In a recent thread by @kanga regarding a nice 1829 half dime with a cud, I offered a die marriage attribution which elicited some fun comments on the AR characteristics of die marriage collectors. Fair enough, we are focused on what to some is minutiae. In that thread, @kanga mentioned he had seven of the die marriages of 1829. There are a total of 27 die marriages and remarriages for 1829, of which I have 13 including one duplicate, the LM-6.3. Herewith are those 13 for your pleasure in two posts. .
I am the temporary custodian of these coins as they will live beyond my passing. I never post a coin that is not mine without stating that it doesn't belong to me,
Of course. If I ever start to take myself too seriously, I just look in the mirror and if that doesn't work then I just ask my lovely bride to set me straight.
This 1829 V-10. LM-12. I picked a few months back is an R-6 and yeah sometimes you take what you can get damaged or not.
@Publius2 What the others dont know ,well maybe they do...just afraid to stick a toe in the pool....lol how habit forming these can become. Yes a smaller bust half...which also have a way of becoming habit forming. But H~10's in general I find to be a series that once bitten one tends to focus more than other series. I do try and look for them as well, US three cent silver, lll cent CN, dates needed when they can be found. IHC for the last 4 needed to complete my set. But all those whom I have introduced to half dimes agree once bitten well ask Nathan from RI a member here who got the fever.... he blames me everytime he buys one.
I will add one other point...if a detailed coin is a problem for you....then walk away! As you can see that sometimes one takes What one can find. Yes everyone would like a problem free coin....but in hunting variety ,and die marriages some are so rare...that one is almost afraid if you pass....the opportunity may never come again.
Not just 1829 but all the die varieties of all the dates, 1829-1837. I don't ever expect to get them all since there are a few R-7s that even in details grades are super expensive and elusive.
Most collectors who aren't savy with half dimes dont know how many die marriages there's to hunt for. As well knowing the series well enough to know if their 7070 set specimen is an R-1 or R-7. And that's understandable as theres series I dont collect or even hunt varieties or die marriages. And you seen how we were sort of made fun of...over doing attributions. And thats ok ! But its a part of the hobby that 90% of collectors have no interest. That's a shame ....as I always been one to look for something different on a coin...or research the specimen. As a middle and HS student I hated to do research! Now I thrive on it...as a" type A " I cannot help to satify our questions,or answers. That's why I asked Publius2, Larry, and Fip ..to check my attributions as I know "you 3" ...I can count on an answer if im correct or not.... as we all are humans subject to error . But I'm a firm believer that being wrong isnt a bad thing....as long as you recognize your mistakes,and file them away not to repeat them again. Im relatively sure those 3 members will agree once you lear to research ,and do an attribution you will want to do more...as I personally like to know that the seated Liberty Quarter or any coin in my 7070 is other than a hole filler.
The representation of the shield on the reverse of many of our coins is derived from the shield in the Great Seal of the United States. Below is a simple, abbreviated version of that shield. Note that the upper part of the shield is blue. The lower part of the shield is comprised of alternating red and white vertical stripes. Until recently, no mint could strike coins with colors, so a means had to be developed to represent the colors of the shield on our coins. The engravers used the horizontal lines, equally spaced, to represent the color blue. These are called "azures", azure being one of the five primary colors used in heraldry. To represent the alternating red and white vertical stripes, they used closely spaced raised lines to represent red and the wide, shallower stripes between them to represent white. I have marked up the reverse of a Liberty Seated dollar to show this. Now the term "pale" comes from heraldry and literally means "picket" like that in a fence. "Gule" comes from the term for "throat" that represents the color red and is one of five color terms in heraldry. So, "pale gules" means "red pickets" or more generally "red vertical lines". Notice that in the dollar coin depicted there are three pale gules representing the color red. In 1829, the capped bust half dime series started out with three pale gules but the coiners quickly realized that they just couldn't engrave hubs and dies well enough to get good struck definition of these three very thin lines on a coin as small as a half dime. So, they remade the hubs to reflect only two pale gules to represent red and kept that design for the entire remaining run of 1829 and all subsequent years to the end of the design in 1837.
