France 1973 5 centimes
This specimen is a common date of a type struck at the Paris mint for France 1966-2001. Struck in large numbers in the sixties and seventies, in later years inflation caused the mint to skip years where possible. Altho all dates were struck for the mint sets sold to collectors (whence came the specimen shown), the last date struck for circulation was 1998. All were demonetized with the coming of the euro in 2002. Several dates have "three fold" and "four fold" varieties, so called from the folds in the front of Mlle Liberté's gown. The second specimen was lot 41211 in Stack's Bowers NYINC sale (New York, January 2023), where it sold for $720. The catalog description[1] noted, "FRANCE. Gold 5 Centimes Piefort, 1973. Paris Mint. PCGS SPECIMEN-67. AGW: 0.2573 oz."
Recorded mintage: 100,423,000 plus 250 pieforts in aluminum-bronze plus 150 pieforts in silver plus 75 pieforts in gold.
Specification: 2 g, aluminum-bronze, 17 mm diameter, designed by Henri Lagriffoul (1907-81) and Adrien Dieudonné (1912-82).
Catalog reference: F.125/9, KM 933, Gad-175. The second specimen is KM-P466.
- Gadoury, Victor, Monnaies Françaises, 1789-2019, 24me éd., Monaco: Éditions Victor Gadoury, 2019.
- Michael, Thomas, and Tracy L. Schmidt, Standard Catalog of World Coins, 1901-2000, 47th ed., Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2019.
- Prieur, Michel, and Laurent Schmitt, Le Franc 10: Les Monnaies, Paris: Éditions les Chevau-légers, 2014.
- [1]Orsini, Matt, Kyle Ponterio and Jeremy Bostwick, The January 2023 NYINC Auction: Ancient Coins, World Coins & Paper Money, featuring the Taraszka Collection and the Mark and Dottie Salton Collection, Costa Mesa, CA: Stack's Bowers LLC, 2022.
Link to: