The North Yorkshire Moors Collection of British Coins formed by Marvin Lessen (Part 2)

Stephen (1135-1154), ‘Baronial’ issues, Penny, Cross Moline type [BMC I var.], mint and moneyer uncertain, crowned bust right holding sceptre, [—]ii :· cmaf · ce, rev. [——]iio : rrci : l, cross moline with no distinguishing features, 0.91g/12h (Mack 199c, this coin; BMC –; N 948, this coin; S 1278 var.). Crudely executed portrait and some legend missing, otherwise fine and toned, an intriguing piece of the highest rarity and believed the only known specimen £500-£1,000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The North Yorkshire Moors Collection of British Coins.

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Provenance: From the Gravesend 1817/Dartford c. 1825/6 (Kent) Find; with C.R. Taylor, 1840s; G.R. Smith Collection, Sotheby Auction, 17-18 July 1848, lot 102 (part) “very crude and curious”; J. Lindsay Collection, Sotheby Auction, 14-17 August 1867, lot 132; H.M. Reynolds Collection, Part II, Sotheby Auction, 5-6 June 1919, lot 95; V.J.E. Ryan Collection, Part II, Glendining Auction, 22-4 January 1952, lot 946; T.O. Mabbott Collection, Part IV, Hans Schulman Auction (New York), 26-8 May 1970, lot 1005.

The background to this Kent hoard, and further details of this particular coin, were given by Blunt, Elmore Jones and Robinson (BNJ 1968, pp.39-40). The present coin was illustrated in Lindsay’s Remarkable Medieval Coins, 1849, as pl. 2, no.43, and Lindsay’s cataloguer attributed it to Henry Newburgh, Earl of Warwick; it has more recently been associated, also probably erroneously, with Ranulf, Earl of Chester, who held the city and royal castle at Lincoln from 1140 to 1146