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Los 88
BRITISH COINS, George II, half guinea, 1745, LIMA, intermediate laur. head l., rev. crowned shield of arms (S.3684; Schneider 602), a beautiful specimen, lustrous and evenly struck with a bold portrait and royal shield, only tiny abrasions in the soft nearly pure gold, in plastic holder, graded by PCGS as Mint State 61, exceedingly rare in this grade A Lima guinea in extremely fine has just been sold for £31,200. British coins marked with the bold capital letters LIMA are storied survivors of a grand moment in history. Reminiscent of the Vigo coins from Queen Anne’s reign, these celebrated a much grander victory and a far larger treasure trove, taken on the high seas from the Spanish. The Vigo and Lima silver coins are of about equal scarcity, and many collectors own examples. The gold pieces are another story. Lustrous and choice-looking examples remain elusive and are collecting prizes. The middle of the eighteenth century was the great era of sailing ships, and the end of privateering by buccaneers, whose piracy at sea reached its zenith a century earlier in the West Indies. By tradition, crews shared in captured prizes, adding incentive for crews to be included on any buccaneering mission. The spirit of those adventurers still resonated in the British Navy when Commodore George Anson set sail with a squadron of warships on 18 September 1740, hoping to locate and to attack Spanish galleons laden with silver and gold mined in South America. It was a voyage requiring much skill and great courage; and the commander of the squadron was ready for the challenge. Born in 1697, Anson was by 1740 an experienced navigator and captain, commissioned as a lieutenant in 1716 and having taken part in Admiral Byng’s victory in August 1718 at Cape Passaro. He was promoted to commander in 1722, charged with capturing smugglers in the North Sea. By 1724, he had been promoted to post-captain in command of a frigate sailing off the coast of South Carolina to protect British ships from Spanish pirates, and from the end of 1737 until late 1739 his ships did similar duty off the west coast of Africa and in the West Indies. As commodore, Anson set off from England in the autumn of 1740 with a squadron of eight ships manned by marines, charged with attacking the Spanish navy in the Pacific. Little did Anson realize that this was destined to be a voyage around the world that would become famed for its success. Anson’s ships reached treacherous Cape Horn at the height of a terrible storm and most of the squadron was unsuccessful at clearing the cape into calmer seas. Two ships gave up and turned back for England. Others were wrecked. Only Anson’s flag ship and two warships got through to the Pacific, with a loss of hundreds of crew. On the three ships remained just 335 sailors and marines, of the 961 original crews. But the long voyage was just beginning! Months later, Anson’s force attacked and sacked the town of Paita in Peru, although the reward was small. Anson pressed onward, with the original goal firmly in mind despite all his setbacks. He aimed to attack the Spanish Manila-Acapulco fleet and capture its treasure. His crew was shrinking as disease took its toll on his men, and deprivation made two of the ships unseaworthy. All the crew was moved to his flagship, the Centurion, and they sailed west for the coast of China, arriving at Tinian by the end of summer 1742. They stayed ashore for months. Rested and restored, Anson’s crew and warship finally steered for the Philippines. On 20 June 1743, they spotted the treasure galleon Nuestra Señora de Covadonga off Cape Espiritu Santo, engaged the largely unprotected Spanish ship, won the brief sea battle, and took possession of its treasure. To their disappointment, most of the Spanish treasure fleet had already sailed, but the Covadonga was no small prize. They discovered in its hold hundreds of thousands of pieces of eight and gold cobs mined and crudely minted at Lima, Peru. They sailed for home around the Cape of Good Hope, but they and their prize were nearly captured by a French fleet in the English Channel before at last anchoring safely at Spithead on 15 June 1744. The tons of silver and gold were offloaded and carried by wagons along a parade route to the Mint in London. The total treasure was found to be nearly a million pounds in value, including proceeds from their sale of the Spanish galleon. Anson was cheered as a national hero and promoted to rear admiral. His share of the booty made him a wealthy man, but he continued to serve the Royal Navy, eventually being promoted to Admiral of the Fleet in 1761. He remained at sea in command of warships in 1746 and 1747, after which he oversaw naval reforms and advances in ship designs in the Admiralty Office. Numerous ships of the Royal Navy have been named after him but none has endured as a remembrance of his greatest victory for as long as the silver and gold coins marked LIMA in his honour by royal warrant. Many collectors worldwide own a silver coin made from this Spanish treasure but few are lucky enough to secure even one example of the Lima gold with old tickets
Los 51
BRITISH COINS, Oliver Cromwell, shilling, 1658, dr. bust l., rev. crowned shield of arms (S.3228; ESC.1005), in plastic holder, graded by NGC as Mint State 63, choice uncirculated with prooflike reflective lustre, bold strike, medallic portrait, dies perfectly centered, crisp legends and a fully struck crowned crest on the reverse, high rims and very sharp vertical edge reeding, rich deep grey toning having magenta hues
Los 411
†FOREIGN COINS, Australia, ‘holey dollar’, 1813, struck on a Lima portrait 8 reales of Carlos IV, 1807JP, counterstamped FIVE SHILLINGS, floral base around inner beaded circle about the central hole, legend not inverted but aligned with that of the Spanish coin, rev. remnant of the classic pillars image counterstamped NEW SOUTH WALES 1813 inverted around the inner beaded circle (KM.2.13), some light surface marks on host coin, otherwise about very fine, the countermark very fine, rarely offered for sale in this country and a good example of Australia’s first coin Australia’s first coin is nothing less than an emblem of exploration and discovery. For forty thousand years, only indigenous people inhabited this huge island in the South Pacific, and it was Captain James Cook who first stepped ashore in 1770, claiming the vast uncharted territory for Great Britain. It was an unknown land. Explorers would come over the following decades, slowly forging inland, but in the main Australia was a prison camp focused on a tiny bit of land; England’s courts sent the first cargo of condemned prisoners on a fleet that arrived in 1778 under the command of Arthur Phillip. Eight years before, in Cook’s party, Joseph Banks was aboard Cook’s ship, HMS Endeavour. Banks was a naturalist, so impressed by what he discovered when first arriving at port – plants, insects and animals unknown in Europe – that he dubbed the place Botany Bay. The prisoners being transported from England were less impressed, facing a life of indenture and hardship, and they were deprived of the wonders of Botany Bay when Captain Phillip decided on Port Jackson as the site of their new home. Phillip called the penal colony Sydney Cove in honor of secretary of state Lord Sydney. The colony immediately became a constitutional autocracy under control of a governor selected by a company formed in England in 1789, in effect a military regiment that oversaw the prisoners and other settlers after the royal marines that were part of Phillip’s fleet departed. The ruling company was called The New South Wales Corps. New South Wales was a harsh land. Agriculture was not easily established. Food was in short supply for the original 778 convicts and their keepers. Most of the convicts were professional thieves lacking skills needed to survive in the new land. But most survived and beginning in 1791 ships regularly arrived with additional prisoners, settlers and supplies from England. Slowly, convicts were emancipated and granted plots of land, and trade with the home country began. A whaling industry started, manned in part by retired soldiers and marines. A settler named John MacArthur formed a wool industry which became the colony’s first important source of exports. Several new towns near the original settlement were established by 1815, all engaged in raising sheep. The rum trade became corrupt, ending in a military rule of the colony from 1808 until 1810. The next decade experienced increased immigration of free settlers. By 1825, New South Wales had its own legislative council. A vast new land would soon open up to further exploration and development, and by 1840 the transportation of convicts was abolished. Australians were then all free people. Hard, real money had been a problem since the founding of the colony. During the nineteenth century, scores of independent merchants issued ‘small change’ money, tokens bearing curious images of the land, in large numbers, but the only official money for decades consisted of Spanish silver 8 reales (dollars) out of which the centres were cut and a local value was inscribed by way of counterstamps. These are what we today call the ‘holey dollars’. Unknown quantities of 8 reales struck at various Spanish mints were the host coins, all dated from the middle of the eighteenth century into the early nineteenth century. These were chosen for their proven inherent value, based on their silver content. They became the standard coin for New South Wales. By the condition of most known examples, they were used long and hard, in local trade and for export. When gold was discovered near Bathurst in 1851, much of the population of New South Wales and other districts of the expanding country rushed to the gold fields, and within a year prospecting settlers thronged to the land from abroad. New discoveries of gold opened up more gold fields during the 1850s, and the former penal colony became transformed. Colonies became territories. Intense rivalries grew between territories. Commerce rapidly developed, and gold was its basis. The so-called ‘easy gold’ petered out within a decade of discovery, but mining had become a major industry across the land. The company BHP Billiton, which began in New South Wales as a silver miner in the 1880s, became a major producer of copper and other metals. Sydney became a centre for business. By the end of the nineteenth century, little more than a century after it was discovered by Cook, New South Wales had become one of the commercial focuses of the modern world. Its first money, the holey dollars made from highly valued Spanish silver, had been long forgotten and most had perished in melting pots as unwanted – mere relics of a penal colony that formed the basis for the development of a modern nation.
Los 506
FOREIGN COINS, Germany, Trier, Werner von Falkenstein (1388-1418), goldgulden, Coblenz, half-length portrait of St. Peter holding key and book, between two columns, rev. shield of arms within trilobe, wt. 3.50gms. (Fr.3419), possible traces of mounting at 12 o’clock, otherwise good very fine *ex Spink, 30 November 2006, lot 423
Los 134
G BRITISH COINS, Victoria, proof five pounds, 1839, ‘Una and the Lion’, lettered edge, young head l., 6 full scrolls and 11 leaves to rear fillet, rev. crowned figure of the queen as Una, standing l. holding orb and sceptre, guiding lion behind her, DIRIGE legend, date in Roman numerals below (S.3851; W&R.278; DM.229), in plastic holder, graded by NGC as Proof 64, an especially fine specimen showing only faint hairlines with a superb portrait, lovely rose-gold toning, in plastic holder, one of the finest certified Unas! Based on the Elizabethan epic poem by Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, the design of the enchanting Una & the Lion five pound gold issue of 1839 remains emblematic of the English public’s captivation with their young Queen Victoria, who was a teenager when she assumed her position as head of the British Empire. She was young and untried, the Princess Diana of her time. Engraver William Wyon’s majestic image of her as the mythical fairy queen (the delicate lady Una, companion of the Redcrosse Knight in Book One of the allegorical poem) seemed then, and now, to capture the essential spirit of the Romantic Age, when adventuring ruled the British mind and when the world seemed Britain’s for the taking. Victoria’s ‘little wars’ abroad were all yet to be played out, and Victoria herself faced the kinds of challenges that no teenager could ever imagine. Over the coming decades, both triumph and defeat would burn into Britain’s collective body politic as the wild escapades of Lord Byron and his contemporaries of the first four decades of the nineteenth century metamorphosed into the realities of conquest and dominion, and as Great Britain reached the zenith of its imperial ambitions. Victoria’s most famous coin occurs with two small variant reverse legends, based on Psalm 119:133 and translating to state, or perhaps to pray, ‘May God Direct My Steps’. William Wyon seemed to sense and to express the untenable future of the Empire by the use of this legend, but his images of the queen guiding the British lion, engraved so deeply and firmly on this wonderful coin, evoked in the public a sense of power and an unquenchable belief in Britain’s right to be great. What Wyon created for the Coronation Proof Sets of 1839 was one of the greatest classics of the Victorian Age.
Los 605
FOREIGN COINS, South Africa, ZAR, Burgers pond (1874), copper test splash for the reverse hub die (unlisted), made at the Heaton Mint, a complete, deep impression of the reverse die, surrounded by the massive copper splash, virtually as struck, unknown in any other collection - a museum piece and probably unique *ex Künker, Auction 206, March 13-15, 2012, ex BIM Collection. Colonial South Africa provides numismatists with a fascinating glimpse at how a system of money, and the need for a native coinage, develop. The colony evolved as a disconnected group of immigrant settlements which initially used coins of their home countries as well as local tokens for money. Some of the early tokens were made of silver but in the main they were exchanged in good faith only. When gold was discovered in the Transvaal in 1869, a new era began for the area's inhabitants. The first gold coin was minted in 1874 in extremely limited numbers but was never put to any commercial use. Thomas François Burgers, second president of the republic, had been urged repeatedly to create a gold coinage that could be traded outside the country and trusted, based on its intrinsic value. No design for it had ever been advanced, however, so Burgers decided to approach the Birmingham, England, firm of Ralph Heaton & Sons to create a coin that would change the situation. Unfortunately he made the decision on his own, lacking any approval from his fellow legislators, and it was to prove to be such a fatal error that the initial gold coinage for South Africa was delayed yet again. The Heaton Mint engaged the services of Leonard C. Wyon, the Royal Mint's engraver, to prepare dies showing a portrait of Burgers, possibly because Burgers himself supplied the gold specie for the coinage. On the coin’s reverse appeared an artistically balanced, elaborate design showing the coat of arms of the fledgling republic. During the process of designing and advancing the stages of die development, Heaton tested the dies, and it is their test of the reverse ‘coat of arms’ die which we see in this lot. The gold specie used to make sample coins had been mined in the Transvaal, meeting Burgers' intention of making use of native gold ore. Mint records (see National Archives reference below) indicate that 837 pieces were made using up the amount of gold ore supplied to the mint by Burgers. When the Heaton Mint’s samples reached South Africa, Burgers proudly displayed his gleaming new gold coins to members of the Volksraad, but the legislators objected vehemently to Burgers' use of his own image and they rejected the coin design which was to become the forerunner of the famed golden Pond. The new republic would therefore need to wait almost two more decades until its first golden Ponds appeared for commerce in 1892. Although only 837 gold coins were struck by Heaton, a surprisingly high number of 16 working dies were needed, evidently because of the high rate of die breakage. These dies and punches (matrices) remain in the collections of the National Cultural and Open Air Museum in Pretoria, the Transvaal Museum, and the South African Mint Museum. It is rumored that a working die is in private possession. Off-metal completed patterns exist in limited numbers, as listed by Hern, but no other physical samples of the coinage’s preparation exists other than this trial splash for the reverse die. Research reveals that L.C. Wyon prepared two matrices, or die punches, that were used by the Heaton Mint to create working dies. The present splash, or hub trial, was made by pressing the die into molten copper alloy to test its design. Once tested, die trials and hub trials are normally destroyed, but this one survived. Primary sources: South Africa's First Gold Coin: Research on the Burgers Dies and Burgerspond 1874, by Esterhuysen, Matthys van As (1976). Correspondence concerning the execution of a gold coinage for the Republic of South Africa by Messrs. Heaton and Sons of Birmingham, June 1874. The National Archives, London
Los 69
BRITISH COINS, William III, five guineas, 1701, D. TERTIO, ‘fine work’, second laur. bust r., rev. crowned cruciform shields, sceptres in angles (S.3456; Schneider 480, plain sceptres), in plastic holder, graded by PCGS as Mint State 62, an evenly bold strike on both sides, just a touch of wear on the king’s hair, only tiny abrasions in the open golden fields, choice mint state, very rare On the death of Queen Mary at the very end of December 1694, King William ruled alone for the first time. Silver coinage and small gold in his name commenced in 1695, but his first large gold pieces were minted in 1699. While much of the energy of the Royal Mint’s workers and administrators was devoted to the Great Recoinage of the silver, and the temporary establishment and furnishing of branch mints around the kingdom during this reign, no little attention was given to the standard gold which was the backbone of the nation’s financial strength. The need was indeed great to recall worn, clipped, and difficult-to-value older silver. Tons of it came into these smelting and minting facilities beginning late in 1696 and concluding in 1698 but the year 1697 saw the heaviest exchange. By 1699, almost all old silver in circulation had been exchanged, and melted, and the country saw a deluge of bright, freshly minted sixpence, shilling and halfcrown coins. At just the same time, Isaac Newton’s work at the Mint changed from that of Warden to Master-worker, or Mint-master. As a man of science, Newton brought both more control and a more scientific approach to the operations of the Mint. Beginning in 1699, Newton watched and weighed the Mint’s suppliers of gold especially and soon learned that a few grains of gold was a standard variance for the Mint that was being used to certain merchants’ advantage when they returned slightly heavy coins to the Mint for a profit. Newton began testing all newly minted gold to assure that it would be of precise weight and fineness, and also required exact measures of all worn and foreign gold brought to the Mint in exchange for new money. By treating foreign money as mere bullion rather than accepting it at a set exchange value, he caused an influx of worn gold to come into the Mint during 1701-02, most of which was coined into guinea denominations. In this way he caused British gold coins to be consistently pure and of precise value. The Royal Mint had been modernized. The first 5 guineas issued for William III varied greatly on the reverse from the coins issued by him with Mary, reverting to the cruciform style seen on the gold of Charles II. The king's portrait was shallowly engraved. But Newton had not finished making changes at the Mint: next he attempted to complete the transition begun during the Renaissance, of departing from the shallow style of portraiture of the monarch to one that suggested lifelike qualities. In 1701 he caused a portrait to be engraved that would not be equalled until the 1760s’ patterns of George III. As Mint-master, Newton’s finest artistic achievement is, without argument, the deeply engraved 5 guineas of 1701, now known as the ‘fine work’ issue, and it has become one of the classics of British numismatics. Its conception has never been documented in detail but its appearance arose from another propitious change at the Royal Mint. For about a third of a century, the job of engraving coin dies had been dominated by the Roettiers family of Brussels. The elder of the family, John, had found favour with Charles II when Thomas Simon, as the former engraver of Cromwell’s coins and seals, saw his tenure decline. John and his brothers, Joseph and Philip, in the words of Challis, exercised the ‘controlling influence over English engraving’ during the last years of the seventeenth century (New History of the Royal Mint, page 363) along with John’s sons James and Norbert, who under his guidance completed much of the die-work during the reigns of James II and of William & Mary and then of William alone. Slowly, the Roettiers faded from the scene: John the master engraver suffered injury, Joseph moved to the Paris Mint, Philip returned to Brussels to work, Norbert left for France in 1695, and James came under suspicion of counterfeiting in 1697 and was dismissed. No one capable was left, save for a young assistant named James Bull. Then suddenly a German jeweller from Dresden named John Croker was brought to the Mint. He soon tired of re-engraving dies made by the Roettiers during 1698-99, and he produced the now-famous ‘flaming hair’ shillings. Newton and others took note and promoted him. His mark on English coinage and medals became indelible, and among his medals may be found exquisite images in high relief, but his greatest achievement was certainly the ‘fine work’ engraving of the king’s portrait used in only one year, 1701, on the gold 2 guineas and 5 guineas. These are the ultimate numismatic images of the reign, magnificent money created three centuries ago and rarely equalled as works of art in all the years that have followed.
Los 173
Late 18th Century, profile portrait silhouette miniature, head and shoulders of a gentleman by "Houghton and Bruce", on plaster, 9.5cm x 7.5cm, cracked, verre eglomise glass, paper labelled to the back, moulded ebonised frame, another portrait miniature, profile silhouette, head and shoulders of a lady on plaster, verre eglomise glass by Houghton, paper labelled verso, moulded ebonised frame, repaired, (2).
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