Commonwealth 1656 Unite, extremely rare date

Commonwealth (1649-60),gold Unite of Twenty Shillings, 1656, English shield within 15 leaf laurel and palm branch, legends in English language, initial mark sun, THE. COMMONWEALTH. OF. ENGLAND.,rev.English and Irish shields, value .XX. above, beaded circle and legend surrounding, date at top, .GOD. WITH. VS., weight 8.90g (Schneider -/344; Bull EGC 29 R4; N.2715; S.3208).Once cleaned, with some residual toning in parts of legend and in shield hatching, raised die flaws on reverse matching with the Schneider example reverse, surface marks and striations, otherwise very fine and extremely rare with approximately ten examples known of this date and the first we have ever offered for sale, extremely rare.

This is the largest denomination gold coin of the Commonwealth, with all hammered coins of this period being the first British coins to have legends in plain English. The gold of the third long accounting period of the Commonwealth totalled £23,111 from 1^st December 1653 until 30^th November 1657 which covers four different dates.

The 1656 Unite is rarer than the Oliver Cromwell gold portrait Broad of the same face value and survival is actually not a great deal different from that of the Fifty Shillings also of 1656.

Provenance:

Ex Dr Rolf Baumhauer, British gold Collection, Sincona Auction 75, 11^th May 2022, lot 123 - the significance of the rarity of date not fully highlighted.