102526 | NETHERLANDS. Amsterdam. Master Surgeon's Guild cast brass Token.

102526  |  NETHERLANDS. Amsterdam. Master Surgeon's Guild cast brass Toegangspenning (Admission Token). Issued 1654, and used for admission to the medicinal garden (botanic gardens) by physicians, surgeons, master pharmacists, and their students (44mm, 27.31 g, 12h).

 

Skeleton (Grim Reaper) standing facing, holding scythe and resting hand upon hourglass on base to right; flowers at feet // Civic coat-of-arms of Amsterdam; below, field left blank for engraving; all set upon decorative cartouche, with skull at the bottom. Edge: A few light marks as made, otherwise plain.

 

Cf. Storer 3865 (for an engraved example); Brettauer 5201; Neumann 35244; Koning p. 46, 6.2; Dirks I.5.7. Choice Very Fine. Red-brown surfaces. A rare and interesting medicina in nummis type. Compare to a similar example (also unengraved) that realized a total of $2,640 in the Stack's Bowers October 2021 CCO (lot 72539).

 

The obverse of this type—featuring a figure of Death along with an hourglass—is an allusion to the transient nature of life and, as such, a memento mori. It was used in Amsterdam as a token of one's membership into the guild of surgeons. Meanwhile, the reverse refers to the city herself, which was home to a medicinal garden—the so-called hortus medicus—which housed various flora that could be used medicinally. Following the fallout of the plagues that had gripped Europe, along with portions of the rest of the world, the understanding and cultivation of plant-based remedies began to take form, with this garden serving in that role. The bearer of such a token would also have access to these grounds to make use of the plants grown.

 

Upload: 19 October 2026.