Denmark, 5 ore, 1965

And a coin for today.

Denmark, 5 ore, 1965 (KM #848.1)

Denmark! Most of the Danish coins I see are from the 1960s, by far more than any other decade. Why is that? Anyway, this coins was Denmark’s 5-ore piece from 1960-1972, when the last Danish 5-ore coin was minted. The denomination was scrapped entirely in 1989. Being bronze, this coin has a melt value of about 5 cents just for its copper content. Today, Denmark’s lowest coin is the 50-ore coin. Denmark is technically part of the Eurozone, but currently has a treaty exemption from adopting the euro.

Mintage is 14,229,000
Metal Bronze
Weight 6 g
Diameter 24 mm
Thickness 1.8 mm
Shape Round
Orientation Medal alignment
Demonetized 06-30-1989

France, 20 centimes, 1976

Say hello to Marianne.

France, 20 centimes, 1976 (KM #930)

This is the same type of coin as the one featured on 22 January 2011. Mintage is 117,610,000.

Metal Copper-Aluminum-Nickel
Weight 4 g
Diameter 23.5 mm
Thickness 1.4 mm
Engravers Henri Lagriffoul (obverse)
Adrien Dieudonné (reverse)
Shape Round
Orientation Coin alignment
Demonetized 02-17-2002

Japan, 5 yen, 1974

Hot on the heels of my last post, I bring you this special update. It’s not often when I find a foreign coin in the wild, but last Tuesday was one of those lucky days. I was at Target, and I spotted a coin on the floor. At first I mistook it for a bus token, but it turned out to be one of these:

Japan, 5 yen, Showa year 49 (1974) (KM #???)

Japan uses a traditional system for dating their coins. Instead of the Gregorian calendar date, which the Japanese are gradually using anyway, their coins follow the ancient precedent of bearing the year since the beginning of the current emperor’s reign. This coin was minted during the 49th year of Emperor Showa, also known as Hirohito.

Also of note, this coin type has been in production since 1949, without a design or composition change. That makes this coin type one of the oldest currently used coin types, having been in continuous production for over 60 years! With a mintage in the hundreds of millions every year (a peak of 950,000,000 in 1974), it is also one of the most common world coins by mintage. By the way, it is worth USD $0.06.

Metal Brass
Weight 3.75 g
Diameter 22 mm
Thickness 1.5 mm
Shape Round with a hole
Orientation Medal alignment

France, 50 francs, 1952

It’s been a awhile, but I haven’t forgotten. Here’s a coin for today.

France, 50 francs, 1952 (KM #918.1)

This was the highest valued French coin at the time, but a 100-franc coin would debut two years later. Rendered obsolete long ago, these larger 50Fr coins are much less common than the dime-a-dozen 10Fr coins, but with a mintage of 74,211,600, this one is still the most common of its type.

Metal Aluminum-bronze
Weight 8 g
Diameter 27 mm
Thickness 2.24 mm
Engraver Georges Guiraud
Shape Round
Orientation Coin alignment
Demonetized 08-03-1966