| Description : On the 14th of July 1790, the first anniversary
of the storming of the Bastille, the Federation Festival was celebrated as an act of reconciliation and the unity of
all French people. Louis XVI (1754‐1793), King of France and Navarre, swore by the nation and the law (he was
deposed in 1792 during the French Revolution and beheaded by guillotine in 1793). In 1880, the 14th of July was
declared a bank holiday ‐ a day that unites all French people and celebrates the Republic. The coin motif shows the
profile of Marianne, national symbol of France, with a Jacobin cap and a circular badge worn on it with the
colours of the tricolour (from the inside out: Blue‐White‐Red, represented by a hatching ‐ albeit stylised
‐ according to the heraldic rules of tinging. On the left is a stanza from the poem Liberté by the French
poet Paul Éluard, written in 1942: "On all pages read / On all blank pages / Stone blood paper or ashes /
I write your name". "Liberté" ‐ the motto of the French Republic ‐ is at the bottom of
the coin, to the left of it is a cornucopia the mint mark of the French mint Monnaie de Paris in Plessac together
with a pentagon, the logo of mint master Yves Sampo, above the word "Liberté" is the year of issue "2015",
the country abbreviation "RF" (République française, French Republic) next to it a square the logo of the
designer Joaquin Jimenez. ‐ There are two minting versions, 20,000 of one of them has the three segments of the
cockade with a flat surface in colour
(see picture). |
