Triton XVII, Lot: 1423. Estimate $3000. Sold for $2500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ANGLO-SAXON, Anglo-Viking (Danish Northumbria). Imitations of Alfred the Great. Circa 885-915. AR Penny (20mm, 1.42 g, 3h). Imitating Oxford mint Orsnaforda type (BMC xviii) of Alfred. Beornwald, moneyer (immobilized). Struck circa 895-900/05. ELFRED– across central field; ORSИΛ/FORDI (pellets around both Os) in two lines above and below / BERIIV/ΛLD IIO in two lines; + + + between. Cf. SCBI 9 (Ashmolean), 283; BMC 143 (Alfred); North 472; SCBC 971. VF, toned. Rare.

Ex Edoardo Curti Collection; Künker 159 (28 September 2009), lot 1748; F. Elmore Jones Collection (12 May 1971), lot 643; Richard Cyril Lockett Collection (4 November 1958), lot 2708 (part of).

M. Blackburn notes that this coinage was likely struck in one of the mints of the Five Boroughs, but it is possible that some were struck at a mint in Northumbria or the ‘Outer Danelaw’ (“Presidential Address 2004. A Currency under the Vikings. Part 1: Guthrum and the earliest Danelaw Coinages,” BNJ 75 [2005], p. 22). As the same moneyer name appears on all of the coins of this type, it suggests that it was also imitating a moneyer on the prototype coins of Alfred, but this is not the case; Beornwald is not known on any of Alfred’s Oxford-signed coins. However, the name is known on some of Alfred’s Canterbury style Two-Line issues (cf. M. Blackburn, “The London Mint in the Reign of Alfred,” KCA p. 110, Table 2 [as Byrnwald]). The repetition of the same moneyer on all the issues is a characteristic that is not replicated on other Viking imitative types, which suggests it is not an actual Viking moneyer, and perhaps the official Alfred Oxford-signed issue that served as the prototype has yet to be discovered.