50 Pence - Elizabeth II The March Hare, Silver Proof

The Isle of Man Treasury has long operated outside the constraints of Royal Mint conservatism, issuing commemorative coinage with a frequency and thematic range unusual for a jurisdiction its size. This piece belongs to a series marking the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass, published in 1871 — the sequel in which the March Hare reappears, having migrated from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland six years earlier. Carroll set the original Mad Hatter's tea party in an eternal 6 o'clock, a detail rooted in the Victorian superstition that hatters went mad from mercury used in felt curing.