As rich as Croesus

The phrase "rich as Croesus" is a famous idiom that describes someone who is extremely wealthy. It refers to the legendary King Croesus of Lydia, who was known for his immense wealth and extravagant lifestyle. His wealth came from the River Pactolus in which the King Midas washed his hands to rid himself of the 'Midas Touch'. Croesus is credited with issuing the first true gold coins with a standardized purity for general circulation.

Lydia was a hugely rich and powerful state when Kroisos became king about 561 BCE. According to Herodotus, Kroisos donated 4.5 tons of gold for construction of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi. The Latin form of Kroisos’ name is used today. Kroisos inherited a coinage system based upon the use of electrum. The most common examples of early Lydian coins are electrum trites (one-third staters) that weigh about 4.7 grams. The coins were first struck during the reign of Kroisos’ father, Alyattes (c. 618 – 561 BCE). Kroisos continued to strike them during the early years of his own reign.

Kroisos launched his own coinage about 550 BCE by minting nearly pure gold staters and nearly pure silver staters, each weighing around 10.7 grams. The Prototype stater is extremely rare, with about a dozen known. The example shown sold for $150k against a $50k estimate in January 2012.

Kroisos struck gold coins under two different weight standards after the Prototype issue. His first series were “Heavy Standard” weighing about 10.7 g. Kroisos replaced the Heavy Standard gold coins with a series of Light Standard gold coins, based upon a weight of 8.05 g. Silver equivalents are known for each denomination of Kroisos’ gold coinage.

Scholars argue that the gold standard of Croesus was introduced in stages, designed to recall the circulating electrum staters. Once a sufficient number had been recalled, the new light stater appeared. Though the light stater was produced for a longer period than the heavy stater, the light stater is actually the rarer coin.

The market seems to be catching on. This NGC Gem MS light stater sold in April 2018 for $180k.

Special ancients bring top dollar

Two dekadrachms from famous engravers minted from the time of Dionysios I were auction stars in 2020.

One was signed by Kimon and graded NGC Ch VF ★ Strike: 5/5 Surface: 5/5, and the other signed by Euainetos and graded NGC Ch EF★ Strike: 5/5 Surface: 4/5. The Kimon coin sold for $360k and the Euainetos for $198k, both well exceeding their estimates.

A phenomenal Elagablus aureus graded NGC Ch MS★, Strike: 5/5 Surface: 4/5 brought $312k, and a Septimius Severus Aureus graded NGC Ch AU, Strike: 5/5 Surface: 3/5 made $192k.

The mines of Ancient Greece

In 480 BCE, the Persian army defeated the Greeks at the Battle of Thermopylae and invaded parts of Greece. When all seemed lost, Themistocles proposed an unusual plan: the Greeks should not face the superior Persian soldiers on the battlefield, but instead invest in a fleet. In the naval battle of Salamis, the newly-built ships destroyed the Persian fleet.

Without a navy to support their army, the Persians were forced to retreat. The battle of Salamis was a critical turning point. The ships that won the battle of Salamis were paid for with silver from the mines of Laurion. 20,000 slaves worked to provide the silver for the fleet. Without it victory would have been impossible.

Discovery of major veins of ore meant that at the beginning of the second Persian invasion of Greece in 480–479 BC, the Athenian state had at its disposal a hundred talents of silver. (about 2.6 tonnes)

After the defeat of Persia, Sparta and Athens waged a long and taxing war. As the silver mines became exhausted, a backwater territory, Macedonia, thrived and became the new power. The gold mines of Macedonia played a critical role. The largest gold mines in antiquity were operating in Macedonia and Thrace and they supported the rise of Philip II and his son, Alexander the Great.

Florida treasure hunters find $4.5m in lost gold

In 2017 a team of treasure hunters recovered a $4.5m bounty of gold coins in shallow waters off Florida. The treasure consisted of 350 gold coins, including nine rare "royal" eight escudo pieces. A Royal 8 escudos is a perfectly struck Spanish colonial gold coin, often produced with special dies for presentation, weighing 27 grams of 0.875 fine gold. These are high-quality "cob" coins featuring rounded flans, ornate crosses, and royal shields.

The coins contain 0.76 to 0.81 troy ounces of pure gold.

The "royal" is the pinnacle of Spanish colonial numismatics. The production of a Royal was a careful, thoughtful process. Few cob 8 escudo Royals were minted due to the time and resources it took to make them.

The find was made off the coast of Vero Beach, Florida in 3 feet of water. Bret Brisben, captain of the S/V Capitana and his crew found the treasure 15 feet from shore.

Brisben’s find comes a month after one of his subcontractors, Eric Schmitt, found 52 gold coins worth more than $1 million. Schmitt found the gold while diving about 150 feet off the coast of Fort Pierce in Florida during his yearly treasure-hunting trip with his wife, his sister and his parents.

The New Forest Hoard

The New Forest Hoard, 63 gold coins and one silver, was found by a family digging a flowerbed in a clump of soil in April 2020 near Milford on Sea, Hampshire. A further six gold coins were then unearthed following an archaeological excavation in the garden after the hoard was appraised at the British Museum and deemed treasure in October 2021. Most of the coins are of a type known as “angels” for the design on the obverse of the archangel Michael slaying a dragon with a cross-shaped spear. First minted under Edward IV in 1465, angels were the standard gold coin in Britain for two centuries.

The coins had been estimated to fetch about £230k were sold at auction for just over £380k.

The earliest coin found was struck in the 1420s in the reign of Henry VI and the latest 1536-37 from Henry VIII. The coins are in five different denominations. The hoard was thought to have been buried in the 1530's. The most valuable single coin was a Henry VIII crown of the double rose from 1536-1537. It sold for over £17,000, more than three times its pre-sale estimate.

The Double Rose minted between 1536 and 1537 was struck in 22-carat gold ("crown gold"), which was a shift from the previous 23-carat standard. 91.67% pure gold, 2 carats alloy, usually copper or silver. Weight was about 57.5 grains (3.73 grams).

When it was buried the hoard was a substantial fortune with a probable purchasing power over £500k today. Experts believe the New Forest Hoard represented a family’s savings and was buried to keep it safe from political turbulence around the dissolution of the monasteries after Henry VIII’s break with Catholicism in 1533.

Four of the gold coins bear the initials of three of the wives of King Henry VIII. The first three of the six, K for Catherine of Aragon, A for Anne Boleyn and I for Jane Seymour. The one with Jane’s initial is the earliest coin in the hoard.

Ancients

ROMAN IMPERATORIAL, SEXTUS POMPEY AS IMPERATOR (44-36 B.C.) Sextus Pompey used dynastic imagery on his coins. In 42 B.C. Marc Antony, Octavian, Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, Marcus Junius Brutus, Gaius Cassius Longinus and Sextus Pompey all fought for supremacy. He and his brother portrayed their deceased father on denarii as early as 45-44 B.C. This example sold for $336k in 2018.

Macedonian Kingdom. PHILIP II (359-336 B.C.) The obverse of this posthumous issue of the ancient city of Colophon bears a portrait. Comparison with the posthumous Alexander coins under King Lysimachus and surviving portraits leave no doubt the portrait is Alexander the Great himself. The coin sold for $36k in 2020.

Zeugitana, Carthage. (circa 350-320 B.C.) Carthage became a naval powerhouse in the 5th century B.C. and challenged the cities of Sicily and Southern Italy for control of the Mediterranean. By the early 3rd century B.C., most of Central North Africa, Spain and Sicily had fallen to the Carthaginians. Mints produced coins to pay the largely mercenary army. This early stater indicates the dies were created by a Greek engraver with superior skill. This coin sold for $15k in 2019.

A powerful army was put to use by the third king of the Ptolemaic dynasty, Ptolemy III Euergetes (246-222 B.C.). Shortly after inheriting the throne, he launched an invasion of the neighboring Seleucid Kingdom of Syria. He crushed all resistance reaching Babylon, where he proclaimed himself King of Kings. The coin sold for $49,350 in 2016.

Gold from ancient Panama - the Coclé

For more than a thousand years, a cemetery on the banks of the Rio Grande Coclé in Panama lay undisturbed, escaping the attention of looters.

The river flooded in 1927 scattering gold beads along its banks. In 1940, Penn Museum archaeologist J. Alden Mason excavated at the cemetery, unearthing spectacular finds.

Human effigy pendant of gold, copper, silver alloy, Sitio Conte, Panama, ca. 700-900CE.

Large golden plaques and pendants with animal-human motifs were found, precious and semi-precious stone, ivory, and animal bone ornaments, and literally tons of detail-rich painted ceramics. It was evidence of a sophisticated Precolumbian people, the Coclé, who lived, died, and painstakingly buried their dead with their gold.

Long overshadowed by research on other indigenous Central and South American peoples, the Coclé, who lived from about 700 to 900 CE, remain mysterious.

The Torzhok hoard

The Torzhok hoard consists of 409 imperial Russian coins that were hidden in an earthenware mug underneath a house floor. The gold ruble coins were found underneath a house in the city of Torzhok, about 260 miles (420 kilometers) southeast of St. Petersburg, northwestern Russia. The 409 coins were minted during the waning days of the Russian Empire. In total, the coins in the hoard add up to 4,085 rubles, a substantial sum. The melt value of one 10-ruble coin — which is 90% gold — is over $1,300

A pit in the foundation contained the broken remains of a glazed earthenware mug, known as a candyushka, filled with 409 coins minted between 1848 and 1911. The hoard consisted of 387 gold 10-ruble coins, 10 coins each of 5 rubles, 10 coins each of 15 rubles and two 7.5-ruble coins.

The Russia 10 rouble gold coin issued during the reign of Nicholas II immortalizes the end of the House of Romanov. It contains .2489 oz of pure gold. The obverse depicts Nicholas II, the last czar of Imperial Russia. Reverse is the Imperial Coat of Arms, along with the seal of His Tsarist Majesty: a shielded double eagle, with crowns that represent Russia, Kazan and Astrakhan.

Two coins were minted during the reigns of earlier czars (Nicholas I and Alexander III), the rest come from the reign of Czar Nicholas II, the last Russian emperor before the Russian Revolution of 1917. Nicholas and the rest of the royal Romanov family were executed in 1918.