Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
1/4 Werk - Menelik II
| Issuer | Ethiopia |
|---|---|
| Year | 1897 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 1.75 g |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | The Lion of Judah passant left in the centre of the field, wearing an imperial crown atop its head and raising its right forepaw to hold an upright cross-staff entwined with a ribbon or sash. The image is a powerful dynastic emblem of the Ethiopian Empire. A circular Ge'ez legend runs around the periphery within a beaded border, and the denomination legend appears in the lower exergue below a horizontal line. |
| Reverse script | Ge'ez (Ethiopic) |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
Menelik II ordered this coinage in 1897 — the same year Ethiopian forces crushed the Italian army at Adwa, the first decisive defeat of a European colonial power by an African nation in the modern era. The timing was deliberate. A gold coinage on European metrology was a statement of sovereign financial credibility directed squarely at the colonial powers then carving up the continent.
The coins were struck at the Paris Mint under contract, as Ethiopia had no domestic minting capability at the time.