It's not often you see coins in the news but over the last couple of days information about an exciting horde of gold coins being discovered on a building site in Western Australia has surfaced. You can read more about it in various locations including on nineMSN, the ABC, and the Herald Sun. As is typical the different media stories are similar but do vary somewhat in the details. What appears certain is that 300-400 coins were discovered while excavating a car park and that the coins are over 100 years old.
The coins are described as sovereigns (worth 20 shillings or £1) dated 1800 in all the stories we've seen. Of course this isn't possible as no sovereigns were minted by Great Britain in 1800. What seems more likely is that the coins were minted in the 19th century and dated in the 1800's. The value of the horde is estimated generally at $500,000. At the time of writing the bullion value alone of 300-400 sovereigns is $100,000-$135,000. Of course, depending on the condition of the coins their numismatic value could well outweigh this considerably.
Posted by mnemtsas at May 19, 2011 3:44 PM
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