More on Sets: Part Three. Relics.

Adding battered and corroded coins to your collection will open up new avenues of exploration. This is the easiest way to put some necromancer principles into action.

Collection #1.   Nice CN cents of the Civil War era.

   Relic coins stimulate the imagination. How was it lost? Who lost it? Where was it found? We cannot answer these questions to our satisfaction, but we can ponder them. What better way to do so then to collect a few relics and create your own interpretation of how they could have been lost.
   We already do this. For example, many collectors imagine that their 1886 Morgan dollar could have been in a poker game in a smokey saloon, or that President Lincoln might have spent the 1860 "nick" that sits on your desk.
   But a lost coin that sat in the ground for decades or more, a lost coin marked with the corrosive badge of authority, is more evocative.
   A shiny cartwheel or mellow Indian cent brings little to the table but for the collector's bravado. We have heard it all before: "Look at what I got," and "It is VF super-plus," and "I paid less than what it is worth!" It that it? It this what the coins are telling you? Well, let's bring out the awards for Mr. Sharp Coin Buyer (Trumpets sounding).

Collection #2.   Relics from the Civil War era.

Maurice Rheims noted in his book, The Strange Life of Objects, that: "One of a collector's most entrancing daydreams is the imaginary joy of uncovering the past in the guise of an archaeologist." The necromancer collector whole-heartedly agrees. And to go further I would add: "Even the seemingly insignificant piece has the power to evoke grand images of the past." And furthermore: "Especially the seemingly insignificant piece!"
    So consider the following two collections: 1) a neat and tidy set of copper nickel cents from the American Civil War, all selected for their pleasant tone and moderate wear; or 2) a few beaten copper nickel cents, plus some larger coppers, all juxtaposed with a few relics dug from skirmish sites. Which collecting is the most exciting?