Among the Rarest Sceattas // The Finer of Two Known

Sale: CNG 75, Lot: 1446. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 23 May 2007.  Sold For $8500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ANGLO-SAXON, Kings of Northumbria. Aethelwald Moll, with Archbishop Ecgberht. 759-765. AR Sceat (1.09 g, 8h). York mint. +EDIGdPGD (P retrograde), cross pattée / ECGBERhT AR, cross pattée. Beowulf 112 = EMC 1999.0019 (this coin); Pirie, Guide 2.4 = I. Stewart, “A Northumbrian Coin of King Ethelwald and Archbishop Ecgberht,” NC 1991, pl. 44, 6 = Firth Collection (Spink 1, 11 October 1978), lot 89 = Lord Grantley Collection (January 1944), lot 798 = Rashleigh Collection (Sotheby’s, 28 June 1909), lot 131 = T.F. Dymock, NC 1841, pp. 154-5; North 193 note (Alchred); SCBC 853. Good VF, slightly soft strike. Extremely rare, the finer of two known.

From the Beowulf Collection. Ex Rudd FPL 42 (1999), no. 39.

For the history of this great rarity, see I. Stewart, op. cit., pp. 223-5, and Lord Stewartby’s article in the Rudd list, op. cit., pp. 2-3. In addition to the two known sceats of Aethelwald Moll with Archbishop Ecgberht, there are also two sceats known in the names of Aethelwald Moll and his son, Athelred R.