Ancient Coin Cleaning And Questions

Thanks! Looks like Gringotts is a good cleaner.

As for the book? Opinions on it?

When I try to loosen the dirt under water, I use regular tap water?

Sorry for all the questions

I will!

There's only one coin where I can make out detail on both sides, want me to get a picture?

I'm gonna try the Gringotts solvent, as I don't have DW or non-virgin olive oil.

I'll get pics.

Edit: Going to get DW and try that first.

ploopy, go to a drug store or supermarket and get a gallon of distilled water for about a buck...that would probably work good. if you already have the cleaning solution, go ahead and give it s shot. those coins aren't going to clean up much probably, there isn't much dirt obscuring the details that are visible. on the individual picks, it looks like remaining patina on the surface of the metal. the good news is, you can't really go wrong here and damage the coins to much, they are in rough shape. it's a great lot to practice cleaning on for that reason however!

The key thing is to have patience: Gringotts et al offer quicker solutions, but they dont alway work out so well. Personally, I'd stick to distilled water or olive oil (oil is messier, but, as said, quicker). The oil's mechanism of cleaning is quicker due to a slight acidity. The mineral leeching that DW does is quite useful - often, coins are received with bronze disease which corrodes the coin rapidly and eventually will wholly destroy it - the way to treat this is to use DW soaks to leech out the chloride ions that cause the disease (of course, changing the water regularly). Coins with BD should be quarantined from unafflicted coins.

The final picture appears to be a quite interesting coin - I suspect it might be a provincial issue showing a dolphin. Coins in such condition are hard to clean - I suggest you utilise oil for that one (along with the aforementioned patience - id start by giving it a short bath, about a week, followed by a good brush, then a longer term soak on the order of months with the occaisonal checkup and brush to check its progess. If you're lucky, the green will melt away very quickly, but I doubt much detail will be left on this one - if you're unlucky, the surface might be too fragile and and melt away too, leaving nothing behind it).