*** Harrogate Spring Coin Fair Lecture ***

Saturday 23rd March, 11:30am, Harrogate


Megan Gooch - Testing your Metal: Assaying in the Tudor Mint 



The Tudor Mint was a dangerous place to work, especially if you were involved in assaying, where precious metals were melted and tested for purity. Assayers risked arsenic poisoning, blindness and mysterious sleeping sicknesses in the service of monarchs who were determined to vary the precious metal content of their coins for their own ends. In the light of recent excavations in the Tower of London, the lives and work of these men can be illuminated, and this talk will focus on how and where their activities took place in the Tudor mint. 


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