Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue 29 i Coin Collector

A few weeks ago, I attended the British Numismatic Society’s summer event at The Royal Mint in south Wales. Our group of around 30 were given a guided tour of the shop floor and the museum in the morning, before having a series of talks in the afternoon. I would like to thank everyone at the mint for providing such an enjoyable day. There was an amazing amount of material on display, and it was wonderful to see experienced numismatists going between exhibits gazing at what was on offer. Among the many highlights was an Alfred the Great Penny, one of the first coins to state it was minted in London, the original home of the mint. From more recent times, the museum has a 1933 penny, one of only…

Stack’s Bowers Galleries has announced the opening of a new office located in the heart of Copenhagen, Denmark. The opening extends the American company’s global presence to better serve its European clientele. Beginning in July, Stack’s Bowers Galleries will manage their upcoming sales of the LE Bruun Collection from this new location. ‘Luther Medals and Reformation Coins: Michigan Connections and Collectors’ is a new exhibition at the Concordia Historical Institute in Saint Louis, MO, USA. The institute houses the most extensive institutional collection of Reformation coins and medals outside of Germany. The exhibition, with over 125 examples, opened on 25 June and runs until 18 February 2025. Full details are available on the institute’s website (concordiahistoricalinstitute.org). On 1 June, the Economy Museum – The Royal Coin Cabinet in Sweden reopened…

Many people tend to forget that the money they use in the form of banknotes, has been created by artists and designers in a long and complicated process, multiplied by the most advanced printing techniques of their time. Friends of notaphily look deeper into the genesis of money. In my ‘View from Europe’ column in the April 2024 edition of Stamp Collector, I took the opportunity to present some examples from the work of Czesław Słania (1921–2005), the eminent stamp and banknote engraver and designer. Słania’s daughter revealed in an interview after his passing that he ‘started his career’ as a youth from a poor coal miner’s family by forging banknotes, painting them by hand! When he wanted to go to the local cinema to see a movie, he spent…

Medal collectors tend to avoid buying awards that have been altered or defaced, and if they do purchase one that has been tampered with, they prefer to restore it to its original state. But as the expert John Hayward once said: ‘medals were not made for collectors’. A classic example of this is the Boer War medal to Thomas Chaplin. The auction catalogue from which I bought the Queen’s South Africa Medal with clasps Cape Colony, Transvaal and Wittebergen to 6548 Private T Chaplin, Wiltshire Regiment, said simply that it was ‘brooched’. I did not pay enough attention to this, and when it arrived, I discovered that the medal was in two parts (Figures 1–2). One was a disc with the obverse scarred by the surviving fittings for a brooch…

From the Meiji era of Japan (1867–1912), the auction at Baldwin’s on 10 July included a phenomenally rare, copper pattern yen, dating from year 3 – 1870 (lot 502). The Japanese government established the official silver standard in 1870, and this coin was a pattern for the first silver yen and represents the first machine-struck yen of Japan. Designed by the famous British engraver LC Wyon, these coins were struck at the Royal Mint. A handful of surviving yen patterns are known to exist in silver, white metal and tin, but this is believed to be the first copper pattern yen to have ever been offered for sale. It sold for £40,000, four times its lower estimate of £10,000. SOLD FOR £40,000 From the Indian princely state of Bhopal, the…

9 August – Tennants Auction Centre, Harmby Road, Leyburn, North Yorkshire DL8 5SG www.tennants.co.uk 21 August 2024 – Warwick & Warwick Chalon House, Scar Bank, Millers Road, Warwick CV34 5DB www.warwickandwarwick.com 27–30 August – Abacus 29 Hardner Road, Mount Waverley, VIC 3149, Australia www.abacusauctions.com.au 4 September – Hansons Heage Lane, Etwall, Derbyshire DE65 6LS hansonsauctioneers.co.uk 15 September – Chris Rudd PO Box 1500, Norwich NR10 5WS celticcoins.com 18 September – Noonans 16 Bolton Street, Mayfair, London W1J 8BQ www.noonans.co.uk 20 September – Mowbray Collectables West Plaza Hotel, Wellington, New Zealand www.mowbrays.co.nz 24 September – Sovereign Rarities 17–19 Maddox Street, London W1S 2QH www.sovr.co.uk 25 September – RWB 144 High Street, Royal Wootton Bassett, Swindon SN4 7AB www.rwbauctions.com 26 September – Spink 67–69 Southampton Row, London WC1B 4ET www.spink.com 25 September…

I began my career in numismatics in the mid-1970s. At the time, precious metal prices played a relatively small role in the market for rare coins. Gold sold for around $150–$200 per ounce and silver hovered in the $4–$6 per ounce range. The rare coin market was quite a cottage industry. The most accurate and widely used price guide was the Guide Book of United States Coins (Red Book), which was published just once per year and highly anticipated. The market for rare coins was also much smaller, and investors had barely given numismatics a glance. By the late 1970s, inflation had become the number one problem in the United States. The numismatic world was about to change almost overnight! Gold and silver prices began a sharp rise in the…

Because Eadmund’s children Eadwig and Eadgar were so young when their father died, he was instead succeeded by his brother Eadred – the youngest son of Edward the Elder (Figure 1). He began his reign facing yet another episode where York see-sawed back to Norse control. To make matters more confusing, conflict even arose between the kings of York themselves – with Erik ‘Bloodaxe’ initially taking control, before being deposed by Anlaf Sihtricsson, and then returning to rule after the latter’s death. NORTHUMBRIA ANNEXED Likely very tired of the constant bickering, Eadred invaded Northumbria in c.948 or 950 and destroyed much of the kingdom’s remaining infrastructure and offered incentives to Erik’s supporters if they deserted him. Perhaps weary after almost 15 years of instability, the Northumbrians finally expelled Erik in…