Fine Silver Issue (1551-3), Crown, 1551, m.m. y, king on horseback right, date below, rev. shield on long cross fourchée, 30.67g., (Lingford dies F-10; N.1933; S.2478), some light smoothing in fields, now darkly toned, otherwise extremely fine

The Edward D J Van Roekel Collection of English and Scottish Coins Edward D J Van Roekel (Eddy to his friends) was born in 1932 in Wageningen, a small Dutch provincial town. When he was eight years old he started to save the foreign coins which family members gave him on their return from holidays abroard. Instinctively even then he paid attention to the quality of the coins, the result of which is obvious in the material now offered. His first major trading partner was his French teacher, and as the transactions took place in that language this certainly helped him to improve his marks for French. When he was about 38 he traded in a secure living as a factory manager for the insecure existence of a wholesale dealer in modern coins, a new profession, hitherto unknown. Very soon he obtained exclusive distribution rights in Europe for several mints. Thanks to this he was also able to act as adviser to these mints, one result of which was that the Netherlands began to issue silver commemorative coins. He was appointed to the advisory board on coin design selection set up by the Ministry of Finance, and later also participated in the EURO coin commission which decided on the design of the coins which will come into circulation on 1 January next year. Also thanks to him Portugal issued various commemorative coins and medals, some of which were designed in the Netherlands. When the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) started to sell silver and gold coins, Mr Van Roekel's sales were so important that H R H Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands (Founder President of the WWF) wrote him a personal note of thanks. In collecting Mr Van Roekel had a distinct preference for English and Scottish coins. This may have been partly the result of the very pleasant relationship he built up with the Royal Mint in Llantrisant where equal attention is paid to good quality production and to the choice of design. Auction catalogues from all over the world were pored over to find a coin which he did not yet possess, or one which would enhance the quality of his collection. In doing this he was particularly interested in the rarity as well as in the history of the coin in question. Mention of a good provenance was also very important. Until his premature death Patrick Finn was his personal adviser. When asked why he had now decided to sell his collection he replied: 'The collection is almost complete, and I want to feel myself the pleasure others will experience in adding my coins to their own collections. I hope that the buyers will enjoy these coins as much as I have done during the 30 years in which I have collected them.' SALE COMMENCES AT 10:00 A.M. PRECISELY Colour illustrations indicated by an asterisk EDWARD VI (1547-53)

Details

Fine Silver Issue (1551-3), Crown, 1551, m.m. y, king on horseback right, date below, rev. shield on long cross fourchée, 30.67g., (Lingford dies F-10; N.1933; S.2478), some light smoothing in fields, now darkly toned, otherwise extremely fine

Provenance

Münzen und Medaillen list, January 1976