Error Vs Variety

There has indeed been instances of error coins being made deliberately.
That happened as a protest in 1970, when employees at The Royal Mint in London were not prepared to go with the transfer of their jobs (and their families) to Llanstrisant in Wales.

They deliberately made all sorts of error coins, and just chucked them over the perimeter wall of the London mint by the handful, to be picked up by passers - by, who were waiting for them out in the surrounding streets!


Almost all Americans are aware of the 1913 liberty Head Nickel made clandestinesly by Mint employees. I believe five of them exist.

It becomes a matter of choice on how you decide if coins in this class of manufacture are errors or varieties or even if indeed, they are legally happen to be coins at all.