Two Pound Piece: George IV (obverse); Shield of Arms (reverse) (1831): Art, History and Details

Two Pound Piece: George IV (obverse); Shield of Arms (reverse) (1831) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Jean Baptiste Merlen (French, 1769–1850); William Wyon (British, 1795–1851).

The work and its context

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

The two-pound piece in this reign was only struck as a pater in 1831. Again, as in the last reign, a limited number of proof sets were struck, and this coin was included in the sets. Since it never went into circulation it is properly called a pattern.

Object facts

• Title: Two Pound Piece: George IV (obverse); Shield of Arms (reverse)
• Date: 1831
• Creator attribution: Jean Baptiste Merlen (French, 1769–1850); William Wyon (British, 1795–1851)
• Culture: England, William IV, 1830-1837
• Type: Coins
• Technique: gold
• Dimensions: Diameter: 3.8 cm (1 1/2 in.)
• Collection: MED - Numismatics
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1969.216

A detail from the museum

This is the largest gold coin issued during his brief reign.

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.