The obverse effigy of Britain’s ‘Gothic Crown’ becomes the reverse of the latest ‘Great Engravers’ coin from the Royal Mint
The third of the Royal Mint’s impressive, and immensely popular ‘Great Engravers’ series, debuted late last year, and updated the classic Gothic Crown coin of 1847. If you’re wondering why, just nine weeks later, we’re seeing another in this series, all is not quite what it seems. In what we believe is a first for the Royal Mint, the original 19th century coin has been reproduced on two separate coin releases.
Why, is quite simple. Britain always has the current monarch’s effigy on the obverse, thus leaving just one face for a new design. The Gothic Crown has such a beautiful effigy of Queen Victoria upon it, that the only way to show it, as well as the main face, was to add it to a whole new coin. Hence, we get a single Victorian original, split up over two modern Elizabethan issues.
The effigy is quite gorgeous, of course, with a young Victoria portrayed in a Medieval style, complete with an elegant font for the inscriptions. It’s a pity nobody thought to produce an effigy of a younger Elizabeth II in the same vein, to sit on this coin’s obverse (perhaps 1970s style with a Mohawk tiara and wearing a Sex Pistols t-shirt… Or maybe not 😉 ). Whatever the case, the coin is a must-have for classic coin collectors. You have to hand it to the Royal Mint for their efforts.
The range encompasses the same selection of gold and silver formats as the first Gothic Crown release. Our same disappointments on a lack of choice at the low end remain, but you already knew that. Packaging remains as before, which you can see lower down with images of the first coin. You can read more about the original in our look at the first Gothic Crown release last December. A lovely release, be prepared for a fight to get your hands on one.
PRESS RELEASE
The Royal Mint today (Monday 7th February) release the latest coin to be remastered as part of their Great Engravers series; the obverse of the iconic Gothic Crown by renowned engraver William Wyon. This coin features the Gothic Crown portrait of Queen Victoria combined with the portrait of Her Majesty Elizabeth II designed by Jody Clark on the reverse. The coin will still be dated 2021 in recognition of the earlier release, giving collectors a second chance to own the sought-after collectible, again combined with the current portrait of the Queen. As the coin bears a 2021 date, it also went to the Trial of the Pyx last week.
The original coin featured a cruciform arrangement of the Royal Arms in a Gothic style on the reverse (tails side) and the portrait of Queen Victoria on the obverse (heads side). The Royal Mint split the obverse and reverse designs to create two commemorative coins to add to collections.
Five extremely limited, graded presentation sets, containing an original coin and both the new commemorative versions in 2oz gold, will also be created. Four go on sale today via telephone sales only, offering collectors the chance to own all three coins. One additional set be reserved for the Tokyo International Coin Convention where The Royal Mint, in partnership with Taisei Coins, will be holding an auction in April this year.
The Royal Mint launched their Great Engravers range in 2019 with Una and the Lion, followed by the Three Graces, both designed by William Wyon, originally produced in 1839 and 1817 respectively. Both are well known as being incredibly beautiful and intricate designs, and the Royal Mint’s Chief engraver Gordon Summers, together with his team, have revived the designs with state-of-the-art technology. The tooling for the modern coins has been taken directly from the original tools worked on by Wyon in the 1800s, remastered by The Royal Mint’s expert team, over 150 years after the original was created.
Introduced in 1847 on the silver crown, the Gothic Crown was created by William Wyon, former Chief Engraver at The Royal Mint. Queen Victoria’s portrait was portrayed in a medieval style, representing the fanciful splendour of the era. Only 8,000 were initially minted at the time, alongside a very small quantity of gold.
| PROOF GOLD | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| DENOMINATION | £10,000 UKP | £5,000 UKP | £5,000 UKP | £1,000 UKP | £500 UKP | £500 UKP | £200 UKP | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| COMPOSITION | 0.999 gold | 0.999 gold | 0.999 gold | 0.999 gold | 0.999 gold | 0.9999 gold | 0.9999 gold | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| WEIGHT | 10.020.00 grams | 5020.00 grams | 2010.00 grams | 1010.00 grams | 312.60 grams | 156.30 grams | 62.42 grams | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| DIMENSIONS | 200.0 mm | 175.0 mm | 150.0 mm | 100.0 mm | 65.0 mm | 50.0 mm | 40.0 mm | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| MINTAGE | 1 | 2 | 9 | 22 | 56 | 181 | 411 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BOX / C.O.A. | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| PROOF SILVER | |||||
| DENOMINATION | £1,000 UKP | £500 UKP | £10 UKP | £10 UKP | £5 UKP |
| COMPOSITION | 0.999 silver | 0.999 silver | 0.999 silver | 0.999 silver | 0.999 silver |
| WEIGHT | 2010.00 grams | 1010.00 grams | 312.60 grams | 156.30 grams | 62.42 grams |
| DIMENSIONS | 150.0 mm | 100.0 mm | 65.0 mm | 65.0 mm | 40.0 mm |
| MINTAGE | 53 | 128 | 231 | 506 | 4,006 |
| BOX / C.O.A. | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes | Yes / Yes |
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