In West Africa around 1920 the silver coinage was replaced by a tin-brass alloy. The contract for 4,000,000 shillings was given to J.R. Gaunt and Son Ltd. of Birmingham, however the company was unable to complete the work and only produced just 16,000 pieces. Surviving pieces are quite rare, and this brief article makes a few observations on some known examples. Click here to read the article
Author: BNS Blog Coordinator
Lord Stewartby – The Numismatic Legacy
The British Numismatic Society, The Royal Numismatic Society with the Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles Committee Joint Summer Meeting, 28 June 2019 at the British Academy, London. Lord Stewartby (1935-2018) was among the leading figures in British numismatic scholarship in the second half of the twentieth century. He published over two hundred papers and was a major contributor both to the development of what became the Medieval European Coinage publication project at Cambridge and other widely regarded publications. His interests ranged across the Romano-British coinage of the London mint, Anglo-Saxon and Viking coinage, medieval English coinage as well as Scottish coinage, the latter being a field in which he was pre-eminent both as a collector and as a scholar. This all day Symposium on 28 June at the British Academy comprises a series of papers by leading figures who place the use of numismatic evidence at the forefront of historical and archaeological interpretation. Structured around topics with which Lord Stewartby was deeply engaged with it will
Tracking a Catrine Cotton Works countermarked 8 Reales – Eric C. Hodge
New Internet Search Facilities are making available more detailed records everyday. In this article the Newman Numismatic Portal has allowed the investigation of Virgil Brand records appertaining to a Catrine Cotton Works countermarked 8 reales. Click here to read the article.
A Moneyer for Edward the Confessor Created by a Printing Error – by Hugh Pagan
This article explains how a printers’ error mistakenly led to a belief amongst some numismatists that Edward the Confessor’s Expanding Cross type included coins from the moneyer Wulfwine at Wallingford. This was based on an erroneous auction catalogue entry dating back to 1955 that referred to PVLFPINE ON PALI (Wallingford). Wulfwine was in consequence listed as a moneyer for the Wallingford mint in this type both by Dr Anthony Freeman, writing in 1985, and by Kenneth Jonsson and the late Gay Van der Meer in their authoritative listing in 1990 of mints and moneyers for the period between c.973 and 1066. Click here to read the article.
An Engraver’s Error – A Second Hand (Aethelred II) Penny of Norwich – by Steve Green
This brief note describes an Aethelred II penny from the Norwich mint with the anomolous moneyer name of FORANTINC. Click here to read the article.
A New Mint for Edward I class 3b/c Transitional Pennies – D. I Greenhalgh
All the recent works for Edward I pennies give the mints that struck for the rare sub-class issue of class 3b/c transitional pennies as London and Canterbury; this note documents the recent discovery of a class 3b/c penny from the York mint. Click here to access the article.
An Eighteenth Century Document Pertaining to the Edinburgh Mint – David Rampling.
The purpose of this note is to place on record a document saved by an eminent nineteenth century numismatist as an insertion in a grangerized book. Documents relating to the Scottish mint during its lengthy survival from the cessation of coinage in 1709 until its closure in 1817 are rarely in the public domain. The Draft of Warrant, dated 1750, and transcribed in this article, may also fill a temporal gap in the National Archive, which is apparently deficient of similar documents for the mid-eighteenth century. Click here to access the article Note: A “grangerized” book is one that has had its’ illustrative content augmented by the insertion of additional prints, drawings, engravings, etc., not included in the original volume.
A Countermarked Spanish Two Reales (Pistareen) – Peter R. Thompson
In the 18th century most European colonies were chronically short of circulating coins which led to many of them countermarking and/or mutilating specific quantities of any available coin, mostly Spanish American silver. These would then be issued and accepted by the authorities at an enhanced rate which, together with any mutilation, would deter their export. Most official (and some unofficial) cuts and countermarks have been positively identified but the simple countermark published here has not. A possible reason for it is suggested and reports of any similar marks, particularly on coins with a provenance, would be interesting. Click here to access the article
Cromford Derbyshire Countermarks – by Eric Hodge
Countermarks are fascinating but even more so when they are applied over one another. The researcher is left to ask when, why and how. This blog post has attempted some answers based on an unusual mark and it is hoped that others will supply more ideas for further research and study. Click to access the article.
The Large Cnut Hoard of the 1990’s – Hugh Pagan
In 1995 a Stockholm auction house offered a parcel of 319 coins of Cnut evidently deriving from a single hoard. The coins were of three consecutive types, Quatrefoil, Pointed Helmet and Small Cross, and the geographical pattern of the mints represented within the parcel pointed clearly to this being a portion of the very large hoard of coins of this reign found c.1993, possibly in the Cambridge area. The parcel offered for sale in this Stockholm auction was small in relation to the likely size of the hoard as a whole and was probably broadly representative of the date range and geographical spread of the coins represented in the hoard as a whole. This article provides a summary listing putting on record the content of the Stockholm parcel, as in the twenty-five year period since the hoard’s presumed discovery no formal publication of any portion of it has been put into the public domain. It is hoped that the appearance
