10 Pa'anga - Taufa'ahau Tupou IV Boxing

Issued to mark Taufa'ahau Tupou IV's participation in the 1956 Melbourne Olympics as a heavyweight boxer — a fact that remains one of the more unusual biographical footnotes of any reigning monarch. He competed under his own name before ascending the throne, losing in the first round, but the episode was celebrated decades later as emblematic of his outsized personal ambitions.

The 1988 issue falls within Tonga's sustained numismatic program of the 1970s–90s, during which the Reserve Bank produced a steady stream of gold and silver commemoratives aimed squarely at the collector market rather than circulation.