The Queen's 80th Birthday

2006 Queen's 80th Birthday Crown to Fund Queen Mother Statue For details of Gordon Brown's original announcement, please see our separate page.

Crowns & Gold Five Pounds There is a historical difference between gold crowns and gold five pound coins. Crowns were originally five shillings pieces worth a quarter of a pound, and five pound coins were, as their name tells, worth five pounds face value. The first British crowns were gold coins issued in 1544, and the first silver crowns were issued in 1551. It was not until 1990 that the Royal Mint retariffed the crown, which was by then a silvery coloured cupro-nickel coin, from five shillings to five pounds.

Queen's 80th Birthday Crown
To celebrate H.M Queen Elizabeth's eightieth birthday, the Royal Mint has issued a crown with a face value of £5, in cupro-nickel and also silver proof and gold proof versions.As this site is about gold, only the details of the gold proof version appear on this page, for other versions, please refer to our 24carat.co.uk website, however the design of all versions is the same.

Obverse:
The fourth portrait of the Queen facing right, designed by Ian Rank-Broadley.ELIZABETH II D G REG F D
FIVE POUNDS

Reverse:
For the reverse Danuta Solowiej-Wedderburn has created a simple but pleasing design of a fanfare of three horns (trumpets?) adorned with royal standards, suggestive of an announcement, proclamation and celebration.
The reverse legend reads:
1926 VIVAT REGINA 2006
Which we translate from latin into english as (Long) live the Queen.
It may just be possible to mis-translate this a "Queen Live", although whether the lead singer would be Freddy Mercury or Paul Rogers we could not say.

Edge
The edge is inscribed in incuse lettering:-
DUTY SERVICE FAITH

Price & Availability

When compared to the Royal Mint price of £1,745.00 you will make a saving of £1,745.00 per item when ordering from us.

Please check our Standard Terms for Bullion Coins.You may wish to use our order form.

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