2022 Royal Mint James the Ist gold coins restrikes
- March 28, 2022
- by
- Pierre
The Royal Mint has today revealed the second coin in the British Monarchs series with a design dedicated to James I – the Scottish king James VI who succeeded Elizabeth I to become king of England.
The British Monarchs range will feature 21 coins over five years and will span four Royal Houses – Tudor; Stuart; Hanover; Saxe-Coburg, Gotha, and Windsor – remastering iconic designs in high definition for the first time thanks to the latest technology and minting techniques. The reverse of the latest coin features a coinage portrait of James I from circa 1604-1619, while the obverse features Jody Clark’s definitive portrait of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II.
The seventeenth-century monarch appears on this new coin in the same classic design that would have featured on the coins of the Jacobean era. Whilst the design first appeared on British coinage more than 400 years ago, this coinage portrait has been faithfully recreated as close to the original as possible using state-of-the-art technology.
Much like Tudor coinage, fishtailing is a common defect on Stuart coins, where you get a slight distortion at the bottom of letters created by the pressure of a die on the metal which in turn causes an outward flow.
“Fishtailing” exemple
Also characteristic of this period is flatter surface area on the blanks which allow for a more polished finish and showcase and improvement in minting technologies compared to the hammered coins of the earlier period. These characteristics have been faithfully recreated in the new James I portrait design.
Sources: Royal Mint and NUMISMAG.
