Geneve, Exercises de l’Arquebuse et de la Navigation. Please note that the mintage in Richter for 680a in incorrect. There were 46 silver and 142 BR pieces minted not 5 & 5 as stated by Richter. This makes R683 substantially more rare than 680.
Although I have collected Schützenfest medals, pokal, bechers, and memorabilia since 1980, my Father has immensely more knowledge than I and thus I asked him to elaborate more about the mintage figures of R680.
Below is his response about the mintage figures in the Richter and Martin catalogs –
I started collecting Swiss shooting medals in 1963. In 1986, after accumulating many duplicates I initiated a modest mail order business involved of these medals.
In 1994 I had a silver and bronze of the 1893 (M376) in my collection and had additionally sold three of each to various customers, but had sold only one M377 dated 1893. This noted discrepancy strongly suggested that Martin’s mintage figures of 5 silver and 5 bronze for the 1893 M376….and 51 silver and 146 bronze for the 1893 M377 is in error.
A review of the Revue Suisse de Numismatique for 1893, pp. 201-202 lists the COMBINED mintage of M376 and M377 that was distributed in 1893 to be 51 silver and 146 bronze, with 3 WM medals being given to members of the Commission.
Richter (2005) and Dr. Paul Stroehlin (Annuaire Numismatique, 1894) both publish figures for M377 (R681) minted in 1893 to be 5 silver and 4 bronze. Referring to the combined mintage (RSN: 51 silver and 146 bronze) of both medals in 1893 and subtracting the mintage figures for M377 from the combined total, the remainder is the corrected mintage of M376 in 1893 of 46 silver and 142 bronze.
Since the above study conducted in 1994 I have handled several additional 1893, M376 medals, but very few of the M377 medals.
Further study of the RSN and Stroehlin have added interesting substantiation of my conclusions.
Well now; that IS an interesting discovery. I’m sure that the one or two collectors who thought themselves extremely lucky and elated having followed Ritcher’s and Stroehlin’s estimate of 5 silver and 5 bronze medals and now having paid an astronomical price for the thrill of owning one, or possibly one of each, have now discovered that what they own is not so rare after all. I would be very interested to read what our experts say as to what one of each would have been valued at prior to this recent news, compared with what those medals would now bring based on the number now recently discovered.
The above comments are not to be taken as an attack on an unsuspecting seller of either medals in recent times but purely to seek an opinion, as obviously Ritcher had accepted Stroehlin’s estimate carte blanche.
I agree with your statement. I assume a few collectors have paid significantly for the medal based on the mintage of 5 figures. One would find the mintage figures of 5 to be hard to believe since my Father has handled more than that figure during his collecting tenure…
I would also assume that many collectors will not necessarily believe my Father’s conclusion regardless of the substantiation. One reason is because it would likely lower the value of the medal(s) and the second reason being that many people merely beleive what is written regardless of the possibility of inaccuracy.
Over the years, accepted or not, my Father and I have provided information that we have learned over our many years of collecting that differs from what Martin and/or Richter state in their respective catalogs. Basically it seems as though because the other collector sees it in a published book means it cannot be wrong regardless of the amount of information we can add to our conclusions. I understand why many would feel this way but I would also think that a true collector would understand that all authors cannot be 100% correct due to mistakes, lack of documentation, etc.