Rarely seen Vietnam/Annam 5 tien

Lancastercoin

I posted this in the Bat Coin thread, but since that thread's kind of old I wasn't sure if it got noticed. I have wanted to own one of these coins for around 8 years, and this was my first chance so I went for it! The coin is ~43mm, struck by Tu Duc c.1847-83, and catalogs as Schroeder 359. I bought this from Joe Lang of Steve Album coins in Baltimore. Enjoy!

sumnom

Very impressive! Can you tell us something about the history of the coin? I don't know much about Annamese coinage.

TwoKopeiki

Very cool - i've never seen this particular issue before.

spoon

Now that is awesome! Great eye-appeal

Edit - I notice in Krause that every version has a different engraving, with wildly different characteristics (like bat's head left here, right there), and the pic for this type is different from yours too. That makes for some added coolness IMO. I take it these were hand-engraved with each die being unique then?

laurentyvan

It's a beauty!

Most of what I like about coins like this is that it's not a Balboa from Panama- you know what I mean. Not everyone has one and
I love the design.

Great deal of history there too.

Lancastercoin

I don't know much about the history of this piece, other than that it was almost certainly a presentation coin that saw little use as currency. I think Vietnam at the time was similar to China, in that copper cash coins were the backbone of exchange, supplemented by silver ingots and foreign silver crowns (mostly Mexican 8 reales) for larger transactions. The dies were absolutely hand engraved, from what I can tell no punches were used at all. There are little guide dots visible in the picture, used to make sure the characters came out even.

sumnom

<< <i>I don't know much about the history of this piece, other than that it was almost certainly a presentation coin that saw little use as currency. I think Vietnam at the time was similar to China, in that copper cash coins were the backbone of exchange, supplemented by silver ingots and foreign silver crowns (mostly Mexican 8 reales) for larger transactions. The dies were absolutely hand engraved, from what I can tell no punches were used at all. There are little guide dots visible in the picture, used to make sure the characters came out even. >>



These were struck instead of cast?

Lancastercoin

Yes, this coin was struck and not cast. Not sure if it was holed before or after striking but I think before.

sumnom

<< <i>Yes, this coin was struck and not cast. Not sure if it was holed before or after striking but I think before. >>



Wow. That would mean that coins were struck in Annam before they were struck in China. I think the first Chinese milled coins were 1889.

spoon

Burma and Cambodia had milled coins by the 1850s and 60s respectively thanks to the European invaders. The French were only then beginning to penetrate Vietnam, so I'm not sure how they gained their techniques, all I have to go on is Krause which doesn't cover mints and such. But they do have some words relevant to our discussion:

The smaller gold pieces saw a limited circulation, mainly among the local merchants and foreign traders. The larger gold pieces were used mainly for hoarding, while most of these were intended as rewards and gifts. Many of these gold pieces appear to have been struck from silver coin dies or vice-versa

... The gold and silver coins with other designs and smooth edges are generally considered as presentation pieces but some did appear in circulation when their owners came upon hard times.Their fineness usually ranges from .500 to .999

... The smooth edge silver dragon coins and those with square center holes are considered presentation pieces.