r/MedievalCoin • u/ExchangeOne2733 • 3h ago
Metal detecting find Henry III voided long cross cut half ID request
Im trying to identify the class and the letters on the cross side of the coin if anyone can help?
Found in eastern Scotland.
r/MedievalCoin • u/Dobro_dan • Nov 26 '20
A place for members of r/MedievalCoin to chat with each other
r/MedievalCoin • u/Dobro_dan • Apr 23 '23
Lots of posts lately involving users asking us to identify some massive amount of low quality coins. While it is ok to ask us for identification help, we will not tolerate spamming and pushing too hard to identify your crap coins so that you don’t have to do any work. This is becoming an issue, and for now we will just remove your posts if it becomes too demanding or spammed too much. In the future we might move to banning if we feel it is necessary. This sub was not created to identify low quality coins for people that don’t want to do any work.
r/MedievalCoin • u/ExchangeOne2733 • 3h ago
Im trying to identify the class and the letters on the cross side of the coin if anyone can help?
Found in eastern Scotland.
r/MedievalCoin • u/Born_Unit1303 • 1d ago
Almost lost forever, a golden penny, one of 8 known, from King Henry III was found on an English farm by a metal detectorist in 2021. This was his first outing since he gave up metal detecting 10 years earlier. The penny sold for $873,000 at an auction held by Spink & Son in 2022. The buyer planned to give it as a permanent loan to a museum in England.
The history almost reads as a fairy tale
Until the reign of King Henry III of England (1216–1272), any need in England for coins worth more than one penny, at the time a silver coin, was met by using Byzantine or Arabic gold and silver coins which circulated among merchants and traders. However, as commerce increased, so did the need for higher value coins.
In 1257 Henry instructed his goldsmith, William of Gloucester, to produce a coinage of pure gold. King Henry III created over 50,000 gold pennies to go into circulation.
The citizens of London made a representation, complaints, against them on 24 November 1257, claiming they were too heavy and too valuable. The King was so willing to oblige them, that he published a proclamation, declaring that nobody was obliged to take it (the gold penny), and whoever did, might bring it to his exchange, and receive there the value at which it had been made current, a halfpenny on being deducted, probably for the coinage.
As all the coins were recalled and melted down, all knowledge of its prior existence was forgotten until the 1800’s.
The gold penny shows Henry III, seated in robes, wearing a crown and holding an orb and scepter. This design was reused extensively on later coinage. It marks the first time an enthroned ruler was shown on a Western gold coin. The obverse legend reads, Henricus REX III. The reverse legend includes the name of the King’s goldsmith, William of Gloucester, and LUNDEN (or London), where the coins were struck.
Only eight pieces remaining of this issue, four of which are in private collections. The remaining four are housed in museum collections: three in the British Museum and one in the Fitzwilliam Museum.
Most of this information comes from Spink & Son auction 22104 in 2022 and from a Heritage Auctions auction in 2021, Ancient Coins Platinum & Signature Auction, lot #31154**.**

r/MedievalCoin • u/Born_Unit1303 • 19h ago
A little history. Jumping ahead to a coin I have, it is a Sommer Island 6-Pence. It is the small portholes variety, minted in 1616. It was found in the sands on the beaches of Bermuda, also called the Sommer Islands centuries ago. It was almost certainly found after the invention of the metal detector. Prior to the metal detector less than 40 examples were known. I do not know how many varieties of Sommer Island coins, 2-Pence, 3-Pence, 6-Pence and one shilling are known today. Some have values exceeding 50k, 100k. I can assure you I do not have one of those pieces. I think it is safe to say that less than 100 of these coins have been found. I used to collect coins to complete sets, all the Lincoln Pennies, Washington Quarters, now I collect coins that I feel have historical significance. I have fewer coins but the stories behind them are fascinating to me. The downside to this strategy is the availability and price of those coins.
The obverse shows a hog with the denomination in roman numerals above the animal and the legend "SOMMER ISLANDS" within two circles of beads (the two and three pence coins have only a single circle of beads and lack the legend). Above the hog you will note the “VI”, Roman numerals for “6”. (The first photo is the reverse followed by the obverse)





The reverse depicted a ship, probably the Sea Venture, with a single circle of beads around the border and no legend (the two and three pence denominations have an S to the left of the ship and a “I” to the right for Sommer Islands). In my coin the ship has been rotated. From the few well-preserved examples, we do know there are shilling varieties with either large or small sails and sixpence varieties with either large or small portholes.
These coins were minted in England to support a small colony on Bermuda, formed in 1609. Members of the colony were typically sailors, usually from wrecked ships, including the Sea Adventurer, wrecked in 1609. The condition of my coin is poor, as you might expect for a coin buried in the salty beach sands for 350+ years. P.C.G.S. graded the coin as large Portholes and noted the coin as having details, just in case that was not obvious. It has since been graded by N.C.G. as small portholes, also my feeling.
There is one AU coin known, photos are in a light brown. The metal is a base metal, lightly silvered, having almost no value. Prior to these coins tobacco and Spanish silver were used as a currency.
The Bermuda Islands were named after Juan de Bermúdez, who first discovered the islands in 1505. Juan was a Spanish Captain / navigator on a ship returning to Spain from Hispaniola. In 1532, while on his way to Cuba, Bermúdez was shipwrecked near these islands and because of his knowledge of the area, he was able to safely make it to shore. Apparently on this second voyage he had several live hogs as cargo, some of whom were saved and overtime, proliferated throughout the islands.
The Bermuda Islands served as a “way” point for Spanish treasure fleets, returning to Spain, with treasures plundered from central and South America. In 1563 five ships from one Spanish treasure fleet returning to Spain from central America, sank off the coast of Bermuda with 1,250 fatalities. Reported to be carrying 22,000 pounds of gold, more than one billion dollars in today’s money. In perspective, less than 500 pounds of gold have been recovered from the Atocha.
The reefs surrounding the islands are treacherous, making a purposeful entry to harbor all but impossible in that era. The screeching cahow birds would have sounded to superstitious sailors like wailing demons. They called the place the “Isle of Devils”.
In 1609, an English supply ship, the Sea Adventurer, left Plymouth, England, with eight other ships to head for the Jamestown colony in the Virginia plantation. On July 25th, as they neared their destination, the Sea Adventurer was separated from the small fleet by a hurricane and three days later ended up in the Bermuda Islands, which were then known as the Bermoothes or the Hogge Islands. These sailors joined the colony. Bermoothes is a word to describe tempests and enchantments.
Sir Thomas Gates, who was on the Sea Adventure, wrote a letter that described the Sea Adventurer shipwreck, describing the hurricane as “a most dreadful Tempest”. This story has been acknowledged as potentially one source for Shakespeare’s book, “The Tempest” written in 1611, first performed in Nov. 1611.
One theory is, Shakespeare wrote the “The Tempest” based on an island inhabited by devils and witches, the Bermoothes. In the first act Shakespeare uses the term “still-vexe’d Bermoothes” which means a ship hidden in a bay in the Bermoothes (Bermuda). Is there a connection to the wreck.
Before the 1960's few Hogge coins were known to have survived. However, with the widespread use of metal detectors in the past few decades, about fifty additional examples of Hogge coins have been uncovered in Bermuda, but most are in very poor condition.
r/MedievalCoin • u/RXXNLXXXXXE • 1d ago
I just got this for £24, do you think its a good price? I might have a suspicion its very good😮💨
r/MedievalCoin • u/apfourcold • 1d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/More-Calendar-9792 • 2d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/EquivalentWorking283 • 2d ago
King Tomaš Ostojić Kotromanić of Bosnia
1443-1461
r/MedievalCoin • u/usedtobeanicesurgeon • 3d ago
Scheeckenberger from Saxony. I’m looking for information on the mint mark.
r/MedievalCoin • u/Top-Educator-9387 • 3d ago
I’m struggling to identify due to lack of identifying features, my thinking is Edward IV or Richard III penny? Thank you
r/MedievalCoin • u/RXXNLXXXXXE • 3d ago
The bust is what really pulled me towards this coin!!
r/MedievalCoin • u/OddStrategy7656 • 4d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/No_Substance6696 • 5d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/Eboracensis • 5d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/ApprehensiveBunch994 • 5d ago
r/MedievalCoin • u/zapfmb • 6d ago
Despot Djuradj Branković, the first one is from the medieval fortress Smederevo, Serbia
r/MedievalCoin • u/Drinfinite782 • 5d ago
Struck under Hetoum I (1226–1270)
Obverse: Lion with a cross and medieval Armenian inscriptions, which read: Hetoum, King of all Armenians
Reverse: King Hetoum and his wife, Zabel; the inscriptions read: By the will of God
r/MedievalCoin • u/OddStrategy7656 • 6d ago
the East west split happened in 395. The medieval era started in 476 with the fall of western rome. Byzantine empire didnt fall until 1453 (the end of the Medieval era to some) that being said the Byzantine empire spent the vast majority of its life in the Medieval era, so why is it always categorized as ancient? Unless they are seeing it as an unbroken continuation of Rome itself (still feels like a strech)
r/MedievalCoin • u/Automatic_Glass_4993 • 7d ago
Jeton de Compte au Dauphin and Nuremberg Jeton
r/MedievalCoin • u/Drinfinite782 • 10d ago