The Central Bank of Malta has produced a new coin to commemorate the Centenary of the First World War.
The design features a nurse in the foreground attending to a soldier, with the words ‘Remember the Fallen’ and ‘Nurse of the Mediterranean’.
In the background, a soldier with his head bowed stands next to a poppy. The reverse of the coin shows the emblem of Malta with the year of issue – 2014.
The design has been struck onto two coins – a silver €10 and a brass €5 coin.
During the First World War, Malta – then part of the British Empire – was described as the ‘Nurse of the Mediterranean’, due to its 27 hospitals and convalescent camps, where thousands of casualties of the war were treated.
Malta’s decision to mint a commemorative coin to mark the Centenary follows a trend seen in other Commonwealth countries, including in Australia, Britain and Canada.
The design of the coin in Britain, which features Lord Kitchener with his famous recruting slogan ‘Your Country Needs You’, has not been without controversy.
Some have dubbed it “too jingoistic” and a petition was launched calling for the wartime nurse Edith Cavell to be commemorated on a Centenary coin. It has attracted more than 100,000 signatures so far.
Source: Central Bank of Malta
Images courtesy of the Central Bank of Malta
Posted by: Daniel Barry, Centenary News