What’s the coin that took you the most to find?

[AncientCoinnoisseur]

I’m talking about your ‘blue whale’, the coin that took you forever to finally acquire. It might be because the coin itself was rare, or because you were looking for something very specific (i.e. a common denarius but perfectly centered, or with a perfect reverse, or a Lysimachos with a perfect Gorgon on the shield, stuff like that).

it doesn’t have to be your ‘crown jewel’, just a coin that made you sweat a lot 🙂

[ambr0zie]

My strategy does not include acquiring very rare/excellent condition coins. The coins from my wish list (fulfilled targets or still to be fulfilled) are "normal coins". 

It took me a while to get a Thasos coin with the NFSW imagery, yep, that one. 

16 mm, 4g.
Islands off Thrace, Thasos. AR drachm. Circa 500-480 BC.
Ithyphallic satyr advancing right, carrying off protesting nymph / Quadripartite incuse square.
Le Rider, Thasiennes 3; HGC 6, 332.

[Simon]

Not pretty for most eyes but to me it is the holy grail. 

My original collecting goals was all the tetartera from the 12th century. An attempt to collect all the small coppers from Alexius I to Alexius III. This coin took twenty years to find, it completed the collection. 

It is a half tetarteron  of Isaac II, through the years I found coins that might have been correct but the description in SBCV and DOC mentioned it had a very small 12mm die. None of my examples had a 12mm die.  One day on ebay I saw this coin and it was misattributed as a Manuel coin, I won it it for a song. After receiving it I thanked the seller and notified them what the coin was, turns out they had another one. Not as nice but when they put it up for auction they made over $500.00 , I did bid on that one too but I stopped at a couple of hundred. 

Now because of this coin (and several other rarities) I have the world's only privately owned complete collection of this denomination for the 12th century. The only place that might have another complete collection is the Museum of Thessaloniki but I am not sure. 

 ISAAC II ANGELUS AE Half TETARTERON S-2006V A DOC 6OBV Bust of Archangel Michael, beardless and nimbate, wearing divitision, collar piece, and jeweled loros of a simplified type, holds in r. a jeweled sceptre, and in l. Globus cruciger.
REV Bust of emperor wearing stemma. Divitision, collar piece, and jeweled loros of a simplified type; holds in r. hand scepter cruciger and in l. anexikakia.

Size 15.55

Weight 1.9gm

Edited October 6 by Simon

[Salomons Cat]

It took me a long time to find denarii of Tiberius and Macrinus, which I assume is somewhat surprising. However, I was looking for a combination of a well-executed portrait, good surface quality, proper centring, and a reasonable price—oh, and I also wanted a Macrinus with a short beard.
Most of the time, these criteria weren’t available together.
To be honest, I'm not even sure why I wanted to have Macrinus with a short beard... 

Here they are 🙂

The reverse features a diminutive Macrinus beside Jupiter.

Edited October 6 by Salomons Cat

[JayAg47]

One of my long time want list coin was a Raja Raja Chola gold stater. While his copper issues are dime a dozen, his gold coins that specifically mention his name, are hard to come by. In the past 5 years I have exactly seen two coins on retail, one is mine on Ma-shops and an other coin on eBay, which was more expensive and more worn than mine and also had test slashes. While there are exceedingly rare Chola coins, at least this type is feasible to acquire if you look hard enough. However if you’re in India it’s not a problem since most Indian auction houses have these for sale but don’t ship overseas. 

[-monolith-]

I'm still looking for a high quality Hadrian AE As, RIC II 573 (248). I need it for a display for my casting error coin of the same type:

Above coin not mine, below coin is part of my collection

 

Edited October 8 by -monolith-

[Croatian Coin Collector]

Ottoman Gold Sultani of Mehmed II (minted in Constantinople in 1454):

 

 

[red_spork]

For me it was a half victoriatus. The denomination is pretty rare with perhaps on the order of 50 examples known of all types from this rare denomination and any time they pop up they are so crazily expensive that I never expected to own one even though it was one of the first coins I remember thinking I would really feel accomplished if I could ever own one. I was lucky to find this example some time ago for a very reasonable price because it was misattributed as a common quinarius. Its a crappy example as the type goes but at a price that was a small fraction of what I expected to pay to acquire one of these(or really didn't expect to pay since I thought I'd never get one), I really can't complain 

Roman Republic AR Half Victoriatus(13.5 mm, 1.45g). Anonymous("VB" series). ca. 211-208 B.C. Uncertain mint(traditionally, Vibo Valentium). Laureate head of Jupiter right. Bead and reel border / Victory standing right, crowning trophy with wreath; VB ligate on exergue between; S to right. ROMA in exergue. Line border. Crawford 95/2

Edited October 8 by red_spork