Trial of the Pyx Trial of the Pyx The Trial of the Pyx () is the procedure in the United Kingdom for ensuring that newly minted coins conform to the required standards. These trials have been held from the twelfth century to the present day, normally once per calendar year. The form of the ceremony has been essentially the same since 1282 AD. These events are trials in the full judicial sense, presided over by a judge with an expert jury of metallurgical assayers. Given modern production methods, it is unlikely that coins would not conform, but this has been a problem in the
Coins of the United States dollar of these coins is legal as tender, but does not actually reflect the value of the precious metal contained therein. On May 11, 2011, Utah became the first state to accept these coins as the value of the precious metal in common transactions. The Utah State Treasurer assigns a numerical precious metal value to these coins each week based on the spot metal prices. Modern commemoratives have been minted since 1982. An incomplete list is available here. Note: It is a common misconception that "eagle"-based nomenclature for gold U.S. coinage was merely slang. The "eagle," "half-eagle" and "quarter-eagle" were specifically