1857 Australia half-sovereign question

Hi all,

My first time posting here, I hope someone can give me a little insight into a question I just discovered.

I looked up the 1857-1866 Australia half-sovereign coin here on Numista and it lists the obverse and reverse of the coin as being set in a matching direction.

I have an 1857 Australia half-sovereign that has the reverse set at 180 degrees opposite.

Does anyone here know if this is a common variation for this coin or do I have something pretty unique here?

Thanks a lot.

Hi, There are a few things that it could be. The first is that it may be a fake or some type of replica. The second is that someone may have cut it down the edge and rotated one side by 180 degrees. The third is that you may actually have an error. Can you post some clear pictures of both sides of the coin and a picture of the edge.

If it was faked it was faked a long time ago. This coin has been in my mother's (very amateur and random) coin collection for at least fifty years.

I'll try to post pictures soon.

To start with, here's The Edge:

Just kidding. The edge looks pretty good to me.

For some reason it's taking a long time for the other pictures to load to the message board...

The edge looks normal and does not show any signs of it being tampered with. I still need to see the obverse and reverse pictures if possible.

I just don't get it! None of the other pictures will load for some reason. I'll keep trying, but perhaps I could email the photos to you?

If the picture file is really large then it may take some time for it to load. It usually take me 5 minuets to load images to post on the forum. Try again and if it does not work then try and send them to me in a privet message.

The files were too large. I've trimmed them.

Hmm...

I wrote to someone that has an Australian coin blog and his response was:

"Half sovs of that year were all made in “coin alignment”, or each side 180 degrees upset. Yours is perfectly normal."

If he is correct then I guess this coin isn't an error after all.

Do you agree with this? On this site the coin is listed as being aligned the same way on both sides. Perhaps that isn't accurate.

The images of your coin do not show any obvious sings of tampering or of it being a fake/reproduction. From the picture I can conclude that it is real.

That is the first time I have heard that half sovereigns form that year are meant to have a coin alignment. But I am also not an expert of the sovereign coinage. Can I ask what blog you asked?

Yeah, it sure looks real to me too, but I'm no expert.

I got a response from Mark at The Australian Coin Collecting Blog: http://www.australian-coins.com

I'm assuming you specialize in Australian coins? I live in Canada so I don't think anyone I can show it to here will know much about it. Do you know of any other message boards or groups that are geared towards Australian coins that might have an opinion on the matter?

Though I've only found a few coins from this year online none mention the reverse alignment, so either it's so common it's not worth mentioning or maybe Mark is mistaken?

I'm getting more and more curious all the time!

I trust the opinions of those who author the Australian Coin Collecting Blog on matters like this. So Mark is probably right in what he told you. And yes I do specialise in Australian and Israeli coins and currency however the Australian sovereign coinage is not something I have studied as much as other categories. If you are on Facebook there are a number of Australian coin collecting groups that are usually very helpful and knowledgeable.