Description
This year marks the 50th anniversary of decimal changeover – a momentous change to our coinage. At the time that change was made, many people put aside our vanishing predecimal coins – but precious few people thought to also put aside the VERY FIRST decimals! This set brings together all six of our decimals, each one of them the very first year of issue and all of them in uncirculated condition, and with them the newly issued 2021 50p coin with a decimal changeover design, in Brilliant Uncirculated condition.
All six decimals, first year of issue
Although decimal changeover was in 1971, some of our decimals had been released before this and circulated alongside the predecimals to enable people to become accustomed to them. This set includes all six coins for their FIRST year of issue
1/2p – 1971 (withdrawn from circulation in 1984)
1p – 1971 (still with us today but a different design of course)
2p – 1971 (ditto)
5p – 1968 (same size as the shilling, it circulated in predecimal days with that face value)
10p – 1968 (same size as the florin, it circulated in predecimal days with that value)
50p – 1969 (had no equivalent in predecimal days but was worth half a pound, so it circulated as ten shilling coin!)
Uncirculated quality
Those first decimals are now 50 years old (and older!) so getting them in tip-top condition can be tricky. We’ve brought together uncirculated coins for these sets.
The new British 2021 Fifty Pence coin
To mark this important anniversary of decimalisation a special commemorative design fifty pence was struck which features a design composed of segments of the outgoing predecimal coins. This is the version minted in Brilliant Uncirculated condition.
 Luxury presentation case
The coins are housed in protective capsules that will help to preserve their quality for the future, and the whole set is housed in a luxury presentation case with informative certificate of authenticity.
