Great Britain. Sovereign, ND. S.2450; Fr-186. Edward VI, 1547-1553. Third period (1550-53). Initial or mint mark tun (struck 1551-53). Half-length figure of king holding sword and orb to right. Reverse; Crowned shield supported by a crowned lion and dragon. Struck on a full, broad flan. Evenly worn with sharp outlines to all details, including complete lettering in the legends and, unusually, a full outer circle. Old-time cabinet toning, deeper near the rims. Rare. NGC graded Fine-15. Estimate Value $8,000 - 10,000
Throughout its history, England has had several youthful rulers, but perhaps none so tragic as the only son of Henry VIII and his third wife, Jane Seymour. Indirectly and through no fault of his own, he was the reason for the rift between the holy church at Rome, England's traditional Catholic religion, and the monarchy. The second Tudor king wanted, indeed demanded, a male heir. In this boy, Henry VIII finally got his wish, but his son lived only a short time after his famous father passed away. Young Edward inherited his parents' intellect, and his father assured that he was tutored in all the traditional royal subjects. But the boy had been born weak, and his body would never allow him to reach maturity nor real power. In the 1540s he was manipulated by a pair of churlish men greedy to seize power: Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, and, even more insidiously, John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, who promoted himself in 1551 to the rank of Duke of Northumberland. The king's son was only nine when he became Edward VI. He was lucky to survive at all. He died of tuberculosis just seven years later, on July 6, 1553, aged 16.
Edward's story is familiar but that of his money is not so well understood. He inherited a once-rich kingdom that his father decimated financially. The gold and especially the silver coins of this brief reign vary in fineness as much as any coinage of any English monarch. The royal money had become an embarrassing series of debased coins by 1547. This variance, together with distinctive changes in portraiture, has caused the mint's issues for the reign of Edward VI to be divided into three periods for collectors. In the late 1540s, at the beginning of this reign, the silver was especially poor in quality. The Royal Mint had no choice, in the absence of good financing, but to continue to issue debased coins during the first two minting periods, from 1547 until about the middle of December, 1550. Poorly alloyed precious metals often brought with them poor images imparted on the coins by dies. Today's collectors are faced with a challenge as a result-finding good portraits on any of the coins. The mint finally resolved its troubles during the first few months of the Third Coinage period, from 1551 until 1553, the end of the reign. The alloys by then were of better, higher quality gold and silver. In gold, the purity was only 20 ct in the 1st Period, increased to 22 ct in the 2nd Period, and finally became almost pure (23 ct, 3.5 gr) in the 3rd Period, although not for every size and denomination of coin. In the gold Sovereign (worth 20 silver shillings face value at issue) seen in this lot, at last a finely detailed portrait of the king was possible. Even in the well-worn state of this coin, the king is lifelike in his crown and armor, and clearly boyish. It's an image of both power and fragility. And it was realistic. While much of the early gold of this reign was melted, the later issues, being purer and well received across the kingdom, circulated long and hard. The proof of this is the scarcity of all of the issues, and the rarity of well-preserved pieces. This specimen is far from the finest known, but nonetheless it is a fine testament to the realities of its age.