Help Identifying Old Coin (Id: Nuremberg Child's Play Token)

Photo of other side.
John1

as requested thanks

to the Community!

What you have here is not an actual coin, but rather an old pre-WWI piece of children's play money.

The city of Nuremberg (spelled "Nurnberg" in German), long before it became infamous as a Nazi parade ground and subsequent war crimes trials, was famous for centuries for being the centre of manufacture of tokens, jetons and similar coin-like objects. Several family businesses dominated the trade in token-making. Ludwig Christian Lauer was the last and greatest member of the Lauer dynasty of token-makers, and introduced modern coin-minting machinery to the family factory in the mid 1800s. The company continued to strike coins in his name after he retired, and expanded their business internationally, particularly to Britain and America, making and selling childrens play money, card-deck gaming counters and similar such pieces. The design on this token roughly copies the design of British gold coins from the period 1887-1896, and it was most likely made during that time period. The obverse "im of 2 Sovgn" expands to "imitation of a 2-sovereign coin". Genuine British double-sovereigns weigh nearly 16 grams and are made of 22 carat gold; this piece is much smaller, lighter, and contains no gold. It probably would have originally been sold in a small tin of assorted play money coins.

The Lauer overseas business terminated abruptly with the onset of World War I. The company switched to domestic token-making, and made numerous notgeld tokens for use within Germany during and after the war, and the factory was of course taken over and turned into a weapons factory by the Nazis during WWII. The company still exists in Germany, but no longer makes tokens.

to the CCF

@ Sap - well said and an excellent historical review.