‘When Queen Elizabeth II came to the throne, no gold coins were issued at the beginning of her reign, breaking a tradition of more than 600 years going back to the reign of Edward III. As Britain struggled to rebuild its economy after the Second World War, there were restrictions on the amount of gold that could be held by the public, with the result that commemorative sets of coins for the Coronation did not include any gold coins: the highest value coin in the set that went on sale to the public was the crown, worth five shillings and made of cupro-nickel.

A small number of sets of gold coins dated 1953 were, however, especially struck to mark the event. They were presented to the Royal Family, to national collections and to Goldsmith’s Hall, but are seldom seen by the public; it is believed that ten sets were produced in total. The set consists of four coins, a £5, £2, sovereign (£1) and half-sovereign. The portrait on the obverse, designed by Mary Gillick, is the same as on the cupro-nickel and bronze coins. The coins depict the young Queen wearing a laurel wreath, in imitation of the style of busts of Roman emperors, a tradition which goes back to the time of Oliver Cromwell in the mid-seventeenth century: this custom was abandoned for much of the nineteenth century but was reintroduced for the first coinage of The Queen. The traditional design of St George and the dragon, which has appeared on gold sovereigns since 1817, was repeated on the reverses.’ Cheek, p. 114