France. 1720-S Sol. Reims Mint. Gadoury-276. LUDOVICUS XX Error. VF-35 (PCGS).

175.2 grains. This came from our (Stack’s) 2008 Americana sale, where it was described: “A remarkable error coin and unlisted by Gadoury as such. In the king’s title on the obverse, instead of the correct LOUIS [sic, should be LUDOVICUS] XV, the engraver had entered LOUIS [sic, should be LUDOVICUS] XX. The error appears to have been detected but incompletely repaired, the hand engraved V over the second X is imperfect and the coin remains a naked eye error. Good color, decent surfaces, good strike quality for the grade.” Despite some trivial granularity, this is an attractive and nice grade specimen. Syd paid $3,162.50 for this back in 2008. This was the only example known to Syd, though a lower grade example with heavy rim bruises sold at CGB in Paris in 2007 for almost $1,300, and a corroded VF example was offered in our recent sale of the Sterling Collection of John Law coinage.

PCGS# 227199.

From the Sydney F. Martin Collection. Earlier from our (Stack’s) January 2008 Americana Sale, lot 5521.