Coin Encyclopedia
Search and identify coins from around the world — with country, denomination, metal, mint, history, and how to tell them apart.
Amphipolis Apollo Tetradrachm
Silver tetradrachm of Amphipolis in Macedon, famous for its masterfully engraved three-quarter facing head of Apollo, widely regarded as a high point of Greek coin art.
Ancient
Liberty Head Eagle ($10)
A long-running 19th-century gold coin featuring Christian Gobrecht's Coronet Head design, minted at numerous branch mints across the expanding United States.
United States
Kennedy Half Dollar
A half dollar issued starting in 1964 to honor assassinated President John F. Kennedy, quickly becoming a widely saved and collected commemorative-style circulating coin.
United States
British Crown
Valued at five shillings, the British crown is a large silver (and later cupro-nickel) coin with a production history stretching from Tudor England to modern commemorative issues.
British
Australian Platinum Koala
Australia's platinum bullion coin from the Perth Mint, first struck in 1988 with a koala design that changes nearly every year.
Bullion
Isle of Man Noble (Platinum)
The world's first modern platinum bullion coin, struck for the Isle of Man government by Pobjoy Mint, featuring a Viking longship reverse.
Bullion
Anglo-Saxon Silver Sceat
Small, thick early Anglo-Saxon silver coin with enigmatic pagan and Christian imagery, the direct forerunner of the later English penny.
British
Ostrogothic Silver Quarter Siliqua
Small silver coin struck by the Ostrogothic kings of Italy in the name of the reigning Byzantine emperor, bearing the Gothic king's monogram on the reverse.
European
French 40 Francs Gold (Napoleon)
An early gold coin of Napoleon Bonaparte as First Consul and later Emperor, struck under France's new decimal franc system.
European
French 100 Francs Gold (Angel/Genius)
A large French gold coin of the Third Republic featuring an allegorical winged genius writing the constitution, often called the 'Angel' by collectors.
European
French Franc Germinal
Not a single coin but the bimetallic monetary standard fixed by Napoleon's 1803 law, defining the franc's silver and gold content for over a century.
European
Draped Bust Half Cent
An early U.S. copper coin depicting a draped bust of Liberty, struck for everyday small change in the first decade of the 19th century.
United States
Austrian Gold Philharmonic
Austria's popular gold bullion coin honoring the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, featuring the Musikverein's Great Organ and an array of orchestral instruments.
Bullion
Byzantine Gold Histamenon Nomisma
A distinctive concave (cup-shaped) Byzantine gold coin introduced in the 10th century as the full-weight companion to the flat tetarteron nomisma.
Ancient
New Zealand Florin (pre-decimal)
New Zealand's pre-decimal florin, famous for its kiwi-bird reverse design, circulated from 1933 until decimalization replaced it with the 20-cent coin in 1967.
Africa & Oceania
Peru 8 Reales (Lima Mint)
The flagship silver dollar-size coin of colonial and early republican Peru, struck at the historic Lima mint from cob and pillar types through crowned-shield busts.
Latin American
Straits Settlements Silver Dollar
A large British colonial silver dollar struck for Singapore, Penang, and Malacca, created to give the Straits Settlements a standardized coin after decades of competing foreign trade dollars.
Asian
Guinea
Historic British gold coin named for the West African region that supplied much of its gold, valued at 21 shillings for most of its history and predecessor to the modern sovereign.
British
Islamic Gold Dinar (Umayyad)
The first purely epigraphic Islamic gold coin, introduced by Caliph Abd al-Malik around 696 AD, replacing figural Byzantine-style imagery with Quranic inscriptions.
Ancient
Byzantine Follis
The large bronze workhorse coin of everyday Byzantine commerce, reformed by Emperor Anastasius I in 498 AD with a prominent Greek numeral denoting its value of 40 nummi.
Ancient
Chinese Tang Dynasty Cash
The influential bronze cash coin introduced in the Tang Dynasty, inscribed "Kai Yuan Tong Bao," that established the round-with-square-hole design copied for over a thousand years.
Asian
Umayyad Silver Dirham
A silver coin of the Umayyad Caliphate struck after Caliph Abd al-Malik's monetary reform, bearing only Arabic inscriptions and setting the template for centuries of Islamic coinage.
World
1866 Shield Nickel With Rays
The first-year Shield Nickel design featuring thirteen rays between the reverse stars, marking the debut of the United States' first copper-nickel five-cent coin.
United States
Japanese Koban
A hand-hammered oval gold coin used in feudal Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate, valued at one ryo and stamped with ink calligraphy certifying its weight and fineness.
Asian