Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
2 Centimes - Léopold II
| Issuer | Congo Free State (1885-1908) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1887-1888 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 4 g |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | * LEOP.II R. D. BELGES SOUV. DE L'ETAT INDEP.DU CONGO |
| Reverse description | Log in to see details |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | 1887 - (fr) 99,000 ont été refondues - 125,000 1888 - 99,000 pieces were melted - |
| Additional information |
The Congo Free State was not a colony in any conventional sense — it was the private property of Léopold II, held under the legal fiction of a humanitarian mission and recognised by the major powers at the Berlin Conference of 1885. These copper centimes were among the first coins struck for what was, in effect, one man's personal African territory. The Brussels mint produced them, though for years much of the economy ran on force and rubber quotas rather than coin.
By 1908, international outcry over atrocities forced Léopold to cede the territory to the Belgian state — making this entire coinage series one of history's shorter-lived monetary experiments.