The more wear a coin receives the more it is apt to acquire other evidences of contact, such as nicks, edge bumps, and scratches. Such additional defects, if serious or especially prominent in nature, should always be mentioned in a coin's description. There are different schools of thought about this. Some feel that a coin should be described, for example, as "EF-40, but with several edge bumps." Such a coin may be worth, say, a VF-20 price. Some feel that it is just as expedient to simply describe the coin as VF-20 and say nothing else, for this equates to the market price level.

Coins which have been polished, soldered, holed and repaired, used as jewelry, re-engraved or burnished, or which have other problems should always be specifically described as such, no matter what their grade level.

Sharpness or Weakness of Strike

The sharpness or lightness of strike can affect a coin's value and, in recent times (for views have changed on this), a coin's grade. Consider as an example the 1941-S Liberty Walking half dollar. Nearly all known specimens, probably 95% or more, have the details on the skirt of Miss Liberty and on the central part of her figure weakly defined. Had you or I been present at the San Francisco Mint in 1941, and at the moment of striking had we taken with a gloved hand a typical 1941-S half dollar from the dies, it would have exhibited a flatness not unlike that observed on a coin which had spent several years in circulation. And yet the coin would have received no nicks, scratches, abrasions, or handling marks, for the newly minted specimen had yet to come into contact with anything else except a gloved hand. From a technical viewpoint, I suggest that a proper numismatic description of this coin, if offered in an auction catalogue, should be something like this:

"1941-S Liberty Walking half dollar. MS-70 from the standpoint of handling and contact marks; there is absolutely no evidence of such. However, in keeping with nearly all other known specimens of the variety, the details of Miss Liberty are lightly defined on the higher areas, giving the coin a flat appearance at the center. This coin is worth an MS-63 price."

However, this view would not be at all in step with prevailing numismatic philosophy. Instead, the piece would be downgraded to, say, MS-63 to reflect its market level, with nothing said about the weakness of strike.