Need Help Identifying An Egyptian Coin | Souvenir Medallion

It's not a coin, but a fantasy medallion, sold to tourists in Egypt.

I first encountered one of these back in the late 1990s when someone submitted one to the "ID Required" section of the coin club magazine I'm the editor of.

They've been around a while; when a similar one was posted over on the CU forum a couple of years ago, Willieboyd (who is also an occasional poster here) mentioned one of these was used as a prop in a 1946 Western movie; another reports they dated back to the 1920s when King Tut's Tomb made Egyptian things the latest fad.

Great info! Thank you so much. The link was extremely helpful, and that's definitely the same coin. You wouldn't believe how many pictures of Egyptian coins I've looked through trying to find a match! I doubt that it's worth a lot, but at least now I know what it is.

Thanks again!

Does anyone have an idea what this token / medallion might be worth? Someone on the forum Sap linked to said they were mass produced, so any value would probably just be for the novelty of it.

Actually, there are nine surviving pyramids on the Giza plateau, three large pyramids and six smaller ones, but the six smaller ones don't sit in the same alignment as the three large ones; three are southeast of the Khufu pyramid, the other three are south of the Menkaure pyramid. When viewed from in front of the Sphinx, the Khufu sattelites would be to the right of and in front of the Khufu pyramid (the rightmost one on the medal); the "fourth pyramid" on the medallion is situated roughly in the correct location of the Menkaure satellite pyramids, but it's much larger than they would be.

Two more smaller pyramids on the plateau used to exist, but were demolished down to their foundations in antiquity; one of them once existed south of the central Khafre pyramid, the other would have been a fourth one next to Khufu.


Not really. A couple of dollars as a novelty item, perhaps.

Mystery Solved.. saw that someone posted that this could of been purchased through Sears & Roebuck Catalog. My father had one of these coins, past to my brother. Looks like they both are missing something at the top of the coin. Ancestry.com has recently loaded images of Sears & Roebuck Catalogs (1896-1993) which has a word search to locate items. It was listed in 1905 spring catalog, page 261. No.4C16186 The latest craze. Gentlemen's fob, imitation ancient Egyptian design, silver plated, oxidized finish on German silver. Price then was going for $0.12 cent, or 6 for .66 cent, 12 for $1.25. Looks like these were mass produced... for about the same price as a loaf of bread then. Neat to see it in their catalog.

The original item is an Egyptian Magic Coin token.



Egyptian Magic Coin token

I have seen versions of this item for years on Internet coin and metal detecting boards, on ebay, at coin shows, and even in the movies.

The coin or token shows Egyptian symbols on both sides, one side has the sphinx and pyramids, the other side has a pharoah and various hieroglyphic symbols.

They have been around since at least 1905, when a listing for one appeared in the 1905 Sears & Roebuck mail-order catalog.