8 Reales 1798 (antique counterfeit)

[frugi]

8 Reales dated 1798......bought from a friend who declared to me it was fake. Interesting to me is that it looks really, really old, and worn. Looks to me like this is a fake pre-dating Chinese fakes, or just well done & aged in China, I dont know? It does not stick to a magnet, and has a slight yellowish appearance, like it is a brassy CuNi. It looks like it has confused several people in its time, since it has large scratches across it like people discovered it was fake, and tried to deface it. It is a dead giveaway on being fake when you look at the date......the "98" is off center and awful looking.

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8realesfake.jpg (106.86 KiB) Viewed 4447 times

EDIT: I have no idea why, but the first image posted twice, even though it doesnt show that in my actual body of my type. weird.

[frugi]

if the "98" was inline with the rest of the date, despite its yellowish appearance I would have bought it as a real coin, luckily my friend told me in advance it was fake and sold it to me for like $0.50 or something. He is a nationwide owner/buyer/coin dealer, and has buckets, boxes, tubs, etc. of foreign, tokens, coins, silver, gold, whatever, and lets me look through them and pull out what I want, and he sells to me pretty cheap. This day I bought this coin and several other fakes for my fakes collection, and I also bought about 50 lbs. of cull copper coins which I collect. He pays no mind to anything cull or counterfeit, so I get it pretty much at scrap metal price.

[Verbane]

Certainly looks to be counterfeit.

I don't know that anyone has done a comprehensive study of the 8 Reales Contemporary Counterfeits, but if anyone knows, these guys would:
http://www.colonialcoins.org/

I can send you a PDF of Kleeberg's paper on Colonial Era Contemporary Counterfeit 2 Reales. May not help with this coin, but its certainly a decent resource.

[highroller4321]

The things that stand out to me:

Rim is very strangely formed and very nonuniform. The majority of the coin is pretty worn except the date and some of the letters are abnormally strong compared to the rest. Also the numbers do not look right.

[John Reich]

I looked through my copy of J.L. Riddell's Monograph of the Silver Dollar (counterfeit detection book from 1845). There are a lot of counterfeit 8 reales pieces listed, but your piece wasn't in the book. It really does appear to be a contemporary counterfeit and as such, should have some collector value. There were literally hundreds of different varieties of these pieces made from the 1820's thru the 1860's and new varieties are being discovered all the time. Nice score if you picked the piece up for metal value! These pieces are rare, cool pieces of our early economic history--and are really neat examples of early American folk art besides.

[frugi]

I looked through my copy of J.L. Riddell's Monograph of the Silver Dollar (counterfeit detection book from 1845). There are a lot of counterfeit 8 reales pieces listed, but your piece wasn't in the book. It really does appear to be a contemporary counterfeit and as such, should have some collector value. There were literally hundreds of different varieties of these pieces made from the 1820's thru the 1860's and new varieties are being discovered all the time. Nice score if you picked the piece up for metal value! These pieces are rare, cool pieces of our early economic history--and are really neat examples of early American folk art besides.

wow. i had no idea.

[Verbane]

I looked through my copy of J.L. Riddell's Monograph of the Silver Dollar (counterfeit detection book from 1845). There are a lot of counterfeit 8 reales pieces listed, but your piece wasn't in the book. It really does appear to be a contemporary counterfeit and as such, should have some collector value. There were literally hundreds of different varieties of these pieces made from the 1820's thru the 1860's and new varieties are being discovered all the time. Nice score if you picked the piece up for metal value! These pieces are rare, cool pieces of our early economic history--and are really neat examples of early American folk art besides.

wow. i had no idea.

One of my 2 reales counterfeits has a market value of about $200.00+. It is one of the most obvious Kleeberg varieties with the "Carous" misspelling. I'll lost pics tomorrow if I have a chance.

[John Reich]

Check out what this guy is asking for counterfeit 2 reales pieces. http://www.davewcoins.com

[frugi]

Check out what this guy is asking for counterfeit 2 reales pieces. http://www.davewcoins.com

wow, that is a ton of money, and the other one he had, he sold. amazing......I am thinking I might just put these 2 I have up for sale as a pair in the buy it now section in the coming days if they are bringing this kind of bank!

[frugi]

i just noticed, I guess I made no mention of the fact that I have two of these.....the one that is shown plus a second I thought was too ugly to photograph, but knowing now the collectors, interest, I will go ahead and photo the other as well, and post below. After I followed the link above to see the prices these things bring I did some research, and the other one I have, I think is a cast piece, similar to those you would expect to see coming from china, but this other piece does have age showing like the other. i will leave it up to you experts to decide.

[frugi]

here is the other one, though not as nice, it came from the exact same place.....it might be just as good, or not at all. u guys tell me.

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[John Reich]

I think the 1798 piece is a die-struck contemporary counterfeit. It's definitely well worth checking out. I collect contemporary counterfeit bust half dollars and some of them are very common, and some are unique or nearly so. The unique pieces bring the most money, but even common pieces usually sell for about what a genuine coin would bring. The 1790 piece appears to be cast. It could be contemporary, but contemporary cast pieces aren't worth as much as die-struck pieces, while Chinese cast coins are worth scrap. Some do collect contemporary cast coins though, so it would be worth checking it out as well. I would try emailing your photos to Dave and see what he says. He specialized in counterfeit 2 reales pieces before he became a full time dealer and would definitely know more about your coins than I would.

[Recyclersteve]

It should be fairly easy to get good quality counterfeits of many types of valuable coins for perhaps $10 each or less. The fact that someone would charge $300-600 each for these obvious fakes is, frankly, offensive. If someone looks, for instance, on Alibaba they can find fake one ounce gold coins in quantity for perhaps $2-3 each including shipping from China. It used to be easy to get fakes on eBay, but they've pretty much cleaned up their act in this regard.

[frugi]

It should be fairly easy to get good quality counterfeits of many types of valuable coins for perhaps $10 each or less. The fact that someone would charge $300-600 each for these obvious fakes is, frankly, offensive. If someone looks, for instance, on Alibaba they can find fake one ounce gold coins in quantity for perhaps $2-3 each including shipping from China. It used to be easy to get fakes on eBay, but they've pretty much cleaned up their act in this regard.

FYI- these arent from china..... and likely from canada or mexico over a hundred years ago, not even in the same ballpark as the fakes from china. It isnt that someone charges $300-$600.00 for these, it is fact that books have been written on these , and there is a large amount of people that collect these.......they do not collect the fakes from china, it has nothing to do with good quality counterfeits, you are confused and talking about something totally different.

[frugi]

I think the 1798 piece is a die-struck contemporary counterfeit. It's definitely well worth checking out. I collect contemporary counterfeit bust half dollars and some of them are very common, and some are unique or nearly so. The unique pieces bring the most money, but even common pieces usually sell for about what a genuine coin would bring. The 1790 piece appears to be cast. It could be contemporary, but contemporary cast pieces aren't worth as much as die-struck pieces, while Chinese cast coins are worth scrap. Some do collect contemporary cast coins though, so it would be worth checking it out as well. I would try emailing your photos to Dave and see what he says. He specialized in counterfeit 2 reales pieces before he became a full time dealer and would definitely know more about your coins than I would.

so I went ahead with your advice, and emailed pics and the following mail to Dave.....

hi dave.....i collect mostly copper tokens, and junk silver. however, i recently came across this piece, and a friend of mine (who collects contemporary counterfeit bust halves) referred me to your website and told me they thought i had a unknown variety of a contemporary counterfeit 8 reales. they told me they could not find it listed in any books as a variety, and expressed to me it may be quite a find and rather valuable, and thought i should contact you.

here is what his reply was...

Thanks for your email. It is in fact a contemporary counterfeit 8 reales.

It is not listed in the new reference book, because that book covers only the portrait 8 reales of the Americas.

The coin in question imitates an 8 reales from Madrid, Spain. Here is a genuine example:

http://www.coinfactswiki.com/wiki/Spain ... F_8_reales

Even newly discovered, unlisted varieties from the Americas are not currently bringing much money, at least not so far. I purchased an unlisted 1794-Mexico City cft 8 reales earlier this week for $40, for example.

I would guess that your example has a market value in the $15-40 range, if I had to guess. you may want to keep it as a neat example of an old counterfeit.

Hope this helps,
Dave W.

It was not the reply I wanted to hear, but perhaps if I hang on to it long enough, maybe it will become valuable, just like anything else.

[John Reich]

Frugi, sorry to hear that your coin doesn't have a high money value--it is still a really, really neat piece. It's great that you have a unique piece! KSA? I think that if a book ever would come out about counterfeit 8 reales pieces, values could jump. I also collect contemporary counterfeit 3 cent silver pieces and have a dozen pieces. With no reference book, I don't know which, if any, are rare and what they are worth. I just collect them because the dies were hand-cut and they are (I think!) neat pieces. After the Davignon book about contemporary counterfeit halves came out, interest really jumped in the series. Same with Kleeburg on the 2 reales pieces. I really enjoy the pieces--you can buy something scarcer that an 1804 silver dollar for $50 to $100!

[frugi]

no worries. before you said anything, i thought it was worthless. i paid next to nothing for it, and $15-$40.00 isnt too shabby. Yes, I was hoping for several hundred dollars, and I would have sold it in a heartbeat, but its okay. I am excited that I learned something new, and now will keep an eye out for these things. I didnt realize they were even something people collect. Now I am going to make a point to find more "antique counterfeits".