Watch List notes:

Sweden, Karl, duke of Södermanland SM 6 2 mark 1587 13.29 g. Nyköping. One year type. Partially somewhat weakly struck. RR. Ex Myntsamlarnas postorders anbudsauktion (Coin Collector's postal order mail bid auction) April 2002, lot 18. SMB 2. The minting of coins by Duke Karl was a clear political mark. On the coins there is no indication whom was the King of Sweden and moneyer i.e. his elder brother Johan III. Through this provocative minting the Duke wanted to show his independence from Johan. Eventually the Duke would win the power struggle of Johan's son Sigismund and was in 1599 elected Head of State/Regent of Sweden. He avoided to have a coronation for a few years, to avoid further provocation. Hans Menzinsky's corpus on the coinage of Karl IX, volume I, p. 88 writes [freely translated]: "According to sources in the books of the Chamber of Deputies (Räntekammaren) in the time frame of December 1586 to June 1587 the moneyer [Sebastian Schoras, katalogförfattarens komplettering] was given silver of 63 mark coinage, 91 lod and 1 quintin silver ore, i.e. 13.39 kg. From this a maximum of 932 pcs of 2 marks could be struck, each of 14.37 g. However, this series was struck by roller dies and then a maximum of approx. 500 pcs could be minted (unless the remnants of the metal strips was re-melted and made more strips of), of which 25 genuine examples have been examined (two counterfeits have been noted). ... Only one die pair has been used". It is notable that of the 25 examples Menzinsky examined a majority are in institutional collections. Approximately 10 of these coins are available on the private market. 1/1+