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Someone's hoping to snare one of his relatives.

10 sold at 12.99 .... I feel a new marketing strategy is needed on my part!

No, it's my sister after a big night out. Or, the most surreal identity parade ever.... : " and can you ask number two to put a hat on and wear glasses, Officer, it was dark, and I'm just not that sure...." You know, I put up my original post, 'cos I couldn't resist, and there was a risk that I would be flamed, but no, the .....well..... I'll call you 'usual suspects', who I have noticed actually have a sense of humour, (in my short time on this forum) , have not let me down. Cheers guys.

It's a hammered coin. Strong portrait/weak legends or vice versa or anything in between, anything can happen. The holy grail is of course something fully struck up, which is why you will pay over the odds for something that ticks all the boxes. A lot must depend on the die pair used, in particular the extent to which the faces are curved, given they were ground down to erase the old detail (which immediately runs the risk of making an undulating surface) before being re-engraved with the new design. Square flans are quite common in the late issues at the end of the war.

When I placed my newly won F98 alongside the existing F96 & F97's yesterday, it also prompted me to compare the dates on all three, and I immediately noticed something I'd not spotted before. That was the quite discernible difference in the positioning of the "9" between the F96 & F97. The F96 "9" is palpably closer to the 7, than on the F97. Firstly I discounted the possibility of an optical illusion. It manifestly isn't that. Then I wondered if it was merely an oddity peculiar to my two coins. So I started looking at other F96/97 pictures together (of which there is no shortage), and noticed it was the same with all of them. Given that the two die pairings are 8+J and 9+J, the essential differences are between obverses 8 and 9. But these are subtle, whereas the difference between the positioning of the 9's on the F96 and F97, hit you in the eye immediately. Notwithstanding they are both reverse J. Might be an additional useful pointer in determining whether it's an F96 or F97. Note: Freeman states the following - "(The date numerals of reverse J in 1879, when combined with obverse 9, usually appear thicker and in higher relief than in other years with other obverses)" . But that's not quite the same thing. Here's my two side by side as a comparison, F96 on the left and F97 on the right:-

As requested by Rob, this ticket from my new Henry II Penny. Apparently this is a "Ray Inder" ticket.

The other one was this Henry II Northampton Penny as an upgrade:

Well both my major purchases at DNW were hammered. Edward the Elder Penny to fill that gap in my sequence of Wessex monarchs:

Isn't that Chewbacca after a big night out?

Maybe its an Abominable rarity?

Damn, all the best puns have been used up.

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