Edinburgh £1 (2011)

Its scarcity means even a worn Edinburgh £1 sells above face value, and it carries the biggest premium of the capital cities coins. Condition then separates one coin from another: soft detail on the castle and rock pulls a coin down, while brilliant uncirculated coins from the 2011 pack shared with Cardiff, and proofs, sit at the top. A silver piedfort version was also made for collectors.

With 935,000 struck for circulation, the Edinburgh £1 is the rarest of the 26 ranked £1 designs and has the 38th lowest mintage of all 194 circulating UK designs. That puts it in the Rare band, for mintages 500,000 to 999,999.

No £1 design has a lower circulation mintage. The next more common is the Cardiff £1, with 1,615,000 struck.

On the Edinburgh £1 coin a castle fills the main circle: three flag-topped towers on a craggy rock, with EDINBURGH above. A small castle also appears in a roundel on the other three city coins, so make sure it fills the large circle. The edge should read NISI DOMINUS FRUSTRA without a mint mark, and the portrait side should be dated 2011. Fakes of round pounds often had the two sides out of line, so both designs should stand upright when you turn the coin over left to right.

Edinburgh was one of the last two capital cities designs, issued in 2011 alongside Cardiff to complete the set begun by London and Belfast. Stuart Devlin, the goldsmith behind all four, built each coin around one city's arms, set large in a central circle, with the other three capitals shown in small roundels below. Devlin died in 2018, the year after the round pound left circulation. Edinburgh's arms were registered with the Lord Lyon King of Arms in the 1730s after centuries of unofficial use, and their centrepiece is a heraldic castle standing for Edinburgh Castle. On the coin the castle has three towers, each flying a pennant, and rises from a rugged rock with a stepped path climbing to its gate. EDINBURGH arches across the top, while ONE and POUND run down the sides. The roundels beneath hold the London cross, the Cardiff dragon and the Belfast ship. The edge carries NISI DOMINUS FRUSTRA, the city motto, a Latin line from the Psalms meaning 'in vain without the Lord'.

In the capital city set it was issued in 2011 together with the Cardiff £1.