James II, King of England, Scotland & Ireland

Monetary Crisis (1689), as James II Fixes Exchange Rates for Foreign Coins in Ireland

Introduction When James II succeeded his father in 1685, he continued to issue copper halfpennies, albeit via a ‘patent’ like his father did before him. This maintained the flow of small change but the same ‘decades old’ problem persisted with the large proportion of under-weight ‘clipped’ silver in circulation. This might have sufficed for transactions…

Ormonde Halfcrown. S.6545. Obv. Crown above C and R, a line circle around, and a somewhat crude blunt toothed outer border. Only cross of crown touches the inner line circle. Only the tail of the trailing R crosses the circle. A faint triangular pellet divides the C and R. The C has a near Roman top seraph, and no bottom seraph. Rev. Huge bold II, height 15.0mm, and shorter VI, height 11.3mm. All four corners of the IIVI cut across the inner line circle of 25.5mm diameter. Minute central pellet before V. An almost snakelike S with almost parallel Roman seraphs is centered above the II, and almost bisected by the line circle with bottom of top seraph of S just touching the outside of the inner circle. Well formed D, height 3.6mm, with a longer top seraph than bottom seraph, is above right side of V and closer to circle than to the V. Struck on an unusually round sterling plate flan, still showing part of original silver detail on obverse

O’Brien Coin Guide: The Ormonde Money of 1643-44

Introduction The 1642 ‘Lords Justices’ issues were followed in 1643 by a larger (fourth) emergency issue of better made, but still crude, silver coins. These are collectively known as ‘Ormonde Money’ since they were issued by the Lord Justice, the Earl of Ormonde (James Butler) some time between 1643-1644. Ormonde’s active career began in Ireland had begun…

Duke of Ormonde’s gold coinage of 1646-7, Pistole, Dublin, undated, stamped 4dwt 7grs both sides

O’Brien Coin Guide: Introduction to the Emergency Coinages of the Great Rebellion of 1641-52

Introduction Many people think of the Great Rebellion as a two-sided fight – the Irish Catholics versus the Anglo-Irish Protestants … but it was a lot more complicated than that. There were at least five opposing parties during the rebellion, which have been described by Carlyle as follows :- the Catholics of the Pale demanding…

Ireland Irish coin sixpence reverse

O’Brien Coin Guide: Irish Pre-Decimal Sixpence

The sixpence (6d) (Irish: reul) coin was a sub-division of the pre-decimal Irish pound, worth 1/40 of a pound or ½ of a shilling.  It ‘nickname’ was a ‘tanner’ and it is thought that this is from John Sigismund Tanner, originally from Saxe-Coburg, who was a medallist and designer at the Royal Mint.  The sixpence he designed for George II…

How hammered coins were made in medieval times (a video blog)

One of the most asked questions relating to hammered coins is “how are they made?” Rather than go into a long speech about how it was done, perhaps it is best if I leave this to the experts …. Dave Greenhalgh (Cosmeston Medieval Village) & Barrie Cook (Curator of Medieval Coins, British Museum) Dave reckons…