Owner Comments:
Under Diederik van Romondt, mintmaster. The knight on the obverse of this coin has an easily seen grin.
I had been making offers through Heritage to the owner of a really nice MS61 Zwolle 1650 ducat. They were always refused. Then, (1) this one became available to bid on and (2) this one has the best and cleanest (least wrinkled or wavy or bent) detail of all of them that I have seen pictures of.
This coin is the finest West Friesland 1650 ducat graded at NGC or PCGS; none are graded at PCGS but there are a bunch graded in Mint State at NGC, with this being the only MS65.
Examples in MS62, AU58 and AU55 appeared in this Goldberg Auction from 2013 at http://images.goldbergauctions.com/php/chap_auc.php?site=1&lang=1&sale=72&chapter=92&page=8
NGC has only graded two ducats of all provinces of the Netherlands from all of the 1600's at MS65; the other is also of West Friesland, dated 1652. However, it does not look as good as this coin, in my opinion, because the face has no detail and is just blank. It sold in 2015 at a Heritage Auction and can be seen here: https://coins.ha.com/itm/netherlands/world-coins/netherlands-west-friesland-provincial-gold-ducat-1652-ms65-ngc-/a/3038-35917.s?ic4=GalleryView-Thumbnail-071515