1 Farthing - Robert I

Robert I secured papal recognition of Scottish independence in 1328, the year before his death, but his coinage program had been running for much of his reign under persistent wartime conditions. The farthing — a quarter penny — was the smallest denomination struck, and surviving examples at 9 mm are genuinely tiny even by medieval standards. Scotland's mint infrastructure during this period was fragile; output was limited, and attrition through loss and melt was high.

Spink 5078 is among the rarer Bruce issues precisely because farthings circulated hard in small transactions and few were preserved intentionally.