Niue, a sovereign state in free association with New Zealand, uses two official legal tender currencies. The New Zealand Dollar is the circulation currency for daily transactions, while the government also authorises legal tender coins in the Niue Dollar currency for collector's purposes.
A number of mints issue a large variety of commemorative, bullion and collector coins under the authority of Niue. These coins are dedicated to historical or general popular culture themes not related to Niue itself. Many of them are in standard bullion sizes - typically, one ounce of silver (abbreviated as 1 oz Ag, where "Ag" comes from the Latin word for silver, Argentum).
This coin is the second issue in the Milky Way series by the Czech Mint, and shows the Milky Way itself.
The mint says about it: The Milky Way is the galaxy in which our Sun and solar system are located. From Earth, it can be seen as a silvery band of merging stars across the sky, which is how it got its name. In reality, however, it takes the form of a central bar to which two spiral arms are connected. The diameter of our home galaxy is up to 200,000 light-years across. It is estimated to contain 400 billion stars and at least 100 billion planets, but the vast majority of its mass is made up of mysterious and invisible dark matter.
No photographs or computer graphics were used as the subject - the author of the coin created an original watercolour painting. |