William III Sixpence

[Jon Hill]

Hi,

This is a 1697 William III Sixpence minted in Bristol that I found with my metal detector yesterday. If you look on the obverse there is a flaw in the field between the bottom and left hand shields. It looks like it was minted this way can anyone tell me what causes this.

Cheers,

Jon.

[Sylvester]

I think that what you have there is a classic case of what we call clashed dies.

That in a nutshell this results when metal is drawn in on one side of the coin more than the other when being struck. In your case the obverse took more metal in than it usually would do, and consequently you get a ghosted image of the obverse showing on the reverse. Hence the other term for this of ghosting.

If you look where the raised level drops to the lower level on the reverse it should be in line with the back of William's head on the obverse.

This type of flaw is perfecty normal for coins of this period, indeed bronze pennies of George V from 1911 to the mid 20s exhibit the same problem often on a more extreme scale. It is a design fault, i.e the obverse is in too higher relief for the thickness of the metal being used. They solved the problem on George V pennies by modifying the effigy and making it smaller, hence the small head coins.

With William III it won't knock much, if at all anything off of the value.

[mint_mark]

Hi Jon,

Some of the others here have more expertise than I on these early milled coins, but here are my thoughts.

The side with the shields is the reverse... the obverse is the side with the monarch's head. The flaw could be from any of several causes... the blank could have been damaged before the design was stamped into it. The die used to stamp the design into the blank could have been damaged. Obviously, the coin could have been damaged after it was made.

One way to help explain it is if you can tell us whether the flaw is like a scratch (a dig into the surface of the coin) or like a ridge (sticking out from the surface of the coin)

For these coins, another possibility is "adjustment marks". Coins would be checked after minting to make sure they were the right weight. If they were a bit over then metal would literally be scraped off the surface of the coin to adjust it down to the correct weight. However, I haven't seen enough of them to know if adjustment marks can look like this.

Finally, that looks fantastic for a metal detector find... you must be really pleased!

[mint_mark]

Just read Sylvester's reply and he is dead right... obvious when I look at it again... the shape matches the top of his hair and the top laurel leaf, upside down. This would also explain why a couple of the crowns look a bit weak... all the metal is on the other side of the coin.

Sorry for any confusion...

[Jon Hill]

Hi,

Very interesting, thanks for such an informative replies.

Sorry, yes the REVERSE of the coin has a fault.

I think Sylvester is right, I can see now that the flaw mirrors the outline of the bust on the other side.

Yes it was a good find althougth a 1696 would have been even better! I found it just outside Bristol so it hasn't travelled far, I don't think it can have been in circulation long before it was lost due to the condition. It came out of the ground shining I only had to wash it off with water before I scanned it.

I wonder if the owner knew they'd lost it?

Cheers,

Jon

[Sylvester]

The side with the shields is the reverse... the obverse is the side with the monarch's head.

How did i miss THAT!?!

My little pet hate, people getting them the wrong way around... but you were lucky i was distracted by the sixpence.

[Sylvester]

Yes it was a good find althougth a 1696 would have been even better! I found it just outside Bristol so it hasn't travelled far,  I don't think it can have been in circulation long before it was lost due to the condition.  It came out of the ground shining I only had to wash it off with water before I scanned it.

Not a bad find at all!

Yours' has Obverse 1 (stop above king's head is just above and to the left).

Reverse 3 (left and right top corners of harp level and crowns just narrower than shields).

I've just checked it to ensure it's a recorded variety which it is. These things often turn up with spelling mistakes, shields swapped over so England and France are in the opposite place etc. Always worth while checking.