The Sovereign: A brief history
The first Sovereign was struck in 1489 under the reign of King Henry VII. Following the turbulent Wars of the Roses, Henry VII sought to cement his authority and the legitimacy of the Tudor dynasty.
He commissioned a magnificent new gold coin, the largest ever seen in England, as a powerful statement of stability and wealth.
Named the " Sovereign”, the coin was a masterpiece of its time. The obverse featured a grand portrait of the King enthroned in full coronation regalia, holding his orb and sceptre. The reverse depicted the Tudor rose with the royal arms at its centre. Weighing half a troy ounce and valued at one pound sterling( 20 shillings), this was not a coin for daily transactions. It was a tool of state, used for international payments and presentations to foreign dignitaries.
Successive Tudor monarchs, including Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, continued to issue their own versions of the Sovereign, each reflecting their own style and reinforcing the power of the Crown.
THE HIATUS AND REBIRTH OF THE SOVEREIGN
After the reign of James I, who renamed the coin the " Unite " to symbolise the union of the English and Scottish crowns, the original Sovereign disappeared from circulation for nearly 200 years.