1652 Pine Tree Shilling Need All The Info I Can Get Before I Get It Graded.

I am not Captain Jack, but to answer your question there are 350 year old counterfeits of the Massachusetts silver coins. They are listed in the Noe reference book, and they are very collectable. They can also be certified by the major grading services as to their origin, and they are usually worth as much or more that the genuine item.

In addition to those there are copies of the Massachusetts silver coinage that were made in the 19th century. These pieces do not interest me, but there are dealers who buy and sell them. The most famous pieces were made by a man named Thomas Wyatt.

Beyond these items there are pieces of later origins that have less credibility. These pieces were either made to commemorate some event, and often only have one side that resembles a Pine Tree shilling. Others are made of base metal and were made before the passage of the Hobby Protection Act. For that reason the word "COPY" or some similar does not appear on them. They are quite detectable as copies if you know anything about how silver looks and feels.

And yes, there are counterfeits that were made to deceive collectors. These things have no merit and are a blight on the hobby.

Thanks for the info, BillJones. I'd heard of the Wyatt pieces, but I've never seen the Noe book with regard to those very early counterfeits. Indeed, considering the many auctions I've witnessed over the years, I have yet to see one of those very early counterfeits change hands.

Yes, as I was looking it up, I saw a website that talked about the Noe variants and several are listed as counterfeits. That was what I was basing my comments on. I'm mainly a guy that knows about american coinage from 1800s on up and can at least figure out if Morgans are counterfeit, but I'm not an expert.

I also dabble in foreign coinage too... my oldest coin is a 1683 or 1686 James II Threepence, and I have a 1689 James II Gunmoney shilling. But my babies are my morgans.

I've been watching this thread for a while. The OP's coin doesn't look like it's been in the ground very long. Here's a real 300 year old ground find:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...Fathers.html

The lettering also looks soft and there appear to be a lot of casting bubbles.

@Tryna interesting point, but I don't know that they were that careful about sterling standards with underweight American colonial coinage. I've seen some SEM/EDAX on 19th century California sterling flatware. None of it made 92.5%, and some of it was as low as 75%.

OP,

Please send it in for at least authentication. There's no way it can be sold until authenticated. You might have to spend some good money to get it authenticated, but it'll set your heart at ease.

See if ICG or ANACS can authenticate it, call them up and specifically ask... and if they can after having the coin, then resubmit it to PCGS or NGC for a full grading.

Sure they would. One to disguise the counterfeit and two because of the amount of work involved in creating the counterfeit die causes them to use it until it crumbled...