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Copyright NE, 2006

“Fine Work” Hammered Coinage

             Pierre Blondeau with his patented milling techniques placed pressure on the Mint to produce higher quality coins using hammered techniques. It was accepted that cost of production was an issue in which the quality/cost relationship was going to be the key to persuading others to adopt the new milling technology. There were two crucial years - 1651 and 1656 - where the mint came under pressure to accept Pierre Blondeau’s production method. Above is a “fine work” shilling which was produced using carefully produced new dies as an example of how good hammered production could be.

             Below is a “fine work” hammered halfcrown produced again to compete with the newer milling techniques.

           Only a handful of “fine work” pieces were actually made. This fact alone should have alerted the decision makers that hammered techniques, although capable of making good quality specimens could only achieve this in very limited numbers under strictly controlled conditions. Pierre Blondeau on the other hand produced around 100 identical sample pieces in a test run.

           The obverse and reverse dies once used, were placed into regular production so there are pieces existing which use either the obverse or reverse die only. These are not “fine work” specimens - see below for an example where the reverse die in use is the “fine work” die.