1/8 Birr - Haile Selassie I Pattern

This 1929 pattern was struck in anticipation of a coinage reform tied directly to Haile Selassie's consolidation of power — he had been regent since 1916 but was manoeuvring toward the throne he would formally claim in 1930. Pattern issues from this transitional period are poorly documented in Ethiopian numismatic literature, and surviving examples surface rarely enough that die relationships between denominations remain incompletely mapped.