Coin catalog

Coin catalog

A coin catalog (or coin catalogue) is a listing of coin types. Information may include pictures of the obverse and reverse (front and back), date and place of minting, translation of inscriptions, description of images, and prices for various grades. Defects may be described.

The quality, detail and completeness of the information available about a particular coin varies according to popularity, commonality, and available scholarly research.

Because of the huge number of coins in world history, there are no comprehensive catalogs. Professional collectors typically keep many books for identification and assessment.

Most commonly, coin catalogs come in one of two forms. Reference works such as A Guide Book of United States Coins, published by Whitman Publishing and more popularly known as the "Red Book", and the Standard Catalog of World Coins, published by Krause Publications, give descriptions and approximate prices of coins at many different levels of preservation, or grades. The other form is the auction catalog, where only those specific coins available in the auction are described, with photo plates available for some of the more prominent coins.

Coin catalogs are essential when dealing with ancient or foreign coins, where the inscriptions may be obscure and unrecognizably stylized, even for a native speaker.

Coin catalogs today are supplemented by Internet sites, some of which have the advantage of being attached to user forums, so that issues such as counterfeiting may be discussed. With the rise of online auctions, it is now possible for collectors to research their coins at commercial sites such as EBay, Heritage Auctions, or Teletrade, as well as myriad collector-created sites containing research into diverse collecting specialties.

See also



Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем сделать НИР

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Coin collecting — This article is about a hobby. For the scientific study of currency, see Numismatics. Numismatics Terminology …   Wikipedia

  • Coin — This article is about monetary coins. For other uses, see Coin (disambiguation). A selection of modern coins …   Wikipedia

  • coin collecting — Systematic accumulation and study of coins, tokens, paper money, and objects of similar form and purpose. The long held view that coin collecting began with the Italian Renaissance has been challenged by growing evidence that the activity is far… …   Universalium

  • Coin board — There are two kinds of coin boards. The first kind, also known as a merchandise board, is a variation on pull tab games. A game board of this type typically comes with a registered package of pull tab tickets, a signers card, and a pay out slip.… …   Wikipedia

  • American Buffalo (coin) — Infobox Coin Country = United States Denomination = $50 Value = $950 (Proof), 4 5% above spot (Bullion) Unit = U.S. dollars Mass = 31.108 Mass troy oz = 1.0001 Diameter = 32.7 Diameter inch = 1.287 Thickness = 2.95 Thickness inch = 0.116 Edge =… …   Wikipedia

  • Penny (United States coin) — Cent (Penny) United States Value 0.01 of a U.S. dollar Mass  2.5 g  (0.080 troy oz) Diameter  19.05 mm  (0.750 in) Thickness …   Wikipedia

  • Dollar coin (United States) — Dollar United States Value 1.00 U.S. dollar Mass  8.100 g  (0.260 troy oz) Diameter  26.5 mm  (1.043 in) Thickness   …   Wikipedia

  • Dollar (United States coin) — Infobox Coin Country = United States Denomination = Dollar Value = 1 Unit = U.S. dollar Mass troy oz = 0.260 Mass = 8.100 Diameter inch = 1.043 Diameter = 26.5 Thickness inch = 0.079 Thickness = 2.00 Edge = Plain w/ incused inscriptions… …   Wikipedia

  • Standard Catalog of World Coins — The Standard Catalog of World Coins is a series of numismatic catalogs commonly known as the Krause catalogs in the numismatic hobby.These massive by century volumes list by date virtually every coin type, most photographed, with mintage and… …   Wikipedia

  • One-baht coin — 1 baht Thailand Value 1 Thai baht Mass  3.0 g Diameter  20.00 mm Thickness  1[ …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”