250 Rupees 'Dodo' Gold Bullion

Issued to mark the 20th anniversary of Mauritian independence, this coin arrives at an awkward moment in the dodo's historiography — by 1988, serious ornithological debate was still ongoing about whether the bird had gone extinct as early as the 1660s or survived into the 1690s. The most recent credible sighting accepted by scholars dates to 1662, recorded by Volkert Evertsz following a Dutch shipwreck on a small offshore islet.

The .917 fineness places this squarely in the crown gold tradition rather than the finer bullion standard, a deliberate nod to the island's British monetary heritage.