Half Guinea: Anne (obverse); Shields and Rose (reverse) (1703): Art, History and Details

Half Guinea: Anne (obverse); Shields and Rose (reverse) (1703) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The coinage of Anne's reign remained fairly constant after the inaugural design in 1662. Before the Act of Union with Scotland (1706), the arms of England and Scotland remained separate, as shown. After the act the two arms were conjoined on one shield. The word Vigo indicates the coins were struck from gold captured from the Spanish at the Battle of Vigo Bay (1702). Although silver coins bearing the Vigo inscription are less rare, the three gold denominations bearing the symbol are all extremely rare.

Object facts

• Title: Half Guinea: Anne (obverse); Shields and Rose (reverse)
• Date: 1703
• Culture: England, Anne, 1702-1714
• Type: Coins
• Technique: gold
• Dimensions: Diameter: 2.1 cm (13/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Numismatics
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1969.205

A detail from the museum

The Battle of Vigo Bay occurred on October 23, 1702. After the battle the treasure, largely of silver with a tiny amount of gold, was transported back to England and coins were made bearing the inscription Vigo.

Collection credit

The Norweb Collection

Further reading listed by the museum

• Cleveland Museum of Art, and Emery May Norweb. English Gold Coins, Ancient to Modern Times, On Loan to the Cleveland Museum of Art from the Norweb Collection. [Catalog. 1968.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.