I much enjoyed Sharpe’s Assassin (and all your other books), but please forgive me for being so tedious as to point out what I believe to be an anachronism on p.113 of the hardback edition, where Fox says: “He likes our money, Sharpe. The horsemen of St George!” You add: “He meant guineas, the golden coin which showed St George mounted on a horse.”

British golden guineas did not bear a St George design, but a depiction of the royal arms. (The simplicity of the arms on the most recent issue led to them being commonly called “Spade Guineas”.) The problem cannot be corrected by changing “guineas” to “sovereigns”, because the gold sovereign bearing Pistrucci’s famous George and Dragon design was not introduced until the currency rearrangements of 1816-7.

Alastair Wilson