Geoff T

My avatar, of course, shows me when I'm dressed up to kill prior to going clubbing. G

Yes, it's a medal simultaneously commemorating the death of Queen Victoria and the accession of Edward VII, but I'd not get over excited about it being a rarity. There were hundreds of unofficial medals like these struck at this time and later for the coronation of Edward VII. Because they're unofficial they're unlikely to be in BHM and there's never been a systematic inventory of medal such as these, largely because they are invariably in base metal and by artists who were not big names. This one was probably produced by a firm who saw a commercial opportunity and jumped in. Geoff

Hi and welcome aboard. I wouldn't say that coins were a hobby in my teens (the first half of which were in pre-decimal days) so much as a latent interest which never became a reality until many years later. To be honest, I doubt very much if I'd have been able to afford to collect coins in those days. It's not a cheap hobby even now. It's strange isn't it; you splash out on a piece of antique furniture or other such artifact and you can display it for all to see, but we pay substantial amounts of money for little discs of metal which we then lock away. Geoff

... but the colon after DEF doesn't point to space, whichever way you look at it. Geoff

Thank you. According to Davies, all 1922 half crowns are Obverse 3 (large head/wide spaced REX) and either Reverse C or D. C is plain garter edge above "F" in DEF and the colon of DEF points to a pearl in the crown. D has the legend closer to the garter and the colon of DEF points to a space. All George V half crowns up to the fourth issue of 1927 have 8 strings to the harp; thereafter it's 9. Geoff

I can check my Davies when I get home this evening. It lives almost permanently next to my bed Geoff

HM isn't going to be very pleased at being demoted to an HRH I would like to know the difference. I have been getting into British coins and even the history of Britain in the past few months. I watched a special on the History Channel last weekend about Boudica, it was awesome because I didn't know anything about Britain during that time and had no idea there was such a massive battle against the Romans that far back. It was an awesome program. HM is Her (or His) Majesty and is used only for a king. queen regnant (queen in her own right like Elizabeth II) or queen consort (the wife or widow of a king). HRH is His (Her) Royal Highness. G

HM isn't going to be very pleased at being demoted to an HRH

Yes - you're right; the wear on the reverse of mine is such that a quick comparison is misleading. G

Thanks Colin - your site is extremely helpful (and in this case more than that which bears the name of your late namesake). It appears that your Obverse B is my - and CCGB's - Obverse 1 (raised ribs), but mine appears to have the larger prongs you mention. I'll try to get you a photo, but my current camera to cope with that small a detail. Geoff This series is littered with double cut lettering, missing bars and serifs etc. Just another overcut letter I think. The rare ones seem to be those with cleanly cut and intact legend. Having said that, I just checked my 2 examples and one is 5/5 in the date and the other is T/A in BRITANNIA. That's one that Colin doesn't have on his site. The R over R is one of the more difficult examples to obtain, I have only seen one example to date, and that is the one in my collection . As you say there are a multitude of repunched numerals/letters in this series, but I have tried to restrict it to the major "obvious" differences at present. I am due to update the George IV section shortly with a few more varieties, and I have now got 3 different obvious 5 over 5 examples, 1 lower, 1 higher and one to the left. I am unaware of the T/A variety, have you got an image (1200dpi would be nice, and your approval to use your images would be even nicer!!)

I've just acquired an 1825 farthing, Obverse 1, with the R of Rex on the reverse over an R. No pic yet (I ony got it this afternoon) but can anyone shed any light on this? I've not seen any reference to it elsewhere. Thanks - Geoff

Yes Chris - that's right. You beat me to it! Yet the reverse appears identical to the Croker medal which I have sitting in front of me. The official mintages figues for the Caroline medal are much lower than those for George II, but the medal seems to be commoner than they would suggest. Geoff

Those are the sizes of the official medal issued by the Royal Mint. What you have is an unofficial medal, of which there are many types and no standard size. Geoff

Yes it is a jubilee medal. 1897 was Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee (as 1887 had been her Golden Jubilee). Geoff

Yes, it's a coronation medal, and from the 1901 produced before the actual date of the 1902 coronation was announced. It was fixed for 29 June but had to be postponed until 9 August as the king had appendicitis. Edward VII coronation medals are extremely common - and very diverse as each local authority produced their own. Several of them, though, have shared designs, some with obverses by leading medallists. Yours doesn't appear to be place-specific, but clearly struck by some opportunist. Geoff

The second sentence "From the error 2p..." isn't a sentence. You need to scrap the preceding exclamation mark, replace it with a comma and make the "f" in "From" lower case. Shame on the rest of you for not spotting this. Teach kids Mandarin - I don't know! Geoff

That's right. I have a larger, uniface version of this medal which has been enclosed in a glass paperweight. G

£30 EF, £80 UNC according to Collectors' Coins. G

Yes. definitely Fidei Defensor: Defender of the Faith. Fidelis defensor would be Faithful Defender. G

You all seem to understand how to play this game. Am I missing out on something or am I the only person in the world who gets really annoyed by online games which don't provide instructions as to how they are to be played? The servants tell me it's something to do with a TV show, which goes a long way to explaining why I rarely watch television. Grumpy old man - moi? G

I got a 1953 proof set for £40 which turned out to have a 2A farthing in it. The 2A in proof is worth about twice that. G

Don't know where you go that from, Chris, I'm much more into German stuff: half of my family comes from there! France still has a boatload of colonies left; springing to mind are French Guiana like you said, Martinique, Guadeloupe, and then French Polynesia and a ton of little islands dotted around. These tend to be split into departments as in France, so therefore use the currency. I'm certain for the first three that they use the Euro, not sure about the rest. The French distinguish between DOMs and TOMS. The former are Departments outre Mer and therefore part of France wherever they are (like Corsica), the latter are Territoires outre Mer and have something akin to a colonial status. G

There were some half crowns specially struck in the 1860s for placing in the foundations of the Albert Hall. Otherwise there are no currency half crowns between 1850 and 1874. Geoff

Given that Old Head farthings were first issued in 1895, there's an interesting parallel with the first issue of Jubilee Head silver coins in 1887. Some of the early strikings have a very proof-like appearance, especially in the mirrored fields, together with notably sharp detail. They're not, however, proofs, as becomes apparent when you put one side by side with the genunie proofs from that year. Geoff

I don't think it's fair to class the silver Britannias with all the other commemorative tat. Surely they're a bit more upmarket than that! G