REVIEW: EARLY MEDIEVAL ENGLISH COINS FROM THE COLLECTION OF WILLIAM MACKAY (PART 1): 3 MARCH

Strong five-figure hammer prices against four-figure estimates confirmed the attractions of the exceptional rarities within this collection.

As expected, a c.864-65 penny of Ceolnoth (833-70) Archbishop of Canterbury proved the highlight – although it shared the honours. Struck at Canterbury by Biarnred, it was a particularly rare Floreate Cross example, made even more attractive by its extremely fine condition.

“Perhaps only 25 specimens exist in total, the vast majority of which are in institutional collections. Of these, only three are of Archbishop Ceolnoth,” Noonans’ Head of Coins Bradley Hopper reminded us before the sale, adding that it was “the most beautiful English ecclesiastical coin in private hands’.

This excessive rarity brought in the bidders who took it well past its £8,000-12,000 to a final hammer price of £20,000 from an English collector.

Taking the same price, but against an estimate of £6,000-8,000, was a London Monogram Penny from the Third Coinage of Alfred the Great. “The London Monogram demonstrates that the city was in English hands during the early 880s. Given the early dating of the issue, it probably reflects an official recognition of Alfred as overlord immediately following the demise of Ceolwulf II.”

Also doing much better than expected was an early Anglo-Saxon period shilling of the Crispus Type dating to c.650-60. From the Post-Crondall Phase when gold content was gradually debasing, it had been struck in East Anglia and was in good very fine condition. Very rare, it was guided at £7,000-9,000 but sold for £15,000.