1897 Swedish 2-kronor

[villa66]

Sweden’s first SMU commemorative—its first decimal commemorative—was this 1897 2-kronor struck in memory of the Silver Jubilee of “Oscar II, King of Sweden, Norway, Gothland and Vendalia.”

The Coronation of Oscar II had occurred in 1873, at Stockholm, and the King appears on this 2-kronor (struck in the same 15 grams of .800 fine silver as the regular issue SMU 2-unit coins) fully bedecked in his ceremonial finery, with the Crown, the Orb, and the Sceptre of Eric XIV, all crafted in 1561 for Swedish coronations.

About the time the Stockholm mint struck this coin—which is still legal tender in Sweden—Gilson Willets wrote flatteringly of Oscar II in his 1899 book Rulers of the World at Home: “King Oscar II of Norway and Sweden is one of the most scholarly men of his time, an accomplished orator and an author of world-wide fame. He is a linguist who has English, French, German, Italian, Russian and Spanish at his command, besides the Swedish and Norwegian tongues...[King Oscar II] can walk abroad in perfect safety without an escort—a thing which no other European monarch dare do. In Winter time he skates alone; that is, without attendants to watch over him....”

v.

[Mynter]

Again , a nice specimen you are displaying. On the swedish coins, Oscar is aging , while in Norway his effigy was not changed for the entire mintingperiod. The codominian between the two " brothernations " was most unpolular in Norway, wich in 1814 was rendered from Denmark to Sweden like another plot of land. ( Though after a short summer of Independece wich pushed the country from the dark ages into a time in some aspects even ahead of its own at those days. ). When in 1905 the norwegian parliament unilateraly declared the union for dissolved ,after Sweden had denied Norway to fly a true norwegian flag without the union mark on her consulary stations , the sabres almout rattled between the two brothers, and Oscar declared that never would a swedish prince accept the norwegian crown again.

But I find it funny to mention that even the start of Oscar being king of Norway did not work too well, at least from a numismatic point of view. Especially for the new kings first visit to Norway a set of the new speciedaler and half speciedaler was to be struck. But the dies for the daler never got finished , and the dies for the half sp. cracked very soon, so only about 5000 speciemens where issued. An issue which today is very rare even in a low grade, the coins continued to circulate as 2 kroner and where consumed in daily use.