Chris Perkins Posted December 7, 2003 Posted December 7, 2003 Leevan,This item is a Victorian coin weight. Coin weights were produced by the Royal Mint as well as private company's (like Avery, who are still going I think?) and were, I believe sold to merchants, shop keepers etc as a way of checking is a coin handed to them was real and not an underweight forgery.Simply by putting the Sovereign on a set of scales with a brass sovereign weight on the other end you'd know if it was a genuine 7.98 gramme sovereign. Nowadays of course digital scales are far more accuarate.Because the weight you post has a young head Victoria on it, I would imagine it dates from around 1840/50.They are collectable and I have a little experience selling Georgian coin weights but I have not sold a Victorin one, so am unsure of it's value. Quote
Guest leevan Posted December 7, 2003 Posted December 7, 2003 That's very interesting, Chris. I suppose it stopped people filing of gold dust and melting it down.Incidentally, am I right in assuming that it was Isaac Newton that thought up milling the edge?Leevan Quote
Chris Perkins Posted December 7, 2003 Posted December 7, 2003 That depends what you mean by 'milling' the edge, as it has a double and sometimes confusing meaning.Milling a coin originally meant making it with a powered machine and not hammering it by hand, that certainly wasn't Isaac Newton's idea as it was being done long before he was born.This milling process also led to the idea of putting the coin into a round collar with letters imprinted on it, so that these letters would end up around the edge after the coin was struck. This was an excellent anti forgery idea and was shrouded in secrecy at the time. This was also being done before Sir Isaac Newton' appointment as master of the mint in 1696 so I'm quite sure was not his idea.As for milling as we understand it today... ie the edge with a ridged surface, well that may well have been Sir Isaacs idea but I have yet to find mention of it in any books I have been glancing through just now to try and find out!Chriswww.predecimal.com Quote
Sylvester Posted December 7, 2003 Posted December 7, 2003 That depends what you mean by 'milling' the edge, as it has a double and sometimes confusing meaning.Milling a coin originally meant making it with a powered machine and not hammering it by hand, that certainly wasn't Isaac Newton's idea as it was being done long before he was born.This milling process also led to the idea of putting the coin into a round collar with letters imprinted on it, so that these letters would end up around the edge after the coin was struck. This was an excellent anti forgery idea and was shrouded in secrecy at the time. This was also being done before Sir Isaac Newton' appointment as master of the mint in 1696 so I'm quite sure was not his idea.As for milling as we understand it today... ie the edge with a ridged surface, well that may well have been Sir Isaacs idea but I have yet to find mention of it in any books I have been glancing through just now to try and find out!Chriswww.predecimal.com M. Pierre Blondeau was the guy that did all the milling in Charles II's reign. Before him of course there had been, Mestrelle (Bessie's reign) and Briot (Chopped Charlie's reign..sorry Charles I ). Mestrelle later got dismissed from the mint and some years later was hung for forgery. Sylvester. Quote
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