Undated (ca. 1652-1674) St. Patrick Farthing. Martin 1d.1-Ba.11, W-11520. Rarity-6+. Silver. Nothing Below King. AU-55 (PCGS).
118.2 grains. A gorgeous silver St. Patrick farthing with choice medium-gray surfaces accented by a bit of flashy colorful iridescence and traces of frosty luster. There are no contact marks to be found, the only very minor imperfections are a couple natural planchet pits below the king and on his arm. Boldly struck on a fairly heavy planchet, just barely off center but affecting only a small portion of the obverse dentils. Light wear is seen on the high points of the design. Despite the rarity and precious metal composition of these pieces suggesting they were struck as presentation coins or for some other special purpose, almost all known examples are worn to some degree, many heavily so, and Choice AU is about as nice as they come. Martin 1d.1-Ba.11 is the most available of the 15 St. Patrick farthing die varieties known in silver, but still rare in absolute sense with just a few dozen examples extant. Martin estimates that no more than 100 silver St. Patrick farthings exist in total. The finest from these dies is probably the impressive Ted Craige example graded PCGS AU-58+ that we sold in November 2012 for $80,500. The present coin is not quite as sharp but still a remarkably high quality piece and would probably be included in a Condition Census were one to be compiled. This coin represents the Martin 1-B group in silver for the present type offering, with silver examples of 1-C and 1-D to follow. Reverse group B is characterized by dies with no halo and no punctuation in the legend. An outstanding silver St. Patrick farthing, always a classy and desirable colonial type coin.
PCGS# 902860.
From the Sydney F. Martin Collection. Earlier from our (Stack's) June 1997 sale, lot 914; Coin Rarities Online; Jim LaSarre, December 2009.