5 Ducats - Aureus Magnus Egypt, Nefertiti, Type 2

The "Aureus Magnus" series was a private gold issue produced in West Germany during the late 1950s, marketed as collector medallions rather than legal tender — a distinction that mattered enormously under postwar Allied currency controls still unwinding in the Federal Republic. The Nefertiti pieces drew directly on the fame of the 1912 Amarna excavation, when Ludwig Borchardt's Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft dig at Tell el-Amarna uncovered the painted limestone bust now held in Berlin's Neues Museum.

Type 2 differs from Type 1 in relief depth and legend spacing — a detail obsessively tracked by German medallic collectors but largely ignored in international auction records.