Excuse the farmer-cheek pink fingers, I’d like to present to you a pretty little Charles I rose farthing.
Dating from somewhere between 27th March 1625 – 30th January 1649, this rose farthing is a ‘single-arch’ type. Single-arch refers to the crown above the rose, as well as the crown on the obverse. Double-arch, you guessed it, has two overlaid crowns with the arch interlinking, centrally.
A ‘Transitional’ rose farthing, has a bit o’both – double-arched crown on obverse, single arched crown on reverse, above the rose. The coins are made from copper, yet in this condition remind me of a lacy doily. I’m not sure where the Royal Numismatic Society stand on that, but there ya go.
It doesn’t end there, though. Rose farthings come with many variations, styles, mules and types, and aren’t confined to the Charles I and James I Royal Stuart period. Farthings were first minted in England, in silver, in the 13th century. The etymology of the word farthing is derived from the Anglo-Saxo ‘foerthing’, ‘fourthling’, or, ‘fourth part, and signifies the worth of one quarter of a penny.
Rose farthings are hammered coins, as opposed to cast or milled coinage. The coins are produced by placing a piece of blank metal between two cast dies, then striking the upper die with a hammer to produce an image on both sides of the coin.
“Hammered coinage is the most common form of coins produced since the invention of coins in the first millennium BC, until the early modern period of circa the 15th–17th centuries”.
I am trying to discover whether my rose farthing had a brass wedge inserted into it. An educated guess says yes – see the missing wedge on my coin in the photograph above. See the photograph and text below for a an illustrated example of copper farthings with a brass wedge…
“The farthings of Charles I (1625-1649) were privately minted. The Rose farthings were issued late in the Reign and later Rose farthings had a brass wedge inserted to stop counterfeiting.”
Source:http://wbcc-online.com/new-releases/rose.html
For further reading on Stuart farthings, see this website here, http://www.stuartroyalfarthingtokens.com/, and here, http://www.britishfarthings.com/Royal/2/Charles_I_Rose.html.
