Catalog
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| Issuer | Cook Islands |
|---|---|
| Year | 2011 |
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| Engraver(s) | Ian Rank-Broadley |
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| Obverse description | The fourth and definitive effigy of Queen Elizabeth II, modelled by Ian Rank-Broadley, depicted as a right-facing draped bust wearing the Girls of Great Britain and Ireland tiara. The engraver's initials IRB appear below the truncation. The legend ELIZABETH II arcs along the left field, COOK ISLANDS along the right, and the date 2011 is inscribed at the bottom of the field. |
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| Obverse lettering | ELIZABETH II COOK ISLANDS 2011 |
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| Additional information |
The Black Swan was a Spanish merchant vessel lost off the coast of Portugal in 1804, carrying an enormous cargo of silver and gold coins from the Americas. Odyssey Marine Exploration located the wreck in 2007 and recovered approximately 594,000 coins — triggering an international legal dispute between the United States, Spain, and Peru that ran until 2012, when a U.S. appeals court ruled the entire hoard must be returned to Spain.
Cook Islands issued this piece while that litigation was still unresolved, incorporating genuine recovered coins from the wreck into some versions of the series.