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Auction: 18011 - The Williams Collection of Anglo-Saxon, Viking and Norman Coins - Part I
Lot: 54

(x) Wessex, Alfred (871-899), Penny, 1.28g, 7h, Cross Lozenge (Ceolwulf) type, uncertain mint, Regingild, + ælfred rex sax, legend starts at 7 o'clock, diademed and draped bust right, no inner circle, rev. regi / ngil / dmo / neta, the ns reversed, in the angles of a long cross with large central lozenge containing a small cross saltire with pellets in angles (Blackburn & Keynes 56 this coin; Haigh, 'Coins of Alfred', p. 25, no. 20 and pl.2, 10 this coin; SCBI Mack 732 this coin; N.629; S.1058), a remarkable portrait of very distinctive style, ragged edge but good very fine, the only known example of this type

provenance:
Linzalone, Stack's, 7 December 1994, lot 2352
Mack, with his ticket
Ryan, part 2, Glendining, 22-24 January 1952, lot 713, 'excessively rare'
Carlyon-Britton, Sotheby, 17-21 November 1913, lot 339, 'of the highest rarity, especially reading sax on the obverse.'
Rashleigh, Sotheby, 21 June - 1 July, 1909, lot 224
Cuff, Sotheby, 8 June - 5 July 1854, lot 453, to Webster

See Hawkins 'An account of some Saxon pennies, and othe articles, found at Sevington, North Wilts' in Archaeologia 27 (1883), referring to a Cross and Lozenge coin of Alfred in Mr Cuff's collection before the discovery of the Cuerdale hoard.

See Ruding, 'Annals of the Coinage', third edition (1840), supplimentary plate c, no.17, for an accurate drawing of this coin. The relative merits of various collections of engraved plates of coins are discussed by Hawkins in his introduction to 'Silver coins of England', 1841, and he observes 'The additional plates included in the edition of Ruding of 1840, are fully entitled to the confidence of the collector.'

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Sold for
£8,500