Royal Mint Museum buys rare shilling of Henry VII for record £52,800

A rare English shilling of Henry VII has been bought for a record £52,800 by the Royal Mint Museum.

The shilling, which bears a clear portrait of the first Tudor monarch and is dated from 1502, sold for the whopping sum when it was auctioned by Morton & Eden in London – beating the previous 2015 record of £38,400.

The coin, which when first introduced was known as the testoon, was bought by London coin dealer Christopher Eimer, on behalf of the Royal Mint Museum based in Llantrisant, South Wales.

Previously it had been in the collection of Dr John Sharp, who served as Archbishop of York from 1691 until his death in 1714 and was one of the great British coin collectors of the 17th century.

The Archbishop Sharp collection, which included some of the rarest and most classic examples of early British coinage made a total of £700,890.

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The same sale included a Bank of England £5 note, engraved with a 5mm portrait of novelist Jane Austen and a quote from Pride And Prejudice, by micro-artist Graham Short, which sold for £6,000.

Funds raised by the auction are going towards causes supported by BBC Children In Need.