Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector 1653-1658, AV Broad, 1656, by T. Simon. Laureate head left, rev. crowned arms, edge: milled. 9.06 g. Lessen A2; N.2744; S.3225. Richly toned and with considerable brilliance. A well struck EF. Rare. NGC MS 61 (805348-011) Ex Spink 190, 27 September 2007, lot 597; Sotheby, 24 March 1988, lot 651. Thomas Simon's gold Broad bearing the portrait of Oliver Cromwell represents, in the words of C. H. V. Sutherland, ‘a supreme example of English monetary art.’ Produced during the Protectorate at a time when the constitutional future of England remained uncertain, it belongs to the innovative milled coinage commissioned in 1656 to be struck from Simon's dies on the machinery of Pierre Blondeau. Sutherland praised Simon's technique in characteristically eloquent terms: ‘Low relief is combined with wonderfully sensitive modelling: engraving is of the finest and most delicate: the lettering is of classic strength and simplicity: and the use of ornament shows the utmost taste in the splendid economy. How much better to discipline abundance in design than to banish, as the standard Commonwealth coinage banished, even the very thought of aesthetic complexity!’ The baroque elements, most noticeably the laurel wreath, ‘detract in no slightest degree from the primary purpose of the artist in creating the complete humanity of a fully naturalistic portrait.’