Athelstan museum is delighted to have been able to purchase and display a rare silver penny of King Athelstan (or Æthelstan) 924-939.
This gives us a direct link to Athelstan, who has strong association with Malmesbury and after whom the museum is named.
After the entire country fell under Athelstan’s control he celebrated his position on charters and coins. Very few coins feature both Athelstan’s portrait and the extended title (Æthelstan rex to Brit, ‘King of All Britons’) as this coin does.
The expansion of West-Saxon control also increased the number of burghs striking money for the King. Athelstan’s attempts to organise his new network of mint-places involved the first widespread use of mint-signatures on England’s coinage. Hence we know that this coin was struck at the mint of Wallingford, Oxfordshire by the moneyer Æthelmund.
As of 2013, no other such penny of Wallingford was recorded in any public museum or institution.
The coin is graded as good very fine. There is some weakness on the crown – this is caused by a flaw in the die, and not from the coin being rubbed. The flan (the original blank disc from which a coin is struck) is full and round, with smooth surfaces and light toning. There are no cracks or significant areas of porosity. Within the corpus of Athelstan Portrait pennies, this is can be regarded as well above average in terms of preservation.
Text credit: Noonan’s Auction House