Toned Bronze (Netherlands Antilles) w/ TrueView

JKT · October 22, 2016 4:38PM

My LCS had this one in an album and the toning spoke to me. I thought Phil did a great job capturing the color. For anyone familiar, this is the "Star & Fish" variety.

TomB · October 24, 2016 4:33PM

I'm not familiar with this issue, but it is mighty cool looking.

cecropiamoth · October 24, 2016 10:45PM

That's a nice coin you have there JKT. The color is wonderful, but what drew me in was the awesome obverse strike. That lion looks like it is jumping off the surface of the coin. A cool LCS album find.

Jeff

TwoKopeiki · October 25, 2016 5:50AM

Love the color! What's the significance of the variety?

asheland · October 25, 2016 7:44AM

Indeed an awesome coin!

JKT · October 25, 2016 4:58PM

Thanks for the comments guys.

@TwoKopeiki - Im pretty sure not much significance in the variety at all to be honest. Mintage of 700,000 compared to 900,000 for the "fish" variety. Every 1968 cent is either a "fish" or "star and fish". And by no means am I any sort of expert on Netherlands Antilles coinage, I've just read up on what was easily accessible online about this one after purchasing the coin at my LCS solely for eye appeal.

ajaan · October 25, 2016 6:12PM

Lovely coin.

mvs7 · October 25, 2016 10:28PM

Nice coin with great color!

@JKT said:
@TwoKopeiki - Im pretty sure not much significance in the variety at all to be honest. Mintage of 700,000 compared to 900,000 for the "fish" variety. Every 1968 cent is either a "fish" or "star and fish".

To the left of the date, there's a fish. There's also a star just to to left of that. So, yours is "star and fish." If there is just a fish, and no star, that's the fish variety. They most likely added the star to denote 1969 coinage without changing the date from 1968, as Krause says "struck in 1969" for the star and fish variety. I actually ran into this when I was a kid in the mid 1970s because I was collecting foreign coins from my birth year 1969 and thought this was an odd anomaly... so here I am 40 years later going "I know what that is!"

Andres · October 26, 2016 4:54AM

Beautifull cent , great toning
The fish is the mintmaster symbol for Dr. J.W.A van Hengel (1945-1969) , when he left office, coins were minted with a star , awaiting the new mintmaster Dr. Ir. van den Brandhof (1969-1979) to choose his own mintmark ( a rooster) The Mercury staff at the right stands for the mintplace Utrecht.
This was common practice on dutch coins, every time there was a change in mintmasters, the intermediate period (sede vacante) coins had a star added.

Stork · October 26, 2016 6:07AM

That coin just pops! Interesting backstory on the mintmarks too. I wonder how a mint master decides what mark he wants.

brg5658 · October 26, 2016 6:59AM

Beautiful coin, RB just like I love copper.

mvs7 · October 26, 2016 8:30AM

@Andres said:
Beautifull cent , great toning
The fish is the mintmaster symbol for Dr. J.W.A van Hengel (1945-1969) , when he left office, coins were minted with a star , awaiting the new mintmaster Dr. Ir. van den Brandhof (1969-1979) to choose his own mintmark ( a rooster) The Mercury staff at the right stands for the mintplace Utrecht.
This was common practice on dutch coins, every time there was a change in mintmasters, the intermediate period (sede vacante) coins had a star added.

Thanks for that tidbit of information... very interesting.

JKT · October 26, 2016 12:47PM

Great information! Completely agree with mvs' sentiments. Very much appreciated.

Andres · October 26, 2016 1:40PM

@Stork said:
That coin just pops! Interesting backstory on the mintmarks too. I wonder how a mint master decides what mark he wants.

They choose a symbol which usually was connected with their name. translation van Hengel = a fishing rod , so he took a fish.
bit more complex ,van den Brandhof translates burning house, when there was a fire somewhere , people said the rooster
is crowing, so Brandhof choose a rooster.

Toned Bronze (Netherlands Antilles) w/ TrueView

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