Rob

I don't have an image immediately to hand as it isn't one for the collection. The R on yours looks to be possibly double cut given the similarity to the foot of the upright. Triple cut? You are in the best position to say.

I have one with one and a bit lines. The date is set high and so impinges on the bottom line, but the line isn't continuous immediately to the left or right of each of the digits, only at the extremes to both sides with just a trace between the 3 & 9.

I have a spare vol.58 if anyone wants one.

Dodgy seller, looks a funny colour, looks modern to me. This person often lists modern fakes that have apparently been in his collection for the past 40 odd years. He is one to avoid at all costs.

I quite agree. In the 50s and 60s, Jackson Kent spent 10 years studying the number of harp strings on W3 coins only to conclude that you couldn't infer anything from it. The same would apply to Anne's coinage. That's the point. The question of single stops, colon stops, filled in colons etc is usually nothing more useful than a means of identifying dies, but as to whether they are worth pursuing as varieties then the answer is probably no in the majority of cases. I would consider stop variation only on coins where you can demonstate that the stops have a meaning. Or for example, no stops whatsoever which is a fairly obvious difference. The convention used for stops was a single stop after a complete word or a colon/stop and apostrophe/ 9 etc in the case of a contracted word. In this context the colon after the date might have a case for inclusion as a variety, but then, so might my single stop after FR. Personally I wouldn't get too excited about it unless as part of a means of identifying the handiwork of an individual or some other method of identification. The crucial factor in all this of course is that a publication is available, otherwise attitudes are either boundless enthusiasm or total anathema. Once someone has done all the spadework, everybody has or wants to have the unrecorded example. Somewhat fewer people are interested in the underlying reason for their existence.

In Colin's sale it made £2200 hammer graded as good EF

I believe Rob bought this one last year in the Corbitts sale if i'm not mistaken, the OBV was just as nice Very good, Dave's on the ball. The image is in the coin acquisition thread around end Sept- early Oct last year.

Further to the above, your specimen has 9 harp strings, mine has 13. Lingford had 4 specimens dated 1707, two with 9 strings to the harp, one with eleven strings and one with 13. Paget had 6 pieces, 1 with 9, one with 10, 1 with 11 and 3 with 13 strings. Whetmore had one piece, this from the same die as yours. Another example from the same reverse die was in Spink 62 lot 361, Spink 125 lot 711 and Ferrari 79. Nightingale had one example with 10 strings. Unfortunately, very few E below crowns are illustrated due to the difficulty in finding high grade examples, this despite their relative abundance. The dies tend to be a bit iffy with many exhibiting flaws. Poor flan quality in the form of regular pitting also plays its part meaning that if you see a well struck and fault free example in EF or better, grab it before it goes.

The blob between the 1 & 7 is irregular and looks like a flaw as opposed to a character. My 1707E crown also has a single stop after the date. Maybe the various punctuation was used as a die identifier?

Vert pomme, but Goom can anglicise (fix) that. But French pommes aren't vert! They're a horrible sort of spotty pasty yellow, and described, laughably, as "Delicious"... Blame the translation offered on a google search. Apparently it means pea-green.

Vert pomme, but Goom can anglicise (fix) that.

Hi Rob. No coin is perfect. One has to view a coin with how it compares to others. These two coins are probably close to the finest business strikes you will see, but are they perfect down to 100x or more? Of course not. As I'm sure you know, if one seeks absolute perfection, one will constantly be disappointed, whether in coins or people. Modern proofs might be the exception, but where is the history of that cookie cutter perfection? The knowledge that for these pictured coins to endure in such a well preserved state, there had to have been collectors down through the years that lovingly treasured them, and, for me, this is part of the allure of coins as an inheritor of their trust. I never meant to imply that these two of my coins were perfect, just that they are glorious examples of the engraver's art and the technology of the Royal mint at the time. And one must remember that, at least for the crown, the dies were cut directly by the engraver into the steel - no reducer used. With the magnified picture (thank you photographer), one can see the painstaking nature of the engraving that went into the hair and fully appreciate the dynamism of the St. George reverse. With the YH half crown, one can appreciate the care that Wyon took with her hair and the girlish nature and openness of her gaze. It wasn't meant as a put-down, just a genuine expression of regret that it was so close to being perfect without looking too hard. A tiny dig in the field, a little scratch in the hair, a miniscule rim ding, bagmarks - we have all been there.

Nice coins. It's a real shame about the couple of tiny marks on the crown bust.

Very good again. You might get a permanent position soon as the man who can defeat binary bloody-mindedness. Ta.

Very good, thank you. Next question. Why does it have A4 pages on the right hand side at least as far as box DX and probably further. All I want is a file about a thousand boxes long, and 6 wide to fit on A4 in x pages. Ta.

The wife cleaned my keyboard. and now an excel file is infinitely wide(?) and hitting the up/down/left/right arrows moves the whole document instead of going to the appropriate box on the page. I previously had it set to fit A4. Recoverable or start again?

Edward IV second reign groat, im. cinquefoil. I suggest you get yourself a copy of North volumes 1 & 2 as this has a considerable number of images - more than Spink, which would be the other book of choice. Value - what someone is prepared to pay on the day.

Nothing wrong with it as far as I can see. An honest example of a fairly common type.

It depends on whether ANANO is the result of double striking, or a wrongly lettered edge. No double striking should ever make the variety list because every one must by definition be different to the next. The use of an edge with the wrong legend is a different matter.

You can call anything you like a variety - it's your coin to do what you like. What it isn't, is a deliberate design difference, an incorrect letter, a spelling mistake or any other major fault. Given it takes a few blows with the hammer to punch in a letter, you must appreciate that to correctly align the characters required considerable skill. These coins predated the reducing equipment now used, so all work was done at the micro level and so a somewhat misaligned legend on a coin should be expected from time to time. For a good selection of unevenly punched legends look at the early copper fractions. If you are going to include small variations in the vertical alignment, then you would also have to list the various separations found in the hoirizontal axis. As discussed previously, this would result in a comprehensive list of dies produced, but I question whether it would do much for the typical variety collector.

I would think it was first used in the late 19th century. Spink Circulars from the 1890s use it as did Montagu in the first edition of his copper book (1885). Auction catalogues seem to use obv and rev going back over 200 years irrespective of saleroom. Snelling (1762) uses reverse as does Ruding 1819-1840. None of the handful of references contemporary with Montagu that I have appear to use it. Hawkins in his various editions from 1841 -1887 doesn't, which suggests the 1880s as a guesstimate. Montagu was quite an influential character, so given he had just written 'the definitive reference' for copper, it is possible that he was responsible. Not a clue as to its name or where it came from. I can see the sense in using a distinctive variation on the letter R due to its common use as an abbreviation for REX in legends.

No problem.

HB from me too. Just in time.

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I think many ebay buyers think it is now a right that all things should cost 99p (with free P&P).