First English Hammered Coin

[Simon S]

In a job lot I acquired a small silver hammered coin, (I will post a picture later), but I think it is a silver penny from 1275 to 1279 an Edward I long cross one, so I am pleased about this.

[sound]

Simon, be pleased to see the picture.

Mark

[Garrett]

Yes would be nice to see the pic !

cheers Garrett.

[Coinery]

Yarp!

[Simon S]

Fingers crossed that this works

[Simon S]

Second picture of the tail, I bought this in a job lot the coin was in a box, which contained a couple of sovereigns and smaller gold coins. This is where the previous owner had kept his more interesting stuff.

I think it is an Edward I coin, however your expertise gentlemen would be more than welcome.

[damian1986]

It's Henry III. You can make out hEN and later a III from the obverse. On Edward I long cross pennies the portrait has proper curls.

The reverse looks to me like NICOLE ON LVND or thereabouts so it was minted by Nicole at London.

There are quite a few obverse varieties with the sceptre, classes IV and V - I'd say this is class Va or Vb as the face is narrower and the eyes very round.

I am waiting on a copy of Christopher Wren's book on Long Cross coinage identification. May be worth a look for in the region of £12. Actually I don't know what would be the best resource for these would guess probably North's hammered coinage but haven't found a copy of that at the right price yet.

[damian1986]

I wish the time to edit posts was a little bit longer... the hEN and III is not an identifying factor for the monarch.

[Peter]

Try rotographics Englands striking history.

A good read and plenty of good info.

[damian1986]

Try rotographics Englands striking history.

A good read and plenty of good info.

Thanks Peter, I'll readily buy the Rotographic publications hadn't seen this one. Easy too to get it sent straight to Kindle.

I just bought The Brussels Hoard of 1908. There's an article in BNJ from 1912 but you wonder how much ground an article from 100 years ago is covering and what has changed since then but there's something to be said for tracing the development of classification / understanding of these things rather than just cross-referencing against Spink. It's all a work in progress.

[Rob]

Try rotographics Englands striking history.

A good read and plenty of good info.

Thanks Peter, I'll readily buy the Rotographic publications hadn't seen this one. Easy too to get it sent straight to Kindle.

I just bought The Brussels Hoard of 1908. There's an article in BNJ from 1912 but you wonder how much ground an article from 100 years ago is covering and what has changed since then but there's something to be said for tracing the development of classification / understanding of these things rather than just cross-referencing against Spink. It's all a work in progress.

A lot of the articles from a century ago are inevitable incomplete due to later discoveries, but in most cases account for over 95% of the material discussed, and sometimes all. The basic classifications of most series were laid down in the 19th and early 20th century. The only glaring shortfall from a 100 years ago was the relative absence of copper references. Montagu published his book in 1885 with a 2nd edition in 1893, but that basically covered what he had in his own collection. It took Peck's tome to get anywhere close to fully documenting the base metal pieces.

The majority of silver and gold had been first covered in the 1700s. Snelling is nowhere near complete and was published in 5 parts over nearly a decade, but still mentions most things. Ruding was a step up in gear when published half a century later. It was followed by Hawkins etc. A good indicator of what was perceived to be the best references of any given time is to check a contemporary auction catalogue for the references used as these will be the most up to date volumes available.

The classification adopted of any series will inevitably be the most complex to date. Today's nerds collecting by Freeman, Peck, ESC, Davies numbers etc are just the current upholders of this tradition. References are used until superseded by something that is either greater in depth, or can be shown to have corrected a previously held assumption. As you say, it is a perpetual work in progress.

[Peter]

Now

Come on chaps...who hasn't got a Brussels hoard coin?

[Gary D]

Now

Come on chaps...who hasn't got a Brussels hoard coin?

Me, I thought he said he brought the Brussels hoard, bet that didn't come cheap.