British Trade Dollar 1900 (Unique Year with 5 Varieties)

It is a pleasure to collect British Trade Dollar 1900. It takes a long time to complete a set of 5 varieties.
Some of the variants are very rare and considered as error coins.
There is a total of 9,106,619 british trade dollar minted for year 1900.
There is a subquoted amount of 363,372 coins minted for 1900 No B No C Variety, which is very rare.
Please click here for full BTD mintage table.


Variety 1: British trade dollar 1900 B
This is the Bombay mint coin. The commonest and usual type.
The B mint mark can be seen at the trident prong area.

The commonest variant with B at the center of the prong

The reverse of all the BTD are soimilar

Variety 2: British Trade Dollar 1900 C
For year 1900,1901 and 1902 British trade dollar minted from Calcutta.
There is a C mint mark at the space next to the outer side of the Brittania left leg and the shield.
This C mint mark indicates the Calcutta mint.
The usual trident prong area is flat and no mint mark.

This VF coins has the C mint mark preserved.
1900C has the highers value, followed by 1902C and then 1901C

The C mint mark is easily worn off as well after moderate circulation. The flat trident prong area may be the indication left for this type of coin.

Variety 3: British Trade Dollar 1900 No B No C
This variety recorded a quoted amount of 363,372 and is among the rarest.
This is difficult to find.
It is believed to be from Bombay mint, however the die containing the mint mark has worn off.
Hence it produced a special type (error variant) where the B mint mark is not seen at the trident prong.
The whole mint mark area at the prong is empty within. Left with a diamond shaped rim.
It is not C mint coin as well as the trident prong area is not flat and there is no C mark at the side of Britannia.

This fairly high grade coin has the usual diamond shaped at the prong
But the B is missing.
It is also different from 1900C where the prong is area is flat

One word of caution in getting this type of coins is the collector must get a fairly high grade coin in order to appreciate the empty mint mark area. Many 1900B with fair amount of circulation might have the B mint mark wearing off and give an impression of a 1900 No B No C mint mark coin.

As in this coin... is the B worn out or it is a no B no C variant.

Variety 4: British Trade Dollar 1900 over 1890 Overdate Variety
Year 1900 is at the turn of the century and this produced an unique overdate coins where 3 characters are changed on the original die.
This overdate variety is one of the rarest to find.
The overdates is not easy to identify and takes a bit of effort to make up.

The  overdates are not meant to be seen clearly.They are retooled to the current year date which is 1900. The 1890 at the background is the erased shadow.
Generally for the 1900/890 coin, the 9 over 8 is clearer to be seen. meanwhile the 0 over the 9 is very faint, but you can see the 9 tail shadow on the background.

The 8 shadow is seen behind the 9.
The original 9 shadow is behind the 0 (look for the tail of the 9)

Another intriguing thing of this overdate coin is 1890 coin does not exist.

Variety 5: British Trade Dollar 1900 over 1900 (based on KN Boon catalogue) or it also known as 1900 over 1000 (NGC census)  
This coin is also very rare variety.
It is probably a retooled die where the original die has worned out and the engraver recrafted the dates.
The coin showed a double shadow of 1900.
This coin is very difficult to find in the market,

There is shadows over the 9 and the 2 zeros.

End...
Hope you enjoy this post as much as I writing on it.