½ Sovereign - William IV large type (1835–1837)

One row for each year the ½ Sovereign - William IV large type was struck. Prices are medians of verified sold listings matched to that year from the listing: circulated is worn condition up to Extremely Fine, uncirculated is About Uncirculated or better. A count in brackets means fewer than three sales behind the figure; a grey figure marked "type" is the median across every year, shown where that year has no sale of its own yet; years with no sales yet fill in as sales are recorded. Most types have been searched year by year only since October 2026, so later years are still filling in. Use the grade table below for a price by condition across all years.

About the 1835 Half Sovereign - William IV large type

The 1835 Half Sovereign - William IV large type is a circulating ½ sovereign coin issued from 1835 to 1837 in the Half Sovereign series, struck in 91.67% gold. It weighs 3.99g and measures 19.4mm across. Reverse design: Crowned shield of arms and mantle, legend and date below.

Mintage figures are recorded for 3 years between 1835 and 1837, 1,079,500 coins in all. 1836 is the scarcest date, with 146,800 struck. It is no longer legal tender (withdrawn 1891), so its value is to collectors only.

Common questions

History and design

The half sovereign returned to full size in 1835. The previous year's coin had been struck on a smaller flan to keep it apart from the sixpence, which was the same size and was gilded by fraudsters, but Clayton says the change was not popular and Wikipedia records that 120,000 of the small coins were recalled and melted. From 1835 to 1837 the coin was struck at its usual diameter of about 19.4 mm, with the weight and fineness unchanged.

Coin Hunter gives 772,554 for 1835, 146,865 for 1836 and 160,207 for 1837, a total of 1,079,626. Kenyon records all three dates, as well as 1834, in the British Museum by 1884. William IV died in June 1837 and Victoria's first half sovereigns are dated 1838.

The obverse is William Wyon's bare head of the king facing right, engraved after a bust by Francis Chantrey, with GULIELMUS IIII D: G: BRITANNIAR: REX F: D: (William IV, by the grace of God King of the Britains, Defender of the Faith). Wikipedia says the reverse, modelled and engraved by Jean Baptiste Merlen, is close to the later George IV half sovereigns: a crowned, garnished shield of the royal arms with the Hanoverian arms in the centre, and ANNO and the date below.

From this reign the sixpence carried its value in words, which Wikipedia links to the same problem of gilded sixpences passed as half sovereigns.

Varieties and errors

Some 1836 and 1837 coins carry a slightly different, larger portrait, apparently struck from obverse dies made for the sixpence. Wikipedia, citing Lobel, says this may have been an error by the Mint, and Clayton describes both dates of the variety as rare. Coin Hunter lists the 1836 coin as the obverse from a sixpence die. No separate mintage is recorded.

Collecting notes

On 1836 and 1837 coins, compare the portrait with a normal coin of the type: the sixpence-die head is larger in relation to the flan. The Royal Mint Museum's 1837 proof has a milled edge and weighs 3.98 g. The coin was followed by Victoria's Young Head half sovereign, which dropped the arms of Hanover.