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Sale 46
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Lot 327
Great Britain. Two Guineas, 1676. S-3335; Fr-284; KM-443.1. Charles II, 1660-1685. Second Bust, with rounded truncation. Laureate head right. Reverse: Crowned cruciform arms, with alternating scepters at angles, central interlocking C's. Possibly the finest known gold coin of Charles II, of any date or denomination! Some sort of Prooflike or Specimen issue, as nothing else like it is known of this date or this denomination. It possesses mirrored surfaces and glorious bright golden red luster, and both sides are deeply impressed by the dies, so that every detail of the design is clear. It is not unreasonable to suggest that it was a "show piece," possibly prepared for royal inspection. Extremely rare. NGC graded Specimen 63.
Born in 1630 at St James Palace, and happy in his early years, Charles led a mostly secretive or secluded life during much of his father's reign, a time of warring political factions, rather than of warring nations, in which the quarry was power itself. This was England's civil war, in which monarchy in its old sense was torn apart. The prince spent his teenage years protected at the court of Louis XIV, France's "sun king," after Cromwell's army pursued his father from fortress to fortress, finally capturing, trying and executing King Charles I in January 1649 by beheading. At Paris the young prince witnessed firsthand France's blooming new culture of high art. But London became a dire place to be, ruled by the Puritans and their Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell, until his painful 1658 death in bed from kidney stones and related ailments. Came a time, then, of Restoration of the Monarchy, in which the exiled prince was proclaimed King in 1660, regrouped his Stuart allies, showed remarkable clemency for many former traitors to the Crown, and relinquished the essence of kingship to parliamentary procedure. Charles II showed other gifts, however, bringing a new era of culture to Britain but also one of war abroad and homeland disasters: the plague of 1665 followed by the great London fire of 1666. The diarist Pepys recorded the new political climate, and the coffehouse became a sensation of the first generation of newspaper readers. Charles built the foundations of today's national collection of artworks, loved yachting, played at the new sciences, and dallied with infamous femmes.
In numismatics, too, the king's sense of beauty prevailed, as during his monarchy the brand-new Milled Coinage began, machine-made coins of great precision and careful workmanship, and a new uniformity. By the time the king died, without blood successor, in 1685, his money had been transformed into a thing of beauty and consistent value. Among the new coinage was a series of Guineas, fractions and multiples, that were nothing but the highest statement of numismatic artistry of the era. This new name was taken from the area also known as the "Gold Coast," where the Africa Company mined golden wealth for an expanding peoples who would soon reach for empire. During this reign, power was restored to royal hands, but the nation had been transformed forever from a medieval state to a more unified citizenry which cherished the pleasures of civilization, gained freedoms previously reserved for the few, and stood on the brink of becoming a military and industrial power of worldwide scope, In it all, Charles "the Merry Monarch" left the stamp of his character. To us, he bequeathed such relics of his times as this momentous Double Guinea bearing his lifelike portrait, to be savored forever. No finer portrait of his exists in any form -- painted, metallic or sculpted.
Estimated Value $40,000 - 50,000.
Ex Spink's Sharps-Pixley Bank Collection (the star piece of the sale), Dec. 1989. Ex Dr Jacob Y. Terner Collection.
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| Realized $74,750 |
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