suggest starts with the distilled water and toothbrush,and works their way up to more dangerous methods, they will know when they are ready (hopefully). There is no substitute for patience.

I don't know if I like it better before or after. ...i'll call it a draw.

it is cool how much intact silvering there was underneath all that. thanks for sharing!