Coins and Historical Medals

Zanzibar, Société de géographie de Marseille, a silver award medal by C. Tasset and A. Allar, seated figure of La France in ship, cherubs around, rev. Arabic inscription ‘arabun ahtiram min al-jam‘iat al-jaghrafia li-hadrat al-sayyid barghash bin sa‘id sultan sanat 1876 on cartouche, globe between cherubs above, 70mm, 186.8g (cf. Palombo 12, 229 and iNumis MBS 32, 1551). Extremely fine and extremely rare; in case of issue £600-800

The Arabic inscription on the reverse roughly translates as: ‘a token of respect from the City Geographical Society to the lord Sultan Barghash bin Sa‘id in the year 1876’. Sultan Barghash bin Sa’id came to London in 1875 at the invitation of the British Consul in Zanzibar, John Kirk, and visited Paris and Marseille on his return journey. This medal was possibly commissioned on the occasion of his visit to Marseille in 1875 and struck the following year, hence the date 1876. John Kirk, prior to his arrival in Zanzibar, had accompanied David Livingstone on his second Zambezi expedition (1858-64)