Rare coin collection sells for £2million - check if you're sitting on a mint
One man has made a nearly whopping £2million by selling his rare old coin collection.
Robert Puddester accumulated a collection of 1,246 old coins relating to the British East India Company over the course of 45 years.
The avid collector made the decision to sell his collection with London-based auctioneers Noonans Mayfair and the stash of coins sold for a monumental price of £1.57 million - totalling £1.95m with fees.
Peter Preston-Morley, who is a special projects manager and associate director at Noonans, helped Mr Puddester amass his collection and described it as being the "finest and most complete" group of coins relating to the East India Company and British India ever assembled.
Robert sold a rare 1770 Bombay gold 15 rupees coin for just under £100,000 and was one of only four known examples (Noonans/BNPS)Robert's collection grew over the course of five decades but said he really "struck the gold mine" when he was posted to work in India in 1983.
'Britain's flattest house' now up for auction for £70,000
His work in the country helped him meet the right contacts and dealers who aided his collection growth and his wife Norma Puddester also lent a hand and focused on Sikh coinage.
The East India Company coins were sold in 905 lots and covered coins from the inception of the East India Company in London in 1600, from the Madras, Bombay and Bengal presidencies and the regal coinages issued by British India down to independence from Britain in 1947.
Robert's top selling lots were a Bombay half-mohur from 1765 which sold for £117,800 and a 1765 Bombay gold mohur which sold for £99,200.
A rare 1770 Bombay gold 15 rupees also sold for just under £100,000 and was one of only four known examples.
The East India Company was a British trade company which became one of the largest and most powerful monopolies in the world for nearly two hundred years.
Historians and economists have studied the era of the company as its influence as a ruthless corporate pioneer has shaped the way modern business is conducted in a global economy.
Peter noted that the auction of Robert's collection was itself a historical event due to the contents which were sold and the nature of the sale.
He said: "This is the first of a historic series of auctions that will be referenced in their own right for decades to come
"This is the most spectacular sale of its kind that has ever been held.
"Those who acquire Puddester coins will own pieces to be rightly proud of, in the knowledge that they rank among the finest, if not the best known.
'Britain's shortest house' standing at just two metres tall on sale for £70,000
"Many pieces in this collection only appear in the marketplace once in a generation, if that."
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