Sale: Triton VIII, Lot: 1820. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 10 January 2005.  Sold For $4500. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

SCOTLAND. David I. 1124-1153. AR Penny (1.25 gm). Roxburgh mint? Crowned bust right, holding sceptre, legend unreadable / Cross potent with pellets-in-crescent in quarters, pellet linking the crescents to the center of the cross; two quarters with additional pellets, legend unreadable. Burns pg. 30, 25 (pl. III 28-28A); Robertson pg. 36; SCBC 5005. Good VF for type. Extremely rare, a fine representative example of the earliest Scottish coinage. ($5000)

Bateson, in his recent study Coinage in Scotland, does not even refer to this type. He places the earliest pellets-in-crescent pennies in the reign of Malcolm IV (1153-1165), mentioning only that imitations of David's types probably continued during the later reign. (The pennies of Malcolm all have bust facing left.) However, there are so few surviving examples of David's coinage, much less any in decent condition with readable legends, that it cannot be said with certainty that David did not strike the pellets-in-crescent type, or that any in his name are later issues.