all that were known of this type before the disinterment of the Cuerdale hoard. In that hoard fifteen specimens were found, including the fragments 17 and 18; and of the whole number of this type now known all the important varieties will be found figured in Plate II.

11. + ÆLFRED REX SA + Bust to the right.

EADVLF MONETA

A cross saltire within a lozenge, which is connected with the margin of the coin by a beaded line; three pellets at one side.

REV. T. F. DYMOCK. Pl. II, FIG. 1.

Similar bust.

This differs from the preceding

in having a cross bar at each angle of the lozenge.

WILLIAM ASSHETON Esq. Pl. II, FIG. 2.
Similar bust.

Same type with a pellet at

J. D. CUFF ESQ. Pl. II, FIG. 3.

Similar bust.

for TORHTMVND.

The lines which

margin are not beaded in this

REGINGIED MONETA. This differs from the last in having crosses instead of pellets on each side of the lozenge.

J. D. CUFF Esq. Pl. II, FIG. 10.

21.

X AELFRED REX

Similar bust.

+ DIARMVND

Similar type, a cross within the

lozenge, and a crescent attached to each side of the beaded lines

which connect the lozenge with the margin.

22.

X AELFRED REX + BVRGNOÐ

BRITISH MUSEUM. Pl. II, FIG. 11.

Similar bust.

Similar type; a pellet at each

side of the lozenge, another in each angle of the cross enclosed therein, and a curved line connecting each opposite pair of

side of the lozenge; a plain marginal line within the usual beaded margin; two of the lines connecting the lozenge with the margin indented, two plain.

WILLIAM ASSHETON ESQ., Pl. II, FIG. 13.

The date of execution of these coins is ascertained by their resemblance to the more common type of those of Ceolwulf II, king of Mercia, A. D. 874. The busts differ on all, but some, especially 13 and 15, are close imitations of those on the coins of the Roman emperors, and the diadem on all is clearly of Roman origin. There is a marked difference in workmanship between those which read REX SAXONUM and those which read simply REX. The former were probably minted in Alfred's paternal dominions of Wessex.

The following are all the names of moneyers which occur on coins of this type:

Before I proceed to notice the coins of Alfred which come next in succession, I must draw the attention of my readers to two coins which are not indeed English, but are the evidence of the former existence of English coins of the same type, and hold out to us the expectation of such being discovered at some future time. In my Essay on the coins of East Anglia, I have noticed

coins of two princes, Ethelred and Oswald, on which we are presented with a type originally French, but adopted by them, the front or portico of a type, and here we have two other coins of the same type which are evidently blundered imitations of the coins of English Kings.

AELRF... REX

+ QVENTOVVICI
EDENATREX

+ QVENTOVVCI

}

Front of a temple.

A cross with a pellet in each angle.

Same types.

BRITISH MUSEUM. PL. VII, FIG. 1 and 2.

This place Quentowic is already notorious for blundered imitations of the coins of Cnut or Canute struck in England at Ebraice and Cunnetti, (for all the coins with the name of this mint found at Cuerdale and elsewhere, were clearly blundered; not one of them presenting anything like a correct legend on their obverse ;) and here we have from the same place two other blundered imitations of coins of Alfred and of Ethelstan: for I think there can be no doubt that the obverse legends of these coins are intended for AELFRED REX, and EDELSTAN REX, respectively. It would appear probable, that the Northmen, when they went to France, carried with them English money, and during their occupation of Quentowic, employed ignorant moneyers to strike coins in imitation of them. It is to be observed that in genuine French coins of this type, the legend on the temple face of the coins is always XPISTIANA RELIGIO, or the name of the place of mintage. Only on these blundered coins, and on those undoubtedly English coins above referred to, do we find that type used as an obverse accompanying the name and title of the king. I consider it, then, extremely probable that future discoveries of coins, lost or concealed about the year 880, may make known to us genuine pieces of this type, both of Alfred and of Ethelstan, and for this reason I give these two pieces a place in the accompanying plates of Alfred's coins.

Mr Assheton's beautiful and unique penny of Ceolwulf II of Mercia, figured in Mr Hawkins's account of the Cuerdale coins, leads me to place next in succession the following coin, and then the London coins, between which and the penny of Ceolwulf it is, as it were, a connecting link.

24. DENI JA XRX + Victory hovering over two emperors

seated, a device copied from the coins of Valentinian and others of the lower empire. LONDONIA

in monogram.

ANDREW MOORE ESQ. M. D. PL. VII, FIG. 3.

I do not myself consider this to be a coin of Alfred. On the contrary I prefer reading the obverse legend ALF DENE XRX+, which is precisely the reading on the obverse of a half-penny found with this at Cuerdale, and assigning it to Halfdene I, whose dominions were properly Northumbria, but who, in common with the other sea-kings, ravaged the whole island. Whether, however, it be considered to be of Alfred or of Alfdene, it answers the same end, of serving as a connecting link between the coin of Ceolwulf and those which follow, of London. Of these, upwards of fifty specimens are now known, the principal varieties of which will be found in Plate III. All have on the obverse the bust of the king, generally turned to the right, but in three instances to the left, and on the reverse the monogram of LONDON.

It is not improbable that this coin may have been minted by the authority of Ethelred, the brother of Alfred, who appointed him to the government of London. The obverse legend is more like his name than that of Alfred: still it is but a blundered specimen.

The last five are half-pennies, all that are known of this class of Alfred's coins, and the earliest specimens that have occurred in the English series of this denomination of money. Nos. 36 and 37 were found at different times amongst gravel dredged from the bed of the Thames, 38 and 39 in the Cuerdale hoard, and 40 was for many years prior to that discovery in Mr Sheppard's collection. The two following, although they do not bear the name of Alfred, or of any other king, are of the same class and date as the foregoing. 41.

EROT BOLT

Bust to the right, of very different

I know not how to explain the legend on 41; it is probably the name of a moneyer blundered. There is a coin, in the British Museum, similar to 42, but with a beardless bust and a blundered legend EREENER on the obverse: (Ruding, Pl. 15, FIG. 9). These are the earliest coins known from the mint of Lincoln. The date of the London coins I am inclined to fix almost immediately after the rebuilding of that city by Alfred in 881. It had been destroyed by the Danes nine years previously. There is another class of these coins much rarer than the above, which present the moneyer's name on their reverses. ÆLFRED REX Bust to the right. TILEVINE MONETA. The usual monogram.

43.