10 Euros - Coin of History D'Artagnan

Part of the Monnaie de Paris' ongoing "Coins of History" series, this issue commemorates Alexandre Dumas' fictional musketeer D'Artagnan — a character loosely based on Charles de Batz-Castelmore d'Artagnan, a real Gascon officer who rose to captain of the Musketeers of the Guard under Louis XIV and died at the Siege of Maastricht in 1673. Dumas borrowed the name and little else, constructing his hero largely from a 1700 memoir by Gatien de Courtilz de Sandras that was itself semi-fictional.

The .333 silver alloy places this firmly in the billon category — a composition the Monnaie de Paris uses for lower-tier collector issues in this series, distinguishing them from the accompanying fine silver and gold strikes produced in the same release.