A milestone for a coin collector

Today I have hit one of the major milestones (to me) in collecting coins, first it was silver (which was easy, the very first coin I “collected” was a silver coin) but now I have finally reached gold after many years. 

Congratulations, this is a big achievement.

Only recently I managed to reach this achievement, and when I bought my gold coin I also had that feeling of milestone reached. And days later I looked for a nice box just for it. Ended buying a small porcelain jewel box (photos are on last october's additions thread).

Giobruno

Congratulations, this is a big achievement.

 

 

Only recently I managed to reach this achievement, and when I bought my gold coin I also had that feeling of milestone reached. And days later I looked for a nice box just for it. Ended buying a small porcelain jewel box (photos are on last october's additions thread).

What a gorgeous little coin! I love that type (is it still hammered by then or when did proper milling come in) I didn't have a choice which gold coin was my first, but I did manage to get this for less than scrap value so im more than happy for it to be a standard sovereign.

And yes :) the first thing that came to my mind was something nice to put it in

(replied on my business account, dont worry)

Actually milled coins originated in France around 1550 and spread around Europe in the later 16th century, however their usage was restricted to mostly higher denominations in many places until around 1700 (UK for instance had some milled 6d in 1561 - 70, but the man who made them Eloi Mestrell from France, found his work unpopular and the hammerers at the mint ganged up on him and he was executed in 1579 for forgery). A second group of milled coins came in through the 1630s with Nicholas Briot, but again these only lasted a few years.

In 1656 Thomas Simon and Jan Roettiers designed a milled coinage for Oliver Cromwell and in 1660 after Charles returned, offered to do the same for him, but Charles rejected Simon for his duplicity with Cromwell and Pierre Blondeau along with Roettiers got to design all the milled silver and gold coins issued between 1662 and 1671. Bronze coins came in 1672, but these were not collared until 1797!

Spain had some milled 8 reales as early as 1592 and it seemed most European nations had one or more milled coins by 1620, but most of the coins, especially low value ones were hammered well into the 1600s.

Milling goes back to Renaissance era medals in Italian states around 1450, but coins only around 1550, although well struck and fairly round hammered coins exist from the 5th century BC onwards. Many old Anglo Saxon pennies are surprisingly round and well made, next to their crude 13th century cousins.