The sovereign is a gold coin

Gold coin

A gold coin is a coin made mostly or entirely of gold. Gold has been used for coins practically since the invention of coinage, originally because of gold's intrinsic value...

 of the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, with a nominal value of one pound sterling

Pound sterling

The pound sterling , commonly called the pound, is the official currency of the United Kingdom, its Crown Dependencies and the British Overseas Territories of South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands, British Antarctic Territory and Tristan da Cunha. It is subdivided into 100 pence...

 but in practice used as a bullion coin

Bullion coin

A bullion coin is a coin struck from precious metal and kept as a store of value or an investment, rather than used in day-to-day commerce. Investment coins are generally coins that have been minted after 1800, have a purity of not less than 900 thousandths and are or have been a legal tender in...

.

Named after the English gold sovereign

Sovereign (English coin)

The English gold sovereign was a gold coin of the Kingdom of England first issued in 1489 under King Henry VII. While the coin typically had a nominal value of one pound sterling, or twenty shillings, the sovereign was primarily an official piece of bullion and had no mark of value on its face...

, last minted in 1604, the name was revived with the Great Recoinage of 1816

Great Recoinage of 1816

The Great Recoinage of 1816 was an attempt by the British Government to re-stabilise the currency of Great Britain following economic difficulties precipitated by the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars.-History:...

. Minting these new sovereigns began in 1817. The gold content then was fixed at 113 grains (7.322 g), equivalent to 0.2354 troy ounce, a weight which has remained constant to the present day.

Sovereigns were minted in the United Kingdom from 1817 to 1917, in 1925, and from 1957.