Remove edge description field for hammered coins

Hi! 

i consider edge description as irrelevant for ancient and medieval coins. Some other fields are irrelevant for these coins, notably thickness (as stated in the guidelines by the way) or often alloy, so its not a problem for me we dont use fields serving only for modern coins.

You'll see that 99% of entries are empty (at least those I saw) and no one ever complained as far as I know.

But some fill it anyway, for the sake of completion feeling I guess (completion bias), putting always “plain” here. Example

It just pollutes the entry in my opinion. Edge become a topic when coins are not hammered anymore in history.

I feel therefore we could deactivate edge section when “hammered” is checked. Dont you agree?

I don't agree with this. There is relevant info that should be recorded for edges of some hammered coins as well, such as protocontorniate or serrated edges:

N#66904

stratocaster

I don't agree with this. There is relevant info that should be recorded for edges of some hammered coins as well, such as protocontorniate or serrated edges:

N#66904

Interesting, Thanks! I feel this info you describe is not really about the edge but more about the shape. It could be sorted as a new shape “round serrated” instead of “round irregular” in the example you gave dont you think?

If you or anyone else has examples of edges not being plain for hammered coins, it would help me indeed as my knowledge is only about domains I'm referree for 🙂

Protocontorniate seems to be more for exonumia, isnt it? (Coins altered afterwards for another purpose) https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=protocontorniate

Compendium

stratocaster

I don't agree with this. There is relevant info that should be recorded for edges of some hammered coins as well, such as protocontorniate or serrated edges:

N#66904

Interesting, Thanks! I feel this info you describe is not really about the edge but more about the shape. It could be sorted as “round with cutouts” instead of “round irregular” in the example you gave dont you think?

How is it created? If the shape is created by hammering into a collar isn't that an edge?

Edit: OK, modern non-round coins get the shape from a collar as well, but a hammered coin gets the shape from hammering. This seems like a modification of the shape rather than shaping the coin.

 The Roman serrated denarii were hand made with a knife on cast silver flans. It is the manual equivalent of machine milled edges.

https://www.forumancientcoins.com/numiswiki/view.asp?key=Serrated 

https://www.jstor.org/stable/42664000?saml_data=eyJzYW1sVG9rZW4iOiIyZjE2MzA0Yy00NzQzLTRjODMtOGIwNS1hZDIwNmEzN2VmZjQiLCJpbnN0aXR1dGlvbklkcyI6WyI2NWRkMDkyOC05YmZiLTQ1ZTUtOTNhNy1iNzA1OTkzMmE4ZjciXX0&seq=22#metadata_info_tab_contents 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milled_coinage#/media/File%3ACoin_edge_enscription_mill.jpg

Thanks!

I still think it's more a “shape description” though: I think that as soon as you can prove the description only by looking at obverse or reverse photo, it is about shape, and it is about edge description when you need a photo of the edge surface itself.

If we think about it, all coins are made with tools giving shape to flans (round, square etc) by cutting in larger pieces of metal, but we dont describe their edge as “rounded edge” for instance.

It is exactly the same as for scalloped coins. And also, why we'd have these categories as shape if not for these cases?

There is also a serrated edge type 

https://en.numista.com/catalogue/edges.php

stratocaster

There is also a serrated edge type 

https://en.numista.com/catalogue/edges.php

Oh indeed! I guess it is up to Admins to decide if it's worth keeping edge desc for hammered coins only for serrated coins; I suggest we rather create a new dedicated shape description in the “technical infos” section.

NB: We currently have 18 of those in the catalog, out of 52608 hammered coins.

Little up here :-)

We talked about it, and the page needs some amendments to allow such behaviour (conditionally hiding field) as far as I gather, so any decision is postponed.

Jarcek

We talked about it, and the page needs some amendments to allow such behaviour (conditionally hiding field) as far as I gather, so any decision is postponed.

Ok thanks!

Any news on the amendments needed you mentionned?

No, nothing so far.

@Jarcek @tdziemia @Xavier am I the only one whole eyes are bleeding when seeing plain edge on new entered hammered coins?

N#526367

;-P

Sorry for coming in on this very late but if this is OK for the thickness field instructions: For coins with a large variance in thickness, such as most ancient coins, this field should be left blank why is this not OK for the edge instructions Nota: for plain edges of ancient or medieval hammered coins, there is no need to indicate “plain” or “smooth”, the edge description field must be left blank?

Yes I always leave it blank for hammered coins :-)

We could say it is useless, it is generally ok to leave it blank, but I do not like the data deletion. What I would like to see is expandable data table. For some coins, we have exact composition measured, useless for standard collector, but still scientific data. Edge would fall into this category as well. Simply have a way how to store additional data, without flooding the page.

Jarcek

We could say it is useless, it is generally ok to leave it blank, but I do not like the data deletion. What I would like to see is expandable data table. For some coins, we have exact composition measured, useless for standard collector, but still scientific data. Edge would fall into this category as well. Simply have a way how to store additional data, without flooding the page.

I get your point but I'd delete only “Plain” word when it's the only info in the field; I'd argue a series of letters just to not let a field empty is not necessarily an actual info from my perspective ;-P