Blank Monroe Dollar has Edge Lettering

A “Faceless” Monroe Presidential Dollar has been found by coin collector Garrett Reich of Michigan. This extremely rare error type, of which only one previous specimen has ever been confirmed, is a Presidential Dollar that didn’t get struck by the coin dies, leaving it without any obverse or reverse designs. Reich’s coin is a blank planchet with a very important difference from nearly other blank Presidential Dollar coins: it has Presidential Dollar edge lettering on it! Garrett found the coin in a bank box of 1,000 coins wrapped up into 40 rolls on February 13, 2008, the day before the coins officially went on sale at most banks. (Some banks are known to distribute the coins ahead of the official release date.)

Monroe Faceless Dollar is NGC Certified

Reich’s Faceless Monroe Dollar specimen has been certified by NGC as genuine, with the label reading “2008P (James Monroe) $1 / Edge Lettered Planchet / Mint Error” along with the verification number on the insert. According to Reich’s wife, Erika, the grading service messed up the label the first time around, apparently not recognizing that the particular president was a certain, known fact in this case.

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A METAL detecting enthusiast has unearthed a Roman coin thought to be one of the oldest ever found in Wales.

Retired butcher Roy Page, 69, of Coedpoeth, found the detailed 2,000-year-old coin on a farm near St Asaph when he went on a search there with the Mold-based Historical Search Society.

Roy handed the tiny silver coin to the Portable Antiquities Scheme, who identified it as dating from the second century BC.

It is believed to have been brought over some time after the Roman invasion of Britain in 43 AD, or during earlier visits in the first century BC.

Roy, who has been metal detecting for five years, said: “The person who held the coin was probably a Roman.

“When he told me I nearly fainted, I was over the moon. I was told by an expert in our group that it could be
the oldest coin found in Wales. Read Full Story

France’s biggest trove of Gaulish coins has been unearthed in Brittany. Archeologists found them while searching along the route of a bypass under construction in the Côtes d’Armor. The coins are in the hands of specialist restorers and will go on display in the département.

The trove consists of 545 gold-silver-copper coins: 58 staters and 487 quarterstaters. ‘Stater’ is the generic term for antique coins. They lay a foot beneath the earth’s surface near Laniscat, 64km south of Saint-Brieuc, at a known Iron Age manor house or farm site, and date to 75- 50BC. They are very well preserved.

Inrap, the national institute for preventive archeological research, which has the right to investigate sites ahead of infrastructure work, reports similar finds in the 1930s at Guingamp and Perros-Guirec, but says the latest trove is the biggest yet. Searching ahead of construction work, an Inrapled team found a single coin about 30cm down, then began a systematic search.

They found another 50 coins the same day, then brought in metal detectors and found the rest. They believe the coins were all buried together but were disturbed over the centuries by ploughing. Read Full Story