Author: BNS Blog Coordinator

The Jacks put to their Trumps: A Tale of a King James’s Irish Shilling – Gary Oddie

This short note presents details of a recent chance find of a pamphlet dated 1714. The 27 verses describe, in the first person, the life of a gunmoney shilling in the decades after its issue. This work was once attributed to Jonathan swift, though not conclusively. The work has similarities to better-known works by Joseph Addison (Adventures Of A Shilling, 1710) and John Taylor (A Shilling, or, the travailes of a twelve pence, 1621).

Some gunmoney-related evidence in French diplomatic and military correspondence, 1689-90 – Oisín Mac Conamhna

The purpose of this note is to highlight some evidence of relevance to gunmoney in French correspondence of 1689-90, particularly that of Antoine de Mesmes, the Comte d’Avaux, the French ambassador to the Irish court of James II.[1] Reference is also made to correspondence held in French state, military, and naval archives, which was published in the 1980s.

Tokens, Tickets and Notes of the De Beers Diamond Fields – Gary Oddie

This note will present a brief history of the de Beers diamond fields in South Africa, beginning with the discovery of the first diamonds in the mid-1860s through to the consolidation of the various companies. The various mining compounds issued metal, paper and later plastic tokens, initially as part of a truck system. A fully illustrated catalogue of items known from the company is included. This provides colour illustrations to the catalogue published by Brian Hern and Allyn Jacobs in 2009, along with six previously unrecorded pieces.

Unrecorded White Metal 18th Century Tokens – Part 2 – Gary Oddie

Since the first note on this topic was published on the BNS blog (19 October 2021), other specimens of false 18thC tokens have been made available for study from two different sources and are clearly from different manufacturers and materials than presented previously. This note will look at the two new groups and then compare all three together. Rather than clarifying the situation, we now have three (possibly more) different series of white metal copies of 18thC tokens. …. or click here to read the earlier article

Contributors to British Numismatics – Introduction – Gary Oddie

This note will provide a brief description of the archive, the reasons behind setting it up and the sources that have been used already to create the 800+ entries in the archive. The project has been prompted by the difficulties sometimes experienced in finding images of past collectors, dealers and authors etc. The late Harry Manville’s five-volume encyclopaedias were published between 1986 and 2009 and are extremely useful and virtually complete, but contain few illustrations, and no portraits of the characters within. The aim of this archive is to add some faces to the names and bring the works up to date. Incidental images, such as book plates, coin tickets and envelopes have also been added. A separate section has been created that contains just images of coin tickets and envelopes which is expected to initially have a life of its own with many of the names not yet appearing in the main archive.A final section describes future plans and also

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