Hey Friend

Wouldn't it be weird if you could cut a $2 coin in half, and the 2 halves would be worth a dollar each.

Seems kind of crazy now, but back in the early 1800s, that is kind of what happened!

England sent a bunch of Spanish dollars to Australia, and these Spanish coins were "converted" to Australian money.

Part of the process was to punch out the centre of the coins resulting in 2 coins. The outer part of the coin was called a "holey dollar" (because of the big hole in the middle). The middle chunk that was punched out was called a "dump". This was done deliberately so that the dump could be used as small change.

The Spanish coins were then re-stamped with New South Wales (Australia didn't exist back then), and these were the first legal coins in Australia.

They're also the only Australian money that can no longer legally be used as money (yes, Australian Pennies, Florins and 1 or 2 cent coins are technically still legal money!)

While these old coins are no longer considered money, they are actually some of the most valuable Australian coins a collector could have. And you can see some of them for yourself - there's a new exhibition starting in a few days at the Royal Australian Mint in Canberra.

These are 11 of the rarest coins, some only made public recently from private collectors - so it's rare to see these coins. Here is a link with more info if you happen to be in Canberra between August 16 and November...

Cheers

Damian

PS the full link for the exhibition is (sorry, it's kind of long):
https://coinworks.com.au/This-exhibition-is-the-most-important-and-valuable-display-of-Australia-s-first-minted-coins-ever-staged-The-venue-is-the-Royal-Australian-Mint-Canberra-the-event-organised-in-partnership-with-Melbourne-rare-coin-company-Coinworks~22137