Kings of Wessex Alfred the Great Silver Penny 871-899AD Hereferth

Kings of Wessex Alfred the Great Silver Penny 871-899AD Hereferth

Good metal and a clear legend reading ‘ELFRED REX’. Struck by the moneyer HEREFERTH.

19x20mm, 1.56g

This coin comes with several old tickets. Sold by Seaby coins in 1926 and from the Dr Gantz Cassel collection.

The stuff of legends, a contemporary penny of king Alfred The Great.

Alfred was the youngest son of Aethelwulf and succeeded his brother Aethelred I as king of the southern Saxon kingdom of Wessex in 871AD. He is the only English born monarch to be known as ‘the great’, his achievements covering social and educational reforms as well as military successes.

Following a series of battles, culminating in that at Edington in 878AD, where Alfred defeated the Danes, a treaty was negotiated. England was then divided, between the north and east (between the River Thames and Tees) the north was declared to be Danish territory – later known as the ‘Danelaw’ and Alfred subsequently gained control of areas of West Mercia and Kent which had previously been beyond the boundaries of Wessex.