The Butchers' Arms

This trade token, worth a farthing, was issued for a business at the sign of the Butchers' Company arms, in Goswell Street, Middlesex.

Boyne & Williamson (1889) reference London number 1188; Obv inscription: AT.THE.BVTCHERS.ARMES (around field, in Roman capitals) Device = The Butchers' arms (in field); Rev inscription: IN.GOSWELL.STREETE (around field, in Roman capitals) Device = M.A.C. (triad of initials in Roman capitals, in field).

See also token number 7937 in the Sylloge of Coins of the British Isles, 62, The Norweb Collection: Tokens of the British Isles 1575-1750, Part VIII - Middlesex and Uncertain Pieces. The issuer is Michael Cope, who also issued a named token, from this premises, see, NN17514, in the museum collection. The arms of the Worshipful Company of Butchers are: Azure two poleaxes in saltire, or blades inwards, between two bulls' heads couped in fesse argent, on a chief argent a boar's head couped gules, tusked or langued azure, between two bunches of holly vert, banded (J. Bromley, The Armorial Bearings of the Guilds of London: a record of the heraldry of the surviving companies with historical notes; with...[illustrations] by Heather Child...(London, 1960). Goswell Street, now Goswell Road, is in the London Borough of Islington, having previously been part of Middlesex.