How's This 2-Cent Look?

interesting, hard to tell if thats corrosion, patina, or paint.

Copper can in fact develop a green patina. I would guess that this coin has spent some time buried. I have seen Roman coins like this. With Roman coins, the green can have a beneficial affect on eye appeal, and so increase the value, probably less likely with this coin. Eye appeal, as you can guess, is a personal thing.

The green is chemically copper hydroxycarbonate, the 'hydroxy' and the 'carbonate' can vary against each other.

What bothers me a little are the brown encrustations, and I think the coin would be better off without them. With ancient coins, a common approach is to store the coin in olive oil for some months, and even a year or more, and maybe the brown stuff will loosen.

After all of that, I think it is a very nice coin, and well photographed. Good photography allows more accurate comment.

If you like the green, disregard this message...but my fear is that the green is actually verdigris which is active corrosion. It might eventually eat the coin up and you will lose the detail it currently has.

I have not seen anyone in the US coin collecting community actually give value to green patina on a copper coin, in fact some might feel like throwing a haz-mat suite over the top of their Lincoln's to make sure it does not spread.

Maybe badthad will chime in...the creator of verdicare. But I believe in the past he has recommended some techniques to remove. But that is just my opinion.

GREAT FIND BY THE WAY!! The best I have dug is a 1940 something wheat...no silver for me yet, either.

Neat, 1870 is one of the scarcer dates too.

Fine DETAILS, environmental damage. My own " Two Cents"

I was searching the vcoins website and found some ancients priced in the thousands that had a very obvious green color, though not as quite pronounced as the 2C in question here.

I would seem that somehow that the verdigris film on these coins has been passivated or was otherwise inactive. No doubt such coins have been professionally cleaned.

I would agree that this very obviously green coin would not sit very well alongside it's contemporaries.

Copper and bronze coins definitely develop green patinas (Most copper compounds are green in color).

If the raised areas are just dirt then I would first just try soaking in distilled water to dissolve and rinse away the dirt. Distilled water will not affect the green patina. But be warned the color may not be the same underneath the raised stuff.

If distilled water doesn't work you could try acetone but if water doesn't do it then I don't have muc hope for acetone. Then you could try the olive oil. Be warned though that the oil method can take a LONG time (months to years) and it may affect the patina because olive oil is slightly acidic. If the acid worries you you might try mineral oil instead. Over time it may also losen th crud, but it will be even slower because the acid in the olive oil makes it work faster. After you are done with the oil a soak in acetone or xylol will remove the oil, but may leave the coin with a "dry" appearance.

I think that the green patina on the coin is very attractive. Perhaps you should keep it as is to remind you of where it came from! I like it.