March 2007 Coin Newsletter

Greetings Cyberfriends,

The last month has been non-stop for the coin department with fairs and our stock take using up all our weekends.

Fun at the Fairs
This last month has been another fair-filled adventure for us at Spink.  We kicked off the month with the London Coin Fair(http://www.simmonsgallery.co.uk/2001site/LCF/lcf.html) , where we set up shop in our usual place in the Jasmine Suite and enjoyed the chance to see new and familiar faces.

On the 16/17th February Paul and David ventured abroad to the Dublin Coin show where we displayed some of our lots from the forthcoming March Auction as well as some brand new stock.

We began March at the Munich Fair where Max, Jeremy and David took predominantly foreign and ancient stock, as well as some lots from the March auction for your delectation.  Still in Germany, both Megan and Max represented Spink at the Künker auctions from 12th-16th March.  Megan bought various items from the De Witt collection of Medieval European coins, including some lovely Carolingian deniers. 

Max purchased one of the most famous coins of antiquity- a Brutus silver denarius - on behalf of an American collector for €103,500.  The coin commemorates the assassination of Julius Caesar by Brutus.  On the obverse of the coin we see the portrait of Brutus and on the reverse the date of the assassination and daggers, the weapons used to carry out the act. Between the two daggers there is a Pileus which symbolizes liberty and clearly suggests the death of Caesar as an act of patriotism. 
The coin was minted under the orders of Brutus by a traveling mint in 42BC. It was the equivalent of one day’s wages for his foot soldiers.  Around 50 of these coins exist in the world today and only 8 or 9 in private hands.

Recently we caught up with some of our northern clients when Paul, David and Ollie (from Medals) travelled to the newly restarted Harrogate Spring Coin Fair on 23rd to 24th   March.

A list of all the events we’ll be attending this year can be found here.

Auction News

Excitement is mounting for our imminent March 29th auction. The catalogue is now available to view online, and catalogues have been sent out to subscribers.  If you haven’t yet received your copy, or would like to subscribe please contact Sasha (swardrop@spink.com).  Highlights of this auction include an Anne Vigo Five-Guineas (estimate £50,000-£60,000), and a Russia gold award medal of Peter the Great (estimate £15,000-£25,000), and a beautiful and extremely fine or better “Una and the Lion” Proof set of Victoria, dated 1839.

All Spink auctions can now be viewed online from the link on our homepage www.spink.com so you can watch Richard Bishop as auctioneer and also bid in real time from the comfort of your own home.

Thinking ahead to our June auction, we already have a superb collection of English Crowns which will be well-worth viewing when the time comes.  There are also some important consignments of Scottish and Irish coins, making this sale a must for British and Irish collectors.

The deadline for consignments for the June sale is the end of March.  Please contact Jeremy Cheek at jcheek@spink.com or Richard Bishop at rbishop@spink.com if you have any items you wish to consign.

The Numismatic Circular
Once again the coin department sends apologies as the Circular will be out a little late in April.  We are expecting it to be sent out in the week after Easter.  This bumper Circular features a wide collection of Scottish coins, as well as our usual selection of English, Ancient, Indian & Islamic and Commemorative Medals. 

New Faces
This month also sees the addition of some new staff for Spink who you may have already been in contact with.  William MacKcay at wmackay@spink.com has joined Richard and Jeremy in the Coin Auctions department, and Andy Williams at awilliams@spink.com is helping with photography, as well as general enquiries and manning the Showroom.  You may also come into contact with another new recruit Xiaohan Guo at xguo@spink.com in Accounts, and for those of you who have difficulty pronouncing her name, she doesn’t mind being called Han.

Website
I’m sure many of you will have noticed some changes on our website, and more will follow as we are currently attempting to improve the look and design of our site and make it more user-friendly.  Many of you will have been emailed regarding the fact that you can now set up a memorable password rather than using our client number and PIN system to login.

If you haven’t already done so, you will need to click here and enter your client number and PIN.  If you have forgotten these, please email enquiry@spink.com for a reminder.  Once you have done this you will be prompted to choose a password of your own and from then on you must login with your email address and password and can throw away your client and PIN numbers for good.

As we are improving the website your comments, criticisms and suggestions are always helpful, so feel free to email Megan at mgooch@spink.com with your ideas.

Have a good month and remember to regularly check our website for new stock additions, catalogues and new ways to bid in our auctions online.  You are, of course, always welcome to visit our brand new showroom in our London premises which includes a gallery of coins and our other collectables.

Kind Regards,

Megan Gooch on behalf of the Coin Department