Ancient, Celtic, British, Irish and World Coins, Tokens, and Historical Medals

Richard Duppa, small silver portrait medal by W. Wyon head left, signed w. wyon mint under truncation, reverse attributes of papal authority, 35mm (BHM 1322-RRRR; BDM VI 681). Good extremely fine, extremely rare (£80-100)

Richard Duppa (1770-1831), artist and writer. Duppa wrote on a variety of matters, but largely on botanical, artistic and political topics. The papal attributes on the reverse refer to A Journal of....the subversion of Ecclesiastical Government in 1798, an account of the Roman Republic, which was installed after the occupation of the city by a revolutionary French army under General Berthier. Brown records the medal in silver from only one example (British Museum) and describes it as RRRR (‘of the highest rarity’). Whether it is quite as rare in silver as BHM maintains is difficult to know but it is the first specimen encountered by the cataloguer and is certainly one of the very rarest of William Wyon’s medals.