I recently added this coin to my collection. It is a Louis d'or issued in 1790 for the french king Louis XVI at Montpellier (mint N). Louis XVI was condemned to die by the National Convention revolutionary court, and was beheaded on January 21 1793 in Paris. Interestingly, I have been unable to find any sales record at all for this year and mint combination. It seems therefore to be quite rare. Would anybody be able to shed more info on this coin? Thanks in advice and regards, France. Louis d' or, 1790-N (Montpellier). Fr-475; KM-591.11; Gad-361. Louis XVI. Bare head left. Reverse: Crown over two square shields. Weak areas in striking.
The only record that I could find was the sale of the coin you posted. The 1790 seems to be one of a kind. No specimens graded for the particular year. Very nice find Eduard.
Hi, Derick, nice to hear from you. Yes, it seems to be quite rare, at least as far as recorded sales is concerned. Actually it was my son who spotted it - so it looks like he made a good catch.
As Derick mentioned, only sale I can find was the Goldberg auction in Sept. this year. Exact same coin sold for $700. Not even cgb has one listed that I can find.
Thank you all very much for your comments. It is intriguing that there appear to be no sales records for Louis d'or with this mint -year combination. I looked in acsearch and coin archives, no records besides this one coin. The NGC-world coin price guide lists prices for all other mint-dates for Louis XVI, besides this one. However, I am still not equating this with absolute rarity - there may well have been sales which have not been recorded in either of these resources (coinarchives only goes back a few years, unless you subscribe to coin archives Pro (and pay the money). But, it does look to be a scarce issue.
If memory serves it only had a mintage of 9000 +, but that is far from the lowest for the period. But even Gadoury which is the French version of the Red Book does not list values for this coin. So that speaks to its rarity.
Thank you, Doug. I was wondering if there are any specific french catalogues, and you answered the question. I am aware of www.lefranc.net which is great for all franc denominated coins, but I have never consulted Gadoury.
