Ancient, British and World Coins, Historical Medals and Banknotes

George III (1760-1820), George III, Maundy Threepence, 1765. Reverse extremely fine, obverse just a little rubbed to highest points of hair and laurel wreath, this almost extremely fine, deeply and pleasingly toned and extremely rare (£200-300)

Brian Robinson (Silver Pennies and Linen Towels, p.161) makes the following observations concerning the rarity of the silver fourpences, threepences and twopences dated 1765. “These are the rarest of the non-proof or non-pattern Maundy coins known. Nonetheless, the claim that only five to ten [ESC] or even twenty to fifty [Trowbridge] examples of each are known is likely to be an underestimate since specimens have been offered for sale on several occasions during the past quarter century.” In the view of the cataloguers Robinson is on firm ground in challenging the ESC rarity rating but does not cite sufficient examples of appearances on the market to invalidate a figure broadly in line, even perhaps at the low end of the range, with the Trowbridge estimate which may indeed prove to be accurate. Illustration enlarged