The Diamond Jubilee year generated a flood of commemorative issues across Commonwealth mints, but Australia's contribution carried a specific institutional weight: 2012 marked sixty years since Elizabeth II's accession following the death of George VI in February 1952, and the Royal Australian Mint had been striking her effigy since its opening year of 1966. The fourth portrait, sculpted by Ian Rank-Broadley and adopted by Australian coinage in 1999, appears here in its final years before the fifth portrait by Jody Clark displaced it from 2019.
The Diamond Jubilee year generated a flood of commemorative issues across Commonwealth mints, but Australia's contribution carried a specific institutional weight: 2012 marked sixty years since Elizabeth II's accession following the death of George VI in February 1952, and the Royal Australian Mint had been striking her effigy since its opening year of 1966. The fourth portrait, sculpted by Ian Rank-Broadley and adopted by Australian coinage in 1999, appears here in its final years before the fifth portrait by Jody Clark displaced it from 2019.