The Triple Unite, valued at sixty shillings, 60/- or three pounds, was the highest English denomination to be produced in the era of the hammered coinage. It was only produced during the English Civil War, at King Charles I's mints at Oxford (between 1642 and 1644) and, rarely, at Shrewsbury in 1642. It weighed 421 grains (27.3 grams, or just over seven-eighths of a troy ounce).
The gold coins show the king holding a sword and an olive branch on the obverse, signifying his wish for peace rather than war.
The extremely rare Shrewsbury-produced coin shows, on the obverse, a plume behind the kings' head surrounded by the legend CAROLUS DG MAG BRIT FRAN ET HIBER REX–Charles by the grace of God King of Great Britain France and Ireland. The reverse shows the legend RELIG PROT LEG ANG LIBER PAR in three lines –The religion of the Protestants, the laws of England and the liberty of Parliament, with three plumes and the value numeral III above the declaration and the year 1642 below it, the whole being surrounded by the legend EXURGAT DEUS DISSIPENTUR INIMICI ("Let God arise and His enemies be scattered", from Psalm 68).
The Oxford issues are very similar to the Shrewsbury one, except that the legend on the reverse appears in three lines rather than two, and the obverse legend appears as CAROLUS DG MAG BRIT FR ET HIB REX. Oxford coins appear with slight design differences in each year of 1642, 1643, and 1644.
The noble was the first English gold coin produced in quantity, introduced during the second coinage (1344–1346) of King Edward III. It was preceded by the gold penny and the florin, minted during the reign of King Henry III and the beginning of the reign of King Edward III; these saw little circulation. The derivatives of the noble, the half noble and quarter noble, on the other hand, were produced in quantity and were very popular.
This article traces the history of the English penny from 1066 to 1154.
The history of the English penny from 1603 to 1707 covers the period of the House of Stuart, up to the Acts of Union of 1707 which brought about the Union of the Kingdom of England with the Kingdom of Scotland.
The British florin, or two-shilling piece, was a coin worth 1⁄10 of one pound, or 24 pence. It was issued from 1849 until 1967, with a final issue for collectors dated 1970. It was the last coin circulating immediately prior to decimalisation to be demonetised, in 1993, having for a quarter of a century circulated alongside the ten-pence piece, identical in specifications and value.
The British threepence piece, usually simply known as a threepence, thruppence, or thruppenny bit, was a denomination of sterling coinage worth 1⁄80 of one pound or 1⁄4 of one shilling. It was used in the United Kingdom, and earlier in Great Britain and England. Similar denominations were later used throughout the British Empire and Commonwealth countries, notably in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
The Spur Ryal was an extremely rare English gold coin issued in the reign of King James I. The coin is a development of the earlier Rose Noble, or Ryal which was worth ten shillings when issued by Kings Edward IV and Henry VII, and fifteen shillings when issued by Queens Mary and Elizabeth I.
The Five Guinea was a machine-struck gold coin produced from 1668–1753. Measuring 37 millimetres in diameter and weighing between 41 and 42 grams, it was the largest regularly produced gold coin in Britain. Although the coin is commonly known as the "Five guinea" piece, during the 17th and 18th centuries it was also known as a Five-pound piece, as the guinea was originally worth twenty shillings – until its value was fixed at twenty-one shillings by a Royal Proclamation in 1717 the value fluctuated rather in the way that bullion coins do today.
The five pound British gold coin, also known as a quintuple sovereign, has a nominal value of five pounds sterling. It has been struck intermittently since 1820, though as a circulation coin only in 1887, 1893 and 1902. Through most of its history, it has depicted, on its reverse, Benedetto Pistrucci's portrayal of St George and the Dragon, which has traditionally been used on the sovereign, or one-pound gold coin.
The two guinea piece was a gold coin first minted in England in 1664 with a face value of forty shillings. The source of the gold used, also provided the coin its name - the "guinea", with the regular addition of an elephant or castle symbol on the earliest issues to denote bullion supplied by the Royal African Company. For most of its period of production, the coin weighed between 16.7 and 16.8 grams and was 31-32 millimetres in diameter, although the earliest coins of Charles II were about 0.1 grams lighter and 1 millimetre smaller.
The guinea was a coin, minted in Great Britain between 1663 and 1814, that contained approximately one-quarter of an ounce of gold. The name came from the Guinea region in West Africa, from where much of the gold used to make the coins was sourced. It was the first English machine-struck gold coin, originally representing a value of 20 shillings in sterling specie, equal to one pound, but rises in the price of gold relative to silver caused the value of the guinea to increase, at times to as high as thirty shillings. From 1717 to 1816, its value was officially fixed at twenty-one shillings.
The half guinea gold coin of the Kingdom of England and later of Great Britain was first produced in 1669, some years after the Guinea entered circulation. It was officially eliminated in the Great Recoinage of 1816, although, like the guinea, it was used in quoting prices until decimalisation.
The Laurel was the third English gold coin with a value of twenty shillings or one pound produced during the reign of King James I. It was named after the laurel that the king is portrayed as wearing on his head, but it is considerably poorer in both quality and style than the sovereign and unite which preceded it. The coin was produced during James I's third coinage (1619-1625), five different busts of the king being used in these years. All the coins were produced at the Tower Mint in London. The laurel weighed 140.5 grains, less than the previous unite but almost exactly the same as the unite issued under Charles I.
The half laurel was a coin of the Kingdom of England minted between 1619 and 1625, with a value of ten shillings.
The Rose Ryal is a gold coin of the Kingdom of England issued in the reign of King James I and is now very rare. The coin is really a two-ryal coin worth thirty shillings and is a development of the earlier fine sovereign of Queen Elizabeth I.
The unite was the second English gold coin first produced during the reign of King James I. It was named after the legends on the coin indicating the king's intention of uniting his two kingdoms of England and Scotland. The unite was valued at twenty shillings until 1612 when the increase in the value of gold throughout Europe caused it to be raised to twenty-two shillings. The coin was produced during James I's second coinage (1604–1619), and it was replaced in the third coinage by the Laurel worth twenty shillings. All the coins were produced at the Tower Mint in London.
A Jacobus is an English gold coin of the reign of James I, worth 25 shillings. The name of the coin comes from the Latin inscription surrounding the King's head on the obverse of the coin, IACOBUS D G MAG BRIT FRA ET HI REX.
The British halfpenny coin was worth 1/480th of a pound sterling. At first in its 700-year history it was made from silver, but as the value of silver increased the coin was made from base metals. It was finally abandoned in 1969 as part of the process of decimalising the British currency. "Halfpenny", colloquially written ha'penny, was pronounced HAY-pə-nee; "1 ½d" was spoken as a penny ha'penny or three ha'pence.
The threepence or threepenny bit was a denomination of currency used by various jurisdictions in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, valued at 1/80 of a pound or 1⁄4 of a shilling until decimalisation of the pound sterling and Irish pound in 1971. It was also used in some parts of the British Empire, notably Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
The English farthing was a coin of the Kingdom of England worth 1⁄4 of a penny, 1⁄960 of a pound sterling. Until the 13th century, farthings were pieces of pennies that had been cut into quarters to make change. The first English farthing coins were minted in the 13th century, and continued to be struck until the early 18th century, when England merged into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707.
The double sovereign is a gold coin of the United Kingdom with a face value of two pounds sterling (£2). Rarely issued in the first 150 years after its debut in 1820, it never had a significant presence in circulation. It became a collector and bullion coin, and has been struck most years since 1980. It features the reigning monarch on its obverse and, most often, Benedetto Pistrucci's depiction of Saint George and the Dragon on the reverse.
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