Medals Are in Fashion: Review of Künker’s eLive Premium Auction 401

By now, everybody in the coin trade knows that you do not need a public auction with on-site bidders to realize phenomenal results. All you need is a potent and easy-to-manage online platform as well as enthusiastic coin collectors from around the world. They will make sure prices go up from their computers at home. Therefore, Künker’s eLive Premium Auctions with printed catalogs and online sales have established themselves as the ideal form to auction off exciting collections that are worth of being documented for posterity. Künker’s eLive Premium Auction 401 with the last part of a private collection from Westphalia with “multiple portraits” illustrates how much interest there is currently in medals of historical significance.

In this review, we will only introduce the three lots that realized the highest hammer prices. However, it is worthwhile to take a look at the results for yourself. You will see the high prices that are being fetched in this section right now, although there were also interesting pieces that sold for low three-digit sums. Therefore, it did not come as a surprise that the total estimate of 237,000 euros soared to a total hammer price of 800,000 euros.

Top 3:

No. 1330. Serbia. Alexander I, 1889-1902. 1900 silver medal by A. Scharff celebrating his wedding with Draga Mašin. Very rare. Frosted. Almost mint state. Estimate: 250 euros. Hammer price: 6,500 euros.

It was a great surprise when a very rare medal of the Serbian King Alexander I, which would not seem not particularly remarkable to an outsider, jumped from an estimated of 250 euros to a hammer price of 6,500 euros. Only insiders knew about the historical significance of this perfectly preserved piece: it bears witness to the Serbian king’s marriage to a scandalous commoner named Draga Mašin.

Draga was a widow and was said to have led a dissolute life in Paris and Vienna. Malicious gossip even suggested that she had murdered her first husband and liked to prostitute herself. The truth was probably much less scandalous; in any case, the Serbian ruler met his future wife during a visit to his exiled mother in Biarritz, where Draga Mašin was serving as lady-in-waiting.

The news of their marriage was not well received, especially by military officers in Serbia. Less than three years later, it resulted in a coup d’état. The king and queen of Serbia were murdered and their mutilated bodies thrown out of the window of the palace in Belgrade. The coup was led by a man called Dragutin Dimitrijević, who was also allegedly involved in the Sarajevo assassination on 28 June 1914. In June 1917, a Serbian military court had him executed. The court’s verdict was overturned by the Serbian Supreme Court in 1953, during Yugoslavia’s communist era. The fate of Alexander I, Draga Mašin and Dragutin Dimitrijević is still the subject of public debate in Serbia today.

By the way, there was another lot that fetched a hammer price of 6,500 euros – a gilded silver medal of the Franconian Circle, minted between 1623 and 1625. It depicts the portraits and coats of arms of the prince-bishops of Bamberg and Würzburg as well as that of the two Brandenburg margraves. With an estimate of 500 euros, its increase was a little less pronounced than that of the Serbian medal. Therefore it only came 4th in our ranking.

Top 2:

No. 1333. Spain. Felipe II, 1556-1598. Silver cast medal n.d. (around 1557) after J. Jonghelinkck. Contemporary cast. About extremely fine. Estimate: 250 euros. Hammer price: 8,500 euros.

In second place of this auction we have a beautiful late Renaissance medal, depicting on one side the old Emperor Charles V, who abdicated in 1556. The reverse shows his son, young Felipe II, King of Spain. The medal is a contemporary cast and was used as a diplomatic gift for high dignitaries. The medal’s price jumped from 250 euros to 8,500 euros.

Top 1:

No. 1082. France, Louis Philippe, 1830-1848. 1833 silver medal by J. J. Barre commemorating the royal family visiting the French mint. Very rare original striking. Extremely fine +. Estimate: 1,500 euros. Hammer price: 8,750 euros.

A 19th-century work of minting art – there is no other way to describe this medal, created by the royal mint of France to celebrate the visit of its still new sovereign in 1833. With its incredibly high relief, meticulous detail and exuberant historicist style, this medal is a unique numismatic testimony to Citizen King Louis Philippe and all that was built under his rule. We only have to think of the Dôme des Invalides and Les Halles, the “belly” of Paris.

With a diameter of 75.11 mm and a weight of 202.24 g, this magnificent medal had been estimated at 1,500 euros and sold for 8,750 euros, making it the most expensive lot in the entire sale.