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Mine too. Thanks bagerap.

They're in my local Lidl next thursday @ £12.99

This person really is the scum of the earth. A while ago I emailed him/her politely correcting an Ebay entry for a penny described wrongly as Freeman 76 (as I recall) and the reply was "Who do you think you are - Michael Freeman ?"

For some reason I cant see the pics Guyincog posted, but here are my two 1879 obverses. The difference in leaf veins, nostrils and re-engraved hair above the ear are obvious I think. I really wouldn't want to be definite from the photos, but it should be easy to tell with the coin in hand. The hair above the ear in Hussolo's photos does suggest to me it might have been re-engraved though? Jerry

Maybe not everyone's cup of tea. I like it. A 1980 decimal penny 90 degree die rotation error. Sorry about the rubbish photo, but does show the error.

You don't need to count the beads as an identifier when you are familiar with the series, but when TPG's are getting this wrong (when there are indicators that even someone not familiar with farthings can use as certainty) it does not fill you with confidence. I agree that when you regularly look at farthings even design types jump out quite readily, but that is not the case for many people. If you are thinking of getting an example but are unsure use the bead count then there is no dispute.

I found this very interesting today. This came with a load of other coins and had a label stating it was a Philip and Mary Groat with portrait of Mary only. I thought nothing of it at first because it's not in great condition, but on closer inspection the shield and cross looked wrong. On even closer inspection the legends also looked wrong - what's left of them. In fact, for a P&M groat they are totally wrong. It took me quite a while doing detective work (hammered aren't my thing really), trying to work out what it says after the very clear 'PHILIP' and on the back between the arms of the cross. There are a lot of tooling marks on the shield and the faint bust of Mary. As my eyes tuned-in better to the writing style of those days it gradually became clearer with a lot of googling that the reverse actually reads ...NOME DNI BENEDICTVM, which led me in a French direction and eventually helped decipher the obverse which instead of reading PHILIP Z MARIA, actually reads PHILIPP DEI G D BVRG Z COM FLAND.... It's Philip Duke of Burgundy (1384 - 1404) and the coin is a Flanders Groot (groat) which should look like the coin posted in the comments. Someone at some stage, at least 150 years later and for whatever reason, has filed off what should be on the obverse (a lion with a flag) and has replaced it with a scratched out effigy of Mary in order to masquerade it as an English groat. That's a lot of effort to go to on a piece of silver that would have probably been readily accepted as cash at the time in its original form! Why?

I think it is a function of metal flow when struck. If you look at the 'straight' exergue it also shows slight deviation at the same points, as do all bar one 1960s penny from a dozen or so in front of me. Not a variety IMO, just an accentuated feature on the coin above.

Not sure how it can be worth 2K if it is listed as being worth 2K on the CGS site. All the prices on there are inflated to provide a premium for being slabbed Either that or the more likely scenario is that they ran out of decimal points. Let's be honest. That coin has zero eye-appeal.