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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Ian, post: 73882, member: 283&quot;]The item looks to me to be a copy of a Guldiner from the Hall mint in the Austrian Tyrol. The very first Guldiner / Thaler minted there.</p><p><br /></p><p>The Guldiner, one of the earliest dated `dollar&#039; sized coins in the world, was made from silver. It is rather scarce. It was struck in two variants, one (like yours) has the knight wearing a ribbon on his helmet. The other is ribbonless.</p><p><br /></p><p>It is difficult to tell from the images, but your coin looks to have been made from copper(?). Maybe it&#039;s heavily toned silver.&nbsp; </p><p><br /></p><p>There are copies of this coin out there made for collectors, museums and generally the tourist trade. Some are obvious re-strikes, some are clearly marked as such either on the surface or on the edge, and some are pretty good imitations without any such markings. </p><p><br /></p><p>The real ones tend to sell for a hundreds of $&#039;s when they emerge (from collections being sold off). Put it this way, if someone trys to sell you one claiming that a friends relative dug it up in his garden somewhere in the Upper Nile Valley....or anywhere else come to think of it, then give it a wide berth. </p><p><br /></p><p>Rather interestingly (well, at least for me), the die for the coin was depicted on the 2003 issue of the Austrian bi-metallic 25 euro coin (silver outer ring with a Niobium centre). The coin was issued to commemorate 700 yrs of Hall mint.</p><p><br /></p><p><img src="http://www.imb4u2.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/stuff/niobium.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" />[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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