Counterfeit Irish Halfpenny 1737? 1787?

P.S. I am posting in this sub-forum because I understand that many coins like this made their way to the colonies circa 1737, if they weren't in fact made here.

P.P.S. I am not entirely convinced that the 3 of 1737 is a 3. It may be an 8 of 1787. What do you think?

P.P.P.S. The diameter is a hair over 30 mm.

I was hoping someone at this forum would be able to answer that somewhat definitively. I can only speculate.

wow "Cartoonish" is right of George.
I hope someone can answer your questions.

Topics merged.

John Lorenzo is currently investigating or should I say ... thanks for the alert! Having some experts currently reviewing this example. An extraordinary piece. HIBERNIA in retrograde. It seems to belong to the Wood 38 Blacksmith group but its crudeness is even beyond the current varieties in this Wood # IMO (see my book Forgotten Coins) - Jeff Rock is taking the lead here since IMO he is the current world authority on counterfeit Irish. Allow several days ... never seen this piece before either obverse or reverse.

Thank you, John. I look forward to hearing back from you. BTW, the webmaster at C4 has put me in contact with Jeff, who has recommended a few books to get me started on my own. Apparently, I have a LOT of catching up to do :)

Welcome to the rabbit hole of Colonial and non-regal counterfeit halfpence and farthings. Fist off this piece is really cool and quite interesting, I have never seen one as crude either. Jeff Rock is my mentor on these along with a few others, I'm sure he turned you on to the Facebook group? It's a good place to share images and have discussions on these oddities of the numismatic world. If not send me a PM and I'll direct you to it. I'm sure Jeff also directed you to get a copy of the C4 publication. It's a great resource and one of the only modern book around on these. The Anton Keese book "Forgotten Coins of North America" is also a good one, with excellent photo plates, but it is very out of date and much incorrect data that has since been dis-proven or changed. Better to have the C4 book (print on demand) "Contemporary Counterfeit Halfpenny and Farthing Families" I got mine through Amazon and the print quality along with the binding was excellent, I was a bit put off ordering one from a Print on Demand service but no worries as it is great.

Several years into the counterfeit and non-regals I'm still just a neophyte and complete noobie, that still has trouble attributing them, one of the more difficult series of numismatics I've found, but also rewarding and the coins (at the moment) are still fairly easy to find at reasonable pricing.

I also have some great PDF files of some auction catalogs that feature evasions and counterfeits, drop me a PM if you'd like copies of them, I find them helpful as reference books too, since there is so little material on the in the marketplace.