James Perera Jayatilleka
1876 - Colombo, 19 cents

Token issued in 1876 which was struck in England for Mr. James Perera Jayatilleka, who had a store in Dam Street, Colombo, and retired in 1880.

SPECIFICATIONS
Denomination19 cents
AlloyBrass
Diameter24.5 mm
Thickness1.5 mm
Weight4.38 gms
ShapeRound
EdgeGrained
DieAxis
1876_jpj_19c_obverse 1876_jpj_19c_reverse
Lowsley #12 Pridmore #46 Mitchiner #2239

Obverse : COLOMBO
*
between plain circles around JPJ at center, within a beaded circle inside raised rim.
Reverse : CENTS
*
between plain circles around 19 at center, within a beaded circle inside raised rim.

This very neat copper 19 cents token represented the usual price paid for picking half a bag of clean coffee.
4½D converts to 18¾ cents at the legal 50 cents per shilling rate adopted for Decimal currency in 1870. 18½ or 19 Cents have been used on Ceylon Coffee Tokens.

Reference
* Coins and Tokens of Ceylon, Lieut. Col B. Lowsley, Num. Chron. Sr III Vol. XV, 1895.
* The Coins of British Commonwealth of Nations to the end of the reign of George VI 1952 Part 2 - Asian Territories by F. Pridmore Spink & Son Ltd., 1965.
* Oriental Coins CE 600 - 1979 by Michael Mitchiner 1979

The choice Uncirculated token was scanned at 300dpi and the images are displayed at 250dpi.
It was purchased in 2002 May from a dealer in USA.