(1616) Sommer Islands Twopence - Small Star
Strike Type
Coin Details
Auction Record
- Price realized
- $51,750
- Sold
- Grade
- F15 PCGS
- Auction house
- Stack's Bowers
Description
Recognized as the earliest coinage produced for an English colony in the Americas, the Sommer Islands twopence dates to approximately 1616 and was struck for use in Bermuda, then known as the Somers Islands after Sir George Somers, whose shipwreck there in 1609 led to English settlement. Hogge money was the first coinage made for an English colony in America: shillings, sixpences, threepences and twopences for the Somers Islands (Bermuda), which James I authorized on June 29, 1615. The pieces are brass with a thin wash of silver and show a hog on the obverse; the shilling and sixpence show a ship on the reverse, while the two smaller values have a single ring of beads and no legend. They stood for amounts of tobacco, the money of the islands, and were given up by 1624. PCGS separates the twopences by the size of the star (PCGS #45353 and #45354). Cataloged as PCGS #45354.
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