Triceratops Posted August 21, 2014 Share Posted August 21, 2014 Are those 3d polished goniatites from morocco real or are they just carved limestone? Often half of the goniatites is covered in white 'fossil' and the rest in black or brown 'stone'. It seems to me that the prep people are taking advantage of a incomplete fossil and crafting the rest around it. See the pics if you don't understand what I mean. Thanks -Lyall Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred Posted August 21, 2014 Share Posted August 21, 2014 They are both real and carved. When found in the field, they are not very pretty. So before going into the commercial circuit, they are grinded and polished. The smooth appearance and sharp keel on the side are products of the imagination of the 'craftsman'. The white part with lines is the chambered part of the shell, which was divided by septa (the black lines). They were moslty hollow when the animal died, and filled with white calcite in the fossilization process. The dark, uniform part is the former 'living chamber', containing the body of the animal. It is usually filled with sediment before fossilisation, hence the different appearance. The curve at the opening of the shell is also a product of imagination. So this are genuine fossils, but badly mutilated. 1 Paleo database, information and community Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triceratops Posted August 22, 2014 Author Share Posted August 22, 2014 (edited) Thanks! I didn't think goniatites were naturally that shape. Edited August 22, 2014 by Triceratops -Lyall Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmaier Posted August 22, 2014 Share Posted August 22, 2014 In the world of ancient coin collecting we have this watchdog database that people contribute to that keeps track of known coin forgeries. http://www.forgerynetwork.com/ The database allows to to type in the species of coin and see what fakes are known on the market. It is standard procedure for experienced collectors to use this before buying coins, so it really kills the sales price of the fakes. You still get unexperienced people buying the fakes, though, but at least the price is cheap. I wonder if there should be something similar for fossils? I don't interact with the fossils sales market, so I don't know if the problem is really big enough to justify it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted August 22, 2014 Share Posted August 22, 2014 ...I wonder if there should be something similar for fossils? I don't interact with the fossils sales market, so I don't know if the problem is really big enough to justify it. I thing that fossils have such infinite variety that any such database would necessarily be either cursory, or completely unwieldy. "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmaier Posted August 22, 2014 Share Posted August 22, 2014 I've read estimates that the coin forgeries on ebay are running about 50%. It's probably only a few percent for fossils, I would think. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wrangellian Posted August 27, 2014 Share Posted August 27, 2014 Cursory would be better than nothing... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmaier Posted August 27, 2014 Share Posted August 27, 2014 (edited) I looked around the web for any information about fossil forgeries and found almost no information. If you search for coin forgeries or antiquity forgeries, you will find the problem is massive.Some of the tips to not getting stung: - buy from reputable dealers. They will not knowlingly sell a fake because if word gets out, they will lose all their good buyers. - if you dare to buy from an unknown source, check the database. - if it looks too good to be true, then it probably is (the old axiom) - if there is a lot of money involved (more than $50), then the probability of a good fake is likely. Low value coins don't attract the criminal element. The comon coins aren't worth forging.Coin forgery started in 600 B.C., fifty years after the first coin was officially minted.I have many ancient coin forgeries and many people collect them, because they are part of history. An interesting part of it, in my opinion.Coin forgery is growing at an exponetial rate, and the technology being used is becoming increasing sophisticated, so these new forgeries are incredably difficult to spot.One way to spot the fakes is to look around the market at other coins of that same species to see if there is a sudden burst of similar coins. Once the forger has made a cast or die or a specific species of a coin, they normally roll off a lot of them. Then they try to disguise them by applying different wear patterns and types of surface oxidation (patina) for each coin.Anyway, the problem doesn't seem to be that big in the fossil market. I've seen people selling fake meg teeth on the beach in Venice, FL. What they are selling are "educational replicas" and when you hold them, you can tell they aren't real. If you wait a minute, the seller will say "It's just a replica, but it's a good one." They probably would not have volenteered that information if you hadn't paused for a bit. Edited August 27, 2014 by tmaier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted August 27, 2014 Share Posted August 27, 2014 In the alternate universe of coin collecting, some of the known forgeries have themselves become valuable collectibles! "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tmaier Posted August 27, 2014 Share Posted August 27, 2014 (edited) Yes, I have some very interesting ancient fakes. There are some "purist" collectors who only collect the official mint marked coins, so they want to list these anceint coins as "forgeries". That is a hot debate among the people who control the database. I think only recent forgeries should be listed, because I collect history and those ancient forgeries tell a lot about the local people and what was going on at the time of the forgery. Since 90%+ of people were illiterate, the ancient forged coins have obvious misspellings and horrible rendering of characters. Some of them are funny, like a series of x'es and I'es and squiggles. I have a large Byzantine forgery of Justinian and the lettering is weird sqiggles and the portrait of the emperor looks like Bart Simpson. It's such a horrible big fake that it is one of my favorite coins. It was "minted" by a primitive germanic tribe to the north of Byzantium. Loaded with history. Edited August 27, 2014 by tmaier Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triceratops Posted September 1, 2014 Author Share Posted September 1, 2014 I've heard that 50% of all coins in circulation in the U.K are fake. Not sure if this is true but if it is.......... -Lyall Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kosmoceras Posted September 1, 2014 Share Posted September 1, 2014 I've heard that 50% of all coins in circulation in the U.K are fake. Not sure if this is true but if it is.......... Most coins in the UK have such a small value it would not be worth forging them. There is a problem with counterfeit £1 coins in circulation here; however, this figure is just over 3%. Maybe this thread has become a bit off topic, but none the less interesting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
art Posted September 1, 2014 Share Posted September 1, 2014 The money in the US is fake-not of any real value except what we are told it's worth.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Auspex Posted September 1, 2014 Share Posted September 1, 2014 The money in the US is fake-not of any real value except what we are told it's worth.... Send it to me, and I'll deal with it. "There has been an alarming increase in the number of things I know nothing about." - Ashleigh Ellwood Brilliant “Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.” - Thomas Henry Huxley >Paleontology is an evolving science. >May your wonders never cease! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Triceratops Posted September 2, 2014 Author Share Posted September 2, 2014 Send it to me, and I'll deal with it. :-) -Lyall Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Herb Posted September 5, 2014 Share Posted September 5, 2014 you can send me all the fake US money you have I'll even pay for the shipping. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence"_ Carl Sagen No trees were killed in this posting......however, many innocent electrons were diverted from where they originally intended to go. " I think, therefore I collect fossils." _ Me "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."__S. Holmes "can't we all just get along?" Jack Nicholson from Mars Attacks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts