Christmas Collectibles

While sorting out one of vault rooms, one of our favourite colleagues came across a group of Mint, never used British stamps that celebrated Christmas. There is the clown 3d, the snowman of 1 Shilling and 6 pence, the doll’s house of 9d, the hobby horse of 4d and the toy train set of 1 Shilling and sixpence. All of these stamps were issued before 1971 and all are in Mint unused condition. There are five different mint stamps and we are going to give you three sets of the five stamps for a very attractive price.

Valence is a town in Southern France, not far from Grenoble, it is dominated by the ancient cathedral of Saint Apollinaire which was consecrated by Pope Urban II in 1095 and completed in the early 12th century. Valence had been ruled by the Bishops from around the 4th-Century, these silver deniers were issued under their authority and were widely used by the early Crusaders to fund the religious wars in the Holy Land. The obverse shows a stylised angel with spread wings resembling an eagle with the legend around VRBS VALENTIAI (Ville de Valence). The reverse shows a cross with an annulet in one quarter with the legend S APOLLINARS (Saint Apollinaire).

These Byzantine bronze Follis are the first coins to portray Jesus Christ. They were issued in the 10th or 11th Century AD and have a portrait of Christ on one side and either a cross or lettering on the other. These coins are individually struck one at a time by hand, so the designs and strikes will differ. Here we offer these coins in Fine grade; they have a lot of detail. Not many are left, get one this Christmas as you might not get the chance to get one next Christmas...

These Byzantine bronze Follis are the first coins to portray Jesus Christ. They were issued in the 10th or 11th Century AD and have a portrait of Christ on one side and either a cross or lettering on the other. These coins are individually struck one at a time by hand, so the designs and strikes will differ. Here we offer these coins in Very Good grade; they have a lot of detail for this grading. It has been sometime since we had so many nice examples.

These George III Sterling Silver 1787 Sixpences were only struck for circulation for just one year, 1787. What is even more interesting is that they were struck for the Bank of England to give out to their favoured clients around Christmas. You have King George III in an armoured bust on the obverse and four crowns and four shields on the reverse. Today the Royal Mint is charging £95 in Fine. The reverse in some ways is even more interesting than the obverse. As you have the arms of England, Ireland, Scotland, Hanover and France. The coins on offer are very high grade and becoming very difficult to find these days. They are available in Extremely Fine. Remember that this coin is now over 230 years old and in very high quality.

Most will know about the illness of King George III, but most don’t know that because of that illness the King would not allow a law to make smaller coins to be passed. This of course caused a lot of problems with day-to-day commerce; there just were not enough small coins around to make change. There are only two silver coins struck before the Currency Reform Act of 1816, that are readily available to collectors: the George III Sixpence and the Shilling of 1787. There is a simple but almost unbelievable reason for this. These coins were struck at the Royal Mint from silver delivered from the Bank of England. The Bank decided that they would need some new shiny coins to give out to their clients at Christmas. So only the Bank of England had these silver coins, and they only handed them out during the Christmas period, and only to their wealthy clients. So now you have the whole history! You have King George III dressed in what looks like Roman armour, and on the reverse the arms of Hanover and France as well as England, Scotland, and Ireland. Back in 1787, you had to be somehow important to have one of these Sixpences, important enough to do business directly with the Bank of England, and someone they wanted to treat. We have selected some very high-quality examples of this beautiful and very important historical coin for your collection.