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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Nap, post: 2239488, member: 73099&quot;]Here&#039;s a coin in which the hole does not take away from the coin, rather it gives the coin a special meaning:</p><p><br /></p><p><img src="http://i1149.photobucket.com/albums/o582/napoleoniii/angel.jpg" class="bbCodeImage wysiwygImage" alt="" unselectable="on" /> </p><p><br /></p><p>Tuberculosis (TB) is a disease that is well known to history. While it is greatly in decline in modern times, it&#039;s still out there, and it is estimated that about a third of the world&#039;s population has been exposed to the bacteria that causes pulmonary tuberculosis. Tuberculosis is one of those rare infections that can affect nearly every organ in the body, but it usually involves the lungs.</p><p><br /></p><p>Tuberculosis, the &quot;consumption,&quot; is a prominent character in 19th century romantic literature. The list of famous people in history who died from tuberculosis could fill volumes of books. While TB is uncommonly communicated person to person in the United States, it is very common in many countries in the world. It still causes severe disease in people who travel to endemic areas, people who have AIDS, and people who are started on immune system-lowering medications (like for cancer or rheumatoid arthritis).</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, the coin tie-in:</p><p><br /></p><p>Besides the lungs, TB can affect the lymph nodes, especially those in the neck. This condition, known today as scrofula, is less dangerous than TB of the lungs, but causes considerable distress as it appears as large nodular masses in the neck, which sometimes drain pus and are fairly disfiguring. It is most common in children. In medieval England, it was called &quot;The King&#039;s evil.&quot; The superstitious people of the time believed that the touch of the king could actually cure this disease, and the Stuart notion of regal divinity only supported this idea. This led to the creation of a &quot;touching ceremony.&quot; People who had scrofula would line up on certain days, and the king would touch them and give them a medal. The medal was a gold &quot;angel&quot; coin, worth 10 shillings, which was holed for wearing on a ribbon. This ceremony was extremely popular during the times of James I, Charles I, and Charles II. It continued through the reign of Queen Anne, after which it fell out of favor. The belief that there was merit to this was reinforced by the fact that it is not uncommon for scrofula to go into remission on its own, and people would get better.</p><p><br /></p><p>The most famous person to be given the &quot;Royal Touch&quot; was the writer Samuel Johnson, whose coin was kept by his descendants and is now a highlight in the British Museum.</p><p><br /></p><p>The obverse of the coin depicts St. Michael spearing a dragon. The intentional hole is through the head of the dragon, which may have been intentional. The reverse depicts a ship.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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