This week’s fresh listings:

 

This page is to be updated every Tuesday and will contain all the latest Coin, Medal & Token listings for that particular week.

 

The more observant of you may have realised that I no longer keep previous "Fresh Listings" coins on this page. 

All for sale coins can be found via the category grid on the front page.  Most sold coins are now accessible via a new link on that same category grid.

 

Additions to www.HistoryInCoins.com for week commencing Tuesday 3rd December 2024

 

 

 

WI-9032:  John (as Lord) Irish Medieval Hammered Silver Halfpenny.  Listed in reference books as pennies but circulated at halfpence (the halfpennies duly circulated as farthings).  Second DOM[inus] coinage with obverse legend ending -OM, c.1185/1190 and no later than 1208/9.  Waterford mint; Walter as moneyer.  With a cross potent as opposed to a cross pommée reverse, this is a Group 1b coin, Spink 6210.  Prince John (his father still being very much alive at this point) was given Lordship of Ireland in 1177.  He finally visited in 1185 which coincided with the first (excessively rare) issue.  This later issue followed on from that.  In 1208, John became king, so heralding the third "Rex" coinage.  Waterford is a rarer mint for this issue.  £385

Provenance

Ex M.J. McKeever collection

 

WI-9033:  Edward 1st Irish Medieval Hammered Round FARTHING.  Second coinage, type 1, the rarer Waterford mint - only Dublin and Waterford struck farthings and only Dublin struck them for the late Edward 1st issue (the issue in between those two struck no farthings).  Spink 6256.  A rare coin.  £195

 

WI-9034:  Excellent Edward VI Irish Tudor Hammered Silver Groat or Sixpence.  Posthumous (Henry VIII) old head coinage, 1547 - 1550.  CIVI TAS DVB LINIE - Dublin mint.  Initial mark P.  The final type IV issue (small right facing bust; very much in the style of the English Tower groats) and so nearer to 1550 in date.  Spink 6488.  Struck in the name of Henry VIII and with the old head portrait of Henry VIII, even though by the time this coin hit the streets of Ireland, Henry had been dead for nearly three years.  The reason for the old king's details on the coinage was not, as most people understand, simply because Edward was too young to do "kingly stuff", or because people still loved the old king, or even that the Irish were slow off the mark - it was actually done to con the people, or rather to carry on conning the people, but conning them just a little bit more.  Actual Henry VIII base coinage, struck towards the end of his reign, was very debased as a way of making money for the mint, and therefore the country, after Henry had all but emptied the country's coffers.  The English ministers planned to bring the currency of England (not Ireland!) back up to .925 alloy from little better than copper and indeed they did this in 1551 with the English fine silver issues.  To pay for this, the Irish debased coinage would continue for a further x4 years after the death of Henry and crucially, having the old king's name and portrait on the coins would, it was thought, trick the public into accepting the poor coins.  Remember, the coin in your hand back then was supposed to be the face value in silver, so much so that the coin itself was largely irrelevant - all you needed was a penny's worth of scrap silver to purchase a penny loaf of bread.  These debased coins were far from being worth their face value in metal.  The bit where the English ministers conned the people just a little bit more was in making the silver content of the Edward VI coinage just a little bit better than the worst of the Henry VIII coinage BUT they increasing the face value from a groat (fourpence) to a sixpence WITHOUT upping the metal content.  Basically, same coin but a revaluation.  To further rub salt into the wound, whilst in 1551 the English were enjoying bright shiny fine silver coinage of .925 alloy, the Irish, in 1552, having suffered in order to pay for the English fine silver halcyon days, suffered further by having their coinage reduced even more to .250!  So here we have a coin that is Henry VIII and/or Edward VI and a denomination of 4d and/or 6d!  More importantly, we have here an excellent grade example with an unusually clear initial mark.  Superior to the Spink plate coin in terms of edge and legends.  A rare offering.  £665

Provenance

Ex Tim Owen

 

WI-9035:  Irish Charles 1st Hammered Silver ORMONDE Groat.  The Great Rebellion in Ireland.  Issued by the Lords Justices at Dublin and termed Ormond Money due to the Earl of Ormonde being appointed Lieutenant of Ireland in 1643.  This issue demonstrated allegiance to the monarch by incorporating the king’s crown on the obverse.  Issued 1643-1644. Large C•R; crown above; all within linear and beaded border / Large IIII; D above; all within linear and beaded border. Spink 6548.  This was the final coinage of the rebellion period to be issued.  The crude fashion with which this coin has been cut, together with the rudimentary die-sinking, and the indifferent strike, is somewhat reminiscent of the Charles 1st besieged issue just across the Irish Sea in Carlisle a year or so later.  £235

 

WSax-9036:  Pedigreed Edward the Confessor Hammered Silver Penny.  Pointed helmet type, B.M.V. VII, circa 1053-6.  +GODRIC ON LEHER - Leicester mint.  Spink 1179.  Only x2 examples recorded on the EMC database; only one of which is GODRIC (same dies).  An exceptionally rare type coin coupled with a rare mint town.  Old tickets here and here.  Better than VF and with an impressive provenance portfolio dating back to over 100 years ago.  £1,885

Provenance

Ex Stanley Gibbons

Ex Baldwins (2011 - sold for £1,250)

Ex E.W. Danson (2005)

Ex B.W. Hunt (dispersed by Spink in 1955 for £3,10.0)

Ex Duke of Argyll collection (dispersed by Spink in 1949)

Ex E.H. Wheeler (dispersed by Seaby, 1931

Ex Major P.W.C. Carlyon-Britton (dispersed Wheeler in 1918 for £2.12.0)

 

WMH-9037:  Edward V or Richard III Hammered Silver Medieval Groat.  Type 2a, reading EDWARD DI GRA REX ANGL Z FRANC.  London mint, initial mark Boar's Head 1 struck over Sun & Rose 1.  Spink 2155.  Obverse dies in the name of Edward with an underlying Sun & Rose 1 initial mark.  In 1483, on 12th February, the Cinquefoil coinage of Edward IV's type XXI ended.  The new mint master, Bartholomew Reed, entered into an indenture with the king and thus Sun & Rose 1 was introduced.  Edward died on the 9th April 1483 but Sun & Rose 1 continued through the very short reign of Edward V and into the reign of Richard III.  This ended on 20th July when a new indenture was prepared by Robert Brackenbury to introduce the Boar's Head mark.  The dies were prepared very soon after Richard III ascended the throne on 26th June 1483.  Boar’s Head initial mark - the White Boar was the personal device or badge of Richard III and dear to his heart.  Richard III was the last of the medieval monarchs, losing to Henry Tudor on Bosworth Field, or as is now the current thinking, on a field a few short miles from that famous location.  The famous "King in the Carpark."  Whist Richard was no saint (I think some poor decisions and a ruthless streak that they all had at that time was about as bad as it got), he probably wasn't a ‘child killer’, ‘murderer’, or ‘usurper’, at least no more than any other medieval monarch.  Don't believe all that Shakespeare tells you!!  So here we have a coin struck from an obverse die that was very much part of the Holy Grail of Edward V's coinage but modified by the addition of Richard III's beloved Boar’s Head initial mark, but crucially leaving the old regnal name intact.  Coincraft place this coin under the Edward V category whilst Spink place it under Richard III.  Incidentally, as a Richard III groat, it is the rarest type, other than the York example - the last one of those I saw go through auction achieved £7,000 before commission.  An extremely rare coin indeed.  £3,875

 

WSC-9038:  Scottish James III Jacobite Touch-Piece which is Guaranteed Touched by James.  James Francis Edward Stuart.  Circa 1720's.  This silver touchpiece would have been personally touched by the would-be James VIII and given out to a sufferer of Scrofula, or modern day tuberculosis.  This "Touching Ceremony" goes way back.  It was basically the monarch of the day saying that as God had put him on the throne, he (the monarch) was a conduit of God, thereby when the monarch personally touched the touchpiece and gave it to the sufferer, God himself had also touched it, thus a rapid cure of Scrofula was all but certain.  Some cynics might claim that this was nothing more than a massive self-promotion on the monarch's part?  However, it was hugely popular and near universally accepted as having value throughout the land, even though I suspect the difference it made to sufferers of TB was as close to nothing as you can get.   James Francis Edward Stuart, ever keen to promote his right by God to be monarch, would have been a fool to not perform the Touching Ceremony, and indeed he embraced it for all he was worth whilst in exile in Italy. 

When the exiled  King James VII and II  died in 1701, his son James Francis Edward Stuart took up the reins of the  Jacobite cause. He laid claim to the thrones of Scotland, England and Ireland as James VIII and III. But to his opponents he was the ‘Pretender’.  Smuggled out of England as a baby when his father was deposed, James ‘VIII’ was raised in France. In 1708, supported by the King of France, Louis XIV, James attempted to invade  Scotland,  but was unable to land.  James himself finally landed in Scotland in December 1715, but he was not able to revive Jacobite fortunes and left for exile again with some of his leading supporters. In 1719 another Jacobite rising, this time supported by Spain, was defeated at the Battle of Glenshiel, in the Northwest Highlands.  James remained in exile for the rest of his life, dying in Rome in 1766. There he was the head of a royal court, with queen and two heirs. His ‘reign’ as Pretender to the throne had lasted just over 64 years. 

Only ever struck in silver, and made with holes already in place in order that recipients should wear them on a chain around their necks, firmly touching the bare skin at all times, these Jacobite touchpieces are considerably rarer than the English gold examples - this being only the second example I have ever had.  See here for a detailed write up of this touchpiece.  Although four or five orders were placed and received for James VIII touchpieces, only x22 pieces are extant today.  This one is type Obv.1 / Rev.1 - see THE SOVEREIGN REMEDY by Noel Woolf, a thoroughly excellent book with much information on touchpieces throughout the ages.  A rare offering indeed.  £1,850

 

 

Extra information / image added to this recent New Addition:

 

Malcolm IV

 

WSC-9014:  Malcolm IV Scottish Medieval Hammered Silver Penny.  Front facing bust of Malcolm, sceptre either side (the right sceptre more angled than the left and not as clear), type IIa, Spink 5016.  Obverse: [MA]LCO[LM REX]; reverse: [HVGO ON ROCABVRG] - Hugo of Roxburgh.  All types have Hugo as moneyer and all are out of Roxburgh, although Berwick is a theoretical possibility as a further mint town.  The difficulty lies in only a single digit total population with some of those being cut quarters and cut halves.  Further, all Malcolm IV coins are poor (bar the one which is described below, and even that has a poor pair of legends), resulting in no coins having full (or even remotely full) obverse or reverse legends - these being pieced together using several different coins from the extant population.  Coincraft sum that up nicely here.  Type IIa (front facing bust, cross fleury with pellets - rarer still with the x4 accompanying stalks) is the rarest of all Malcolm IV pennies although it goes without saying that all Malcolm IV coins are excessively rare.  I've been looking to buy any type for the entire lifetime of this website (nearly 25 years now) as well as a good few years prior to that eventful day!  This is the very first (and only) example I've seen on the open market in all that time.  The National Museum of Scotland, which has a very impressive and in-depth coin collection, has no Malcolm IV examples in their collection - indeed, they gloss over the reign completely in their Sylloge (my edition is 1977) by going from David 1st / Earl Henry straight to William the Lion.  The Hunterian Museum of Glasgow, again possessing a very impressive and in-depth coin collection, has no examples in the collection.  The Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, which has a formidable Scottish coin collection, has but a single (but remarkable!) example - a left facing portrait (Spink 5019) - which is the very best known example of all Malcolm IV coins and is illustrated on the excellent EMC database (EMC/SCBI NUMBER:1035.0014).  Of the remaining five coins on the EMC database, two are cut fractions whilst the other three are on a par with this coin - one of those three has recently come up for sale for £15,000 - see image here.  The Ashmolean example will not be the only one of those coins to be permanently locked away into a national / institutional collection.  Even if that is the only one locked away, it effectively leaves this coin as one of two or three best known examples available on the open market, assuming the other one or two ever come up for sale because as you know, coins of this desirability and rarity invariably get sourced straight into major collections long before they hit the open market.  Most people, when collecting Scottish coins by monarch, do as The National Museum of Scotland does - pretend Malcolm IV doesn't exist.  A rare opportunity to have a coin in your collection that virtually nobody else will, or realistically can have.  £12,750