Continuing List To Show Everyones Latest Acquisitions

1851 braided hair Liberty head large cent.

I received this very nice Red & Brown 1901 Victoria Penny in the mail this week.

I love the "Old Head" coins of Victoria.

Another ebay medal find, for less than $12, or about 1/10th of its normal price. Due for some Verdi-Care. But it's a medal with a story, like most of them!

1814 copper "visitation medal" honoring King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia's visit to the Paris Mint. 44 mm, engraved by D. Vivant, 1st Baron Denon, Napoleon's hand-picked Louvre curator and confidant. The rough areas seen on the obverse near FRED. and below the bust are present on all known examples, possibly created when a piece of the obverse die cracked off and rusted. Ref: Bramsen 1466; Schwering 1396.

Obverse: Fred. Guill. III Roi De Prusse. Uniformed bust facing left, signed under by engraver Denon.

Reverse: Frederic Guillaume III / Roi De Prusse / Visite / La Monnaie Des Medailles / MDCCCXIV

It is helpful to keep in mind that the Allied forces of Friedrich had just managed to defeat Napoleon and effect the short-lived and ill-fated Bourbon Restoration in France. Despite the fact that the Bourbon Restoration would shortly turn into a train wreck of unemployment, economic stagnation, civil unrest, and harsh repression, in 1814 after Napoleon's defeat there was a general attitude of optimism at the restoration of Louis XVIII to the throne; the weary French populace was tired of being constantly yoked to the war oxen, so to speak.

This perhaps explains why the Prussian King who had at last managed to kick the French out of Germany (after finally admitting that he needed the help of the Russians and Austrians to do so) would be honored with a visitation medal in Paris! The French engravers and medal-makers issued a great number of medals during this period, both before and after Napoleon's defeat.

In one of many ironies, the restoration of the Bourbons helped in bringing Catholicism back to France after the Revolutionary regimes, which must have slightly disturbed the Prussian King, who had just launched a major venture to reconcile the Reformed and Lutheran Churches in Prussia with the aim of uniting the Protestant denominations.

Of course, Friedrich's grandson by his second son, the Kaiser Wilhelm II, wouldn't enjoy quite the same Franco-Prussian relations, not after the whole World War I thing...

MS65



MS66

Two 1900 Bombay Mint Indian Rupees that arrived from India today. They got here in less than a week!

I do love Victoria Rupees! They are lovely, big and affordable.

Agreed. I like the portrait of Queen V. It's so different from the usual British ones.

Very nice!