Does Anyone Else Do This?

[David Atherton]

In my Flavian RIC volume I started marking the varieties I've acquired with a penciled dot next to the entry.

The same with RPC.

This is the easiest way at a glance I can tell what I have or do not have. Does anyone else do this?

Edited May 28 by David Atherton

[CPK]

I don't have enough coins yet. 😉

[David Atherton]

3 minutes ago, CPK said:

I don't have enough coins yet. 😉

Fair point! I suppose if you're not specialising with certain volumes it would be pretty impractical. 

I know there are computer programmes out there that catalogue your coins, but I'm old fashioned: coins stored in paper envelopes organised in coin boxes, and the invoices filed in a filing cabinet. It works for me. 

[AETHER]

You mean you haven't filled this book yet??

[KenDorney]

God no!!  I’m really weird about my books. Most look like they have never been cracked open, no folds, creases, wear marks, but certainly no notations!

I’ve been like that since I was a kid. Even my pulp fiction paperbacks usually look like they have never been touched. 

[JeandAcre]

Busted as charged!  To @CPK's point, I do this (check mark, but also, thank you, pencil) to help with finding the relative few coins in any given book.

...But I've always been borderline-abusive toward books.  For the really ruthlessly utilitarian approach, a role model (not quite there yet) has always been Samuel Johnson.  As one 20th-century biographer said about this picture, 'the book will never be the same.'

[maridvnvm]

How do you annotate new/unlisted entries?  

[David Atherton]

28 minutes ago, maridvnvm said:

How do you annotate new/unlisted entries?  

I mark them off in my printout of the Addenda & Corrigenda.

New entries are penciled in.

At some point I need to pencil the A&C entries into the RIC volume. 

[Anaximander]

8 hours ago, David Atherton said:

In my Flavian RIC volume I started marking the varieties I've acquired with a penciled dot next to the entry.
The same with RPC. 
This is the easiest way at a glance I can tell what I have or do not have. Does anyone else do this?

Heavens NO!  I'm with @KenDorney on this. 
I'd rather compose notes on bookmarks and insert them into a reference. I have a lot of bookmarks.

I like to make virtual trays, family trees, and tables of contents (TOCs).

Edited May 28 by Anaximander
Removed one virtual tray (Roman) as one tray too many.

[maridvnvm]

For my collecting areas RIC is so out of line with what we understand today that I have taken a different approach. I have created a document (think of it like a local mini-Wildwinds focussed on my collecting area) which is structured around the current thinking, noting RIC numbers, corrections etc. and each entry is then linked to a file detailing that coin. I then insert new entries into the document at what would be the most appropriate position. I can spot coins that I don't have as they do not have anything linked to them. Doubtful entries in RIC / BMCRE are coloured red.

If I take my eastern Septimius Severus collection as an example, I have more coins that aren't in RIC/BMCRE than there are entries in RIC/BMCRE. This necessitated a different approach to the one that you use. 

[Ancient Coin Hunter]

In most cases I have only one or two coins of a specific emperor. So not necessarily a worthwhile exercise. It is possible that I might specialize more in the future so never say never.

Edited May 28 by Ancient Coin Hunter

[Heliodromus]

This wouldn't really be practical for the late roman period I collect, since there can be so many bust and obverse legend variations and combinations, not to mention different mints and issues and no-one is going to want to collect them all. Sometimes RIC (esp. for gold) will even attribute based on reverse legend breaks.

A check list just of RIC/reference reverse types would make a bit more sense (erring in opposite direction), but for my period there are quite a few unlisted reverse types as well as excruciatingly rare ones (known from 1 or 2 specimens, maybe in a museum), so that a reference check list is incomplete, and a complete list of reverse types an impossible goal.

My solution, as a Constantine specialist, is to define my own want list (a subset of all known reverse types) and represent these as pictures of the coins. I have multiple levels of want list: a directory of wanted reverse types, one of additional wanted types (e.g. same reverse type, but different obverse/etc in cases where it makes sense), plus a written "core want list" of attainable types that I critically want to complete certain groupings with an eye to future presentation.

Despite all the "want list" planning, I still find that a fair number of my acquisitions are unplanned and opportunistic, and these are often more satisfying than crossing one off the want list.

Edited May 28 by Heliodromus

[Phil Davis]

A dot?! Blasphemy! Patently, the proper way to do this is a discreet penciled check mark, like I do in my copies of Crawford, Sydenham and RSC I.

jk/!

Edited May 28 by Phil Davis

[Roman Collector]

I can't do this for the Antonine coinage. RIC 3 is hopelessly out of date and not only incomplete, but also full of spurious entries. BMCRE 4 is better, but still incomplete. I have had to create my own checklist. 

[David Atherton]

It does make things much easier for me having the Flavian RIC and RPC volumes being fairly up-to-date. I can only imagine the impracticalities with out-of-date references!

[David Atherton]

1 hour ago, Phil Davis said:

A dot?! Blasphemy! Patently, the proper way to do this is a discreet penciled check mark, like I do in my copies of Crawford, Sydenham and RSC I.

jk/!

Lol. When I first started marking entries off in the references, I did consider using checkmarks ✔️! Not sure why I settled on dots?

Edited May 28 by David Atherton

[DonnaML]

Five or six years ago, when I still had a "one coin per realistically obtainable emperor" goal, I used to put a dot next to the the name of each emperor or empress I acquired in the list at the back of my well-thumbed copy of the old Zander Klawans Handbook of Ancient Greek & Roman Coins -- my first ancient coin book. I gave up that goal, and stopped adding those dots, some time ago. I'm content with making sure I add the write-up of every coin I buy (the same write-ups I post here) to my personal catalog of ancient coins, or my separate catalog of non-ancient coins and medals.

Once upon a time, when I was in my teens 50 years or so ago and was intensely interested in "old" movies -- everything from silent movies up through the mid-1960s -- and used to buy lots of books about movies that usually had lists of the ones they discussed, I would put dots in those lists next to the movies I had seen. So that's probably where I got the idea.

[JeandAcre]

...The annotations I do (thank you, in pencil) are pretty summary, written in the margins or above the entry.  As such, they preponderate to cross-references.  Even in the case of variant legends ...well, in the case of medievals, those can amount to being the default mode, so generally, I just say "(var.)," in implicit reference to my example, and leave it at that.

[Helvius Pertinax]

As others have said, it makes more sense when you're specialised. I am not, but I do note the ID number I've assigned to each coin in my collection into Kampmann for the Roman imperials, next to their respective entry.

 

My mentality is buy books to use them. I not collection numbers, underline and mark sentences, add my own findings. My Carradice is an absolute mess of marked paragraphs and additional notes.

 

Books are used for working with them, while the end product is my own writeup (or study if I find the time).

[Qcumbor]

I do that all the time with my specialized collection : dots, annotations about varieties, references to other collections or auctions for very rare coin types when I happen to know their existence. The Dombes reference book is a mess. I'm considering buying another copy to have it clean though !

Q

Edited June 1 by Qcumbor

[Rand]

I do not write in books (childhood teaching), but 90% of books I buy now are electronic or audio. I mark electronic books extensively with no concern. Love to always have them with me.

 

Edited June 1 by Rand

[Postvmvs]

I primarily collect antoninianii of the Gallic empire and use as my "checklist" AGK (Schulzki, H. J. Die Antoninianprägung der Gallischen Kaiser von Postumus bis Tetricus. Bonn, 1996.) with corrections by Weder. But I don't actually write in the book, I made a spreadsheet and work from that.

[Ten-Speed]

I've kept a bound numismatic journal for a few years, many different kinds of comments can go into it: new coin purchases and the history behind them; reviews of numismatic books or articles; lists of emperors; defining characteristics of varieties I'm trying to figure out, especially Large Cents; email addresses that may come in handy; prices of coins then and now; or just a good description of what I see on the coin. It really gives me a sense that I'm accomplishing something in the hobby, especially at this age I remember things better if I write them down and then review them a few times. I use those Moleskine notebooks, the same kind that Hemingway wrote in. 

[CPK]

23 minutes ago, Ten-Speed said:

I've kept a bound numismatic journal for a few years, many different kinds of comments can go into it: new coin purchases and the history behind them; reviews of numismatic books or articles; lists of emperors; defining characteristics of varieties I'm trying to figure out, especially Large Cents; email addresses that may come in handy; prices of coins then and now; or just a good description of what I see on the coin. It really gives me a sense that I'm accomplishing something in the hobby, especially at this age I remember things better if I write them down and then review them a few times. I use those Moleskine notebooks, the same kind that Hemingway wrote in. 

This sounds like a great idea. Do you try to keep an organized collection catalog along with it? I keep wanting to do that but have never gotten around to it.

[Ten-Speed]

I just have my coins organized in red boxes with either envelopes with cotton liners or in Saflips. And a PCGS box or two. I classify the coins in about 10 different ways and seem to be able to find them in the right box.Ancients are categorized by the A-Team (nice ones) and the other is coins in the $30-50 range.The cotton liners seem to do a good job with bronze coins. It would be great to have a catalog but for some reason it's difficult for me to get going on it. I do have each coin listed on a 3 x 5 old-fashioned index card with. basic info including price. I saw that one of the larger dealers would make you a catalog if you have valuable coins to auction with them. That must look really neat! But that is in the realm of heavy-hitters, of which I'm not.

Edited June 8 by Ten-Speed
accuracy