1802 Capped Bust to Right Quarter Eagle - 2/1

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Description

This is the 1802/1 overdate variety, as it is usually called, of the 1802 Capped Bust to Right Quarter Eagle. Dies were expensive, and a serviceable die left over at the end of a year was often kept and re-dated rather than destroyed: the new digits were punched directly over the old ones. The earlier date survives underneath wherever its strokes fall outside the digits punched over it, which is why an overdate is read from the shapes that do not belong to the date as printed. The effect is in the die, so every coin struck from it carries the same remnant in the same position. The 1802 Capped Bust to Right Quarter Eagle - 2/1, struck at the Philadelphia Mint, is part of the Capped Bust to Right Quarter Eagles 1796-1807 collection. Every 1802 quarter eagle comes from the one obverse die usually called 2 over 1, so the issue's mintage of 3,035 is this variety's own; John Dannreuther doubts that a 1 lies under the 2 and blames a defective punch or a die break. The obverse features Liberty facing right in a soft cap, and the reverse displays a heraldic eagle, shield on breast, holding a bundle of arrows and an olive branch, with E PLURIBUS UNUM on a ribbon in its beak and clouds and stars above. No quarter eagles are dated 1799, 1800 or 1801; coinage resumed with this date, still with the heraldic eagle reverse. Struck in 91.7% gold, 8.3% silver and copper, weighing 4.37 grams, 20 mm in diameter, with a reeded edge. Cataloged as PCGS #7650.