|
HANOVER. Victoria. 1837-1901. Proof Pattern AV 5 Pounds (37mm, 38.38 g, 12h). London mint. Dies by W. Wyon. Dated 1839. VICTORIA D : G : BRITANNIARUM REGINA F : D :, head left with hair bound in two fillets, the first with six full scrolls showing above the lock of hair, the second with eleven leaves / DIRIGE DEUS GRESSUS MEOS, Victoria (as Lady Una) leading lion left, holding scepter and globus cruciger; MDCCCXXXIX in exergue. Edge: plain. Holloway 1d; W&R 280; Linecar & Stone 19A var. (struck here in gold); Bull, Gold 1051; SCBC 3851. In NGC encapsulation 8396372-001, graded PF 62 Ultra Cameo. Extremely rare. W&R gave this variety a rarity rating of 7, placing it among the rarest of the famous Una & the Lion patterns. Five additional examples can be found in CoinArchives. Top Pop.
In Edmund Spenser’s 1590 epic poem The Faerie Queene, the Lady Una quests to free her parents, who are being held captive by a dragon. Separated from the Redcrosse knight, the young woman is set upon by a vicious lion.
It fortuned out of the thickest wood
A ramping Lyon rushed suddainly,
Soone as the royall virgin he did spy,
With gaping mouth at her ran greedily,
To haue attonce deuour’d hr tender corse:
But to the pray when as he drew more ny,
His blodue rage asswaged with remorse,
And with the sight amazd, forgat his furious forse.
In stead thereof he kist her wearie feet,
and lickt her lilly hands with fawning tong,
As he her wronged innocence did weet.
O how can beautie maister the most strong,
And simple truth subdue auenging wrong?
(Book 1, Canto 3)
The beast is struck by Una’s beauty and innocence, stopping him in his tracks, and joins the young woman on her journey. This scene saw a resurgence of popularity in the early 19th century, with many Victorians seeing in their new Queen Victoria the same beauty and innocence of Spenser’s Lady Una. Indeed, on this superb pattern 5 Pound, the great engraver William Wyon draws on the scene to combine the image from Spenser’s poem with the lion as a symbol of English royalty. Wyon’s work on this pattern is widely held by collectors to be among the finest examples of numismatic engraving in the entire English series.
The final winners of all Triton XXIX lots will be determined at the live public sale that will be held on 13-14 January 2026.
Triton XXIX – Session Four – Lot 920-1141 will be held Wednesday afternoon, 14 January 2026 beginning at 2:00 PM ET.
Winning bids are subject to a 22.5% buyer's fee for bids placed on this website and 25% for all others.
We recognize that our users may have various Internet Browsers and Operating Systems. We like our visitors to have the best possible experience when using our bidding platform. However, we do recognize that it is impossible to develop applications that work identically, efficiently and effectively on all web browsers. The CNG bidding platform supports the latest stable major version and stable previous version of Chrome and Firefox.
|
