England (UK) 1839 5 Pounds (Una and the Lion)

The Una and the Lion was a British £5 gold coin depicting

Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until Death and state funeral of Queen Victoria, her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 21 ...

. It is recognized as one of the most beautiful British coins ever struck. It was designed by

William Wyon William Wyon (Birmingham 1795 – 29 October 1851), was official chief engraver at the Royal Mint from 1828 until his death. Biography Wyon was born in Birmingham and, in 1809, was apprenticed to his father, Peter Wyon who was an engraver a ...

in 1839, to commemorate the beginning of Queen Victoria's reign (in 1837). The coins were first produced in 1839 and were probably intended for collector sets rather than for circulation. The production ran to a few hundred coins including a number of variations such as different metals, different hairbands on the depiction of the queen, different edge types, and a variation in the reverse inscription. The coin is the lightest of the British £5 coins, weighing only 38.7–39.3 grams.{{clear

Obverse

The obverse of the coin shows Victoria's head, and the Latin phrase "VICTORIA D G BRITANNIARUM REGINA F D – "Victoria by the Grace of God, Queen of the British Territories, Defender of the Faith" - is inscribed around the head.Milled coin inscriptions and their meanings
Paul Shields Metal Detecting Website

Reverse

The reverse of the coin is a depiction of Queen Victoria walking to the left of a lion. The Latin phrase DIRIGE DEUS GRESSUS MEOS – "May God direct my steps". There is also a variant of the inscription with DIRIGIT instead of DIRIGE. Underneath the lion are the

Roman Numeral Roman numerals are a numeral system that originated in ancient Rome and remained the usual way of writing numbers throughout Europe well into the Late Middle Ages. Numbers are written with combinations of letters from the Latin alphabet, eac ...

s "MDCCCXXXIX" (1839). The same Latin inscription appears on the 2012 Royal Mint £5 Crown, minted to commemorate the

Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II The year 2012 marked the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II being the 60th anniversary of the accession of Queen Elizabeth II on 6 February 1952. The only diamond jubilee celebration for any of Elizabeth's predecessors was in 1897, for the 60th an ...

. The reverse design, with a Roman numeral date of MM and then "2000 AD." below instead of Wyon's signature, was used for a silver one ounce coin of the Milestones of the Millennium series. The depiction of the young Queen as Lady Una (a character from Edmund Spenser's poem ''

The Faerie Queene ''The Faerie Queene'' is an English epic poem by Edmund Spenser. Books IIII were first published in 1590, then republished in 1596 together with books IVVI. ''The Faerie Queene'' is notable for its form: at over 36,000 lines and over 4,000 sta ...

'', from 1590) was seen at the time as a bold design decision as it was the first occasion when a British monarch had been depicted on a coin as a fictional character. Queen Victoria, as Una, is depicted holding a sceptre while the lion, Lady Una's guardian, represents England.

References

British gold coins Works based on The Faerie Queene Cultural depictions of Queen Victoria

External links

A history of Una and the Lion