Twenty-five Pence (Crown) 1975 Manx Cat, Coin from Isle of Man - detailed information

The Isle of Man has its own circulating coinage, which is used in parallel with the British Pound Sterling; it also issues an extensive range of Non-Circulating Legal Tender (NCLT) coins for collectors, as well as bullion coins in a variety of formats and designs.

The coin format most popular with collectors is the Crown, which has the same specifications as the British (decimal) Crown - also issued as a collector coin, and historically is derived from the British pre-decimal Crown, which was a circulating denomination.

After decimalisation, a Crown coin was nominally denominated as 25 pence, an old Crown being equal to five shillings, and a shilling re-denominated as five pence. The UK Crown and its derivatives - such as the Manx Crown - was later re-denominated as £5 in 1990. The Manx Crown displays the denomination as "Crown" though and not as £5 (which its UK counterpart almost never does), and is - also unlike the UK Crown - subdivided into fractional denominations, such as half-crown, one-tenth Crown etc.

This is only the third Crown coin issued by the Isle of Man, and the second featuring a Manx cat.

The Manx cat (in earlier times often spelled Manks) is a breed of domestic cat (Felis catus) originating on the Isle of Man, with a naturally occurring mutation that shortens the tail. Many Manx have a small stub of a tail, but Manx cats are best known as being entirely tailless; this is the most distinguishing characteristic of the breed, along with elongated hind legs and a rounded head. Manx cats come in all coat colours and patterns, though all-white specimens are rare, and the coat range of the original stock was more limited. Long-haired variants are sometimes considered a separate breed, the Cymric.