My recent acquisitions

PatAR · January 6, 2017 10:13AM

With spare time being scarce I lurk more than post on the forums lately. However, I made some nice additions to my Isabel II type collection recently and wanted to share them with you. You are always welcome to check out my collection website www.coinsofisabel2.com for the complete collection and historical context. But for the hedonist in all of us, I've reposted them here as well.

These are from the earlier Kingdom period of Isabel's reign. It has been very challenging to find nice examples of this period.

The first is a silver 2 reales in bright, lustrous uncirculated. An excellent example that I'm very pleased to have acquired.

The second is a 20 reales with beautifully toned, prooflike surfaces on both sides. Isabel 20 reales in general and Kingdom period pieces in particular, are rarely found in anything other than "beat up" condition (fine to extra fine with heavy marks in focal areas). Few were minted (67,156 for this issue) and many were exported and melted due to their greater weight versus other European (mainly French 5 francs) silver coins of the period.

This piece was hidden away for decades in the exceptional O'Callaghan collection. I am pleased to have acquired such a stunning example for my Kingdom 20 reales type. It actually looks better in hand than the auction photos! My photos shown here better capture its in-hand appearance. Please note that NO image editing of the coin itself was performed (only cropping and framing for presentation). This is a pure photo.