Brasher Doubloon On Powder Horn

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If that powder horn is definitely genuine (Revolutionary War Era ish), you might very well have a Copper Brasher Doubloon there.

That said, you need to do some serious research on this potentially high value piece.! You could find someone who specializes in items of that era and willing to take the time to authenticate the Doubloon. I would NOT remove the coin until you have bonafide, hands-on research from someone who has the historical knowledge of both items - the powder horn and the Doubloon. It's possible that you have not only a beautiful antiquity but, Brasher's mark to go along with it. I hope this makes sense to you. There are many replica's to be aware of. The nails are telling me that this is potentially real even though they don't appear to be rose head nails. It would be great if you had some sort of provenance to go with this!!!

I've spent most of my life dabbling in antiques but, mostly Civil War Era. Good luck! Here's some good historical reading material if you haven't done so yet. https://coins.nd.edu/colcoin/colcoi...r.intro.html

paralyse makes some good points as well. I'm not tempted to authenticate either item based upon a photograph.

Au con·traire




Still has potential for mid-1800's, albeit not "original" nor gold. Could be Copper or Brass.

https://coins.nd.edu/colcoin/colcoi...asher.1.html

https://coins.nd.edu/colcoin/colcoi...r.intro.html

The actual Brasher Doubloon wasn't made by the Spanish but by Ephraim Brasher. Brasher created a few copper coins but none were called Doubloons. A Copper Brasher Doubloon was never made, and the Brasher Doubloon was actually a double Doubloon of 8 Escudos or $16. Copies of the Brasher Doubloon exist in copper and likely many other metals.

Thanks for the replies. The horn came from a picker from Maine. It is marked "Medad Hill at Goshen" on the body. He was an 18th century musket/fowler maker and also a Committee of Safety musket maker.
The coin is about 30 mm in diameter. The cartouche has EB in it.
Al

Pictures of the entire horn and the inscription might help somebody. I'm a little suspicious of a gunsmith also engraving a powder horn but I don't know anything about these.

It's entirely possible that it might be a reproduction or restrike. But then you have the issue of a date mismatch -- the originals were only struck in gold, and the most common restrike was not produced until the Civil War as @numismaticstudent noted above; the originals were not struck in New York until 1787, 10 years after the "revolutionary war", and are so rare that I question whether a contemporary Connecticut gunsmith would have even known of their existence, much less had any reason to obtain a copy of one and then deemed it to have significance enough to affix to a powder-horn stopper.

However, there were only 50 of the restrikes issued, and a quick comparison of one of the brass or copper restrikes will highlight the stark difference in quality -- the restrikes are mushy and look almost like a caricature of the original issues - they were prepared from new dies that were engraved at Jos. Merriam's workshop in Boston.. The coin on your horn is much too sharply struck and detailed, which to me suggests that it is a modern copy made with modern techniques not available in the 19th or 18th centuries.

The Medad Hills reference makes it quite a bit more interesting since Hills is the brother of John Hills and the son of Benoni Hills, also well-known gunsmiths and Connecticut Patriots.

The three Hills brothers and their father Benoni are widely considered some of the best Colonial-era gunsmiths and firearms that can be linked to them with provenance are mostly museum pieces or sell for a ton of money when they do come up for private sale. The name carries as much weight as Hawken, Ferree or the Henrys of the same era, just to name a couple, and later, Sharps, Remington, Winchester and Colt. He did sometimes sign "at Goshen" on known examples of his work. If this horn was made by or engraved by Medad Hills it is worth quite a bit of money and there are quite a few museums that would pursue it avidly. It sounds like you are qualified to make such a distinction.

However, the inclusion of the "doubloon" still throws me off. It is just too out of place and incongruent. Ultimately your best bet would be to have the coin inspected by a specialist in the Brasher coins and their restrikes.

I would tend to agree with that assessment. I would be more inclined to think it's an older item that's been modified with a modern fake copy of a Brasher doubloon.

I updated my original post for clarification.

I enjoy black powder and antique firearms in general, but have neither the means nor the space to buy and display them (I spend all my money on coins!) so I can only dream about owning anything related from the 18th century.