King Charles III to appear on commemorative 50 pence coin

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Images copyright of the Royal Mint.

The King's portrait will first appear on a special 50 pence coin commemorating the Queen.

The reverse of the 50 pence features a design that originally appeared on the 1953 Coronation Crown. 

It includes the four quarters of the Royal Arms depicted within a shield.

They are separated by the emblems of the home nations; a rose, a thistle, a shamrock and a leek.

The Royal Mint reports:

On 3 October 2022, we are honoured to be releasing a special collection of memorial coins to mark this poignant moment in British history. Featuring one of three reverse designs, each new coin in the collection features the official coinage portrait of King Charles III. The UK 50p coin will also enter general circulation.

See: His Majesty The King's Official Coinage Portrait.

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See also:

1] King Charles III 50 pence coin unveiled.

2] King Charles III and late Queen to appear on commemorative £5 coins.

[Deeman]

Lack of imagination! Charles is living in the past.

Get a grip Charlie, move forward, no more nostalgia and no more heraldry.

[Offa]

I really like the 50p. Reminiscent of the George V early florin reverse.

[Alan71]

Lack of imagination! Charles is living in the past.

Get a grip Charlie, move forward, no more nostalgia and no more heraldry.

To be fair, these are memorial coins for Elizabeth II.  There's no indication that his normal circulation designs are going to be like this.  At least "Charles" is rendered in English. 

Of course, there's nothing yet to say that Matthew Dent's jigsaw designs won't remain for a while.  I hope not.

Looks like they're going back to starting the text bottom left, after Jody Clark moved it to top right, so the date will be near upside down again.

[chrisild]

As for how the text is arranged, there will surely be regular 50p coins where the denomination appears on the other side. I would wait for the entire circulation set.

Now "living in the past", well, a monarchy with a king or queen "by the grace of God" who is a "defender of the faith" ... what would one expect?

[Alan71]

As for how the text is arranged, there will surely be regular 50p coins where the denomination appears on the other side. I would wait for the entire circulation set.  

The obverse of the £5 has both the denomination and the date, with the date practically upside-down.  I would imagine the normal circulation designs to expand the latin to fill the space left by the denomination, but still with an upside-down date.

Even if Charles wanted to abandon the Latin nonsense on coins, he wouldn't be able to.  There'd be uproar if he did and criticism of him personally, even if most of the UK population couldn't care less.  What could it be replaced by though? "UK of GB & NI"?

[GCVO]

I don't know how serious it was, but there was a design for the Edward VIII coins that said "Edward VIII by the grace of God" on the obverse. The rest presumably would have followed on the reverse, but it would have been awfully cramped if it kept everything that was in abbreviated Latin.

[Deeman]

Just accessed the RM site (12.45 UK time) and find myself in a queue in excess of 50,000.

The memorial collection has obviously generated a lot of interest.

Interestingly, the proclamation has not yet been published.

[chrisild]

Here is a short video showing the production of the coins. With comments from Royal Mint historian Chris Barker and artist and designer Martin Jennings.

[andyg]

Westminster are today advertising a set of 15 50p coins from the islands for the coronation.  Just £100 for £7.50 worth of coins.  Bargain? Perhaps not.

[<k>]

My one complaint - the year on the reverse of the CIII 50 pence of 2022 is nothing like as clear as on the image in the first post here. It's very small, and at first I was convinced it was a dateless coin. Even after looking closely, I couldn't see the year, and I had to check an online photo to see where it was positioned.

I got my second one this afternoon at my favourite Chinese takeaway. After Wendy Wong (from Hong Kong) gave me my change, I spotted a very shiny 50 pence, so I rushed to the window to examine it in the light. "Is it OK?" asked Wendy, who seemed curious. "Yes, it's the King Charles 50 pence", I explained. I walked back to the counter to show her, and she was all smiles as she looked at it. "Come back again!" she said with a smile, as I left.

[chrisild]

The "2022" is nicely built into the reverse design. Maybe a little too nicely.   Guess it would have been possible to have the date on the obverse – after all, the king's name is a little shorter than that of QEII. So the year could have appeared on the obverse below his heck maybe. Having four large digits on the other side would in my opinion have spoiled the design.

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Having four large digits on the other side would in my opinion have spoiled the design.

Maybe so, but they could have been placed somewhere that was not too obtrusive, without being TOO large. Where there's a will, there's a way.

[FosseWay]

The reverse design is a copy of the coronation crown of 1953, where the date was in the same place.