Jester's Challenge #194

1jester

Welcome to Jester's Challenge, an interactive history lesson.

Inspired by many others here on the Darkside forum, I'd like to present what I hope will turn into a great learning experience for all of us. Many members on this World and Ancient Coin Forum have done a formidable job of sharing with us many fascinating and historically important coins. Since looking at coins is also one of my greatest pleasures, I'd like to try to follow in that time-honored tradition and submit for your pleasure and entertainment some world coins I've come across in my short lifetime.

I will pick out a coin on a regular basis, and post it along with the challenge to you to name the coin, its provenance, denomination, metallic content, mintage, any distinguishing characteristics or noteworthy features, and its value. The more information, the better. I'd like as many people as possible to participate, regardless of how little knowledge you might have on the subject. I appreciate comments on every aspect of the coin, including its history, or its role in human history, or info on similar coins in its series, etc. I myself don't presume to know 1/1000 of what you collectively know, hence my challenge to all of you to share your knowledge with the rest of us. Hopefully this exercise will encourage thought, discussion, and most importantly, more friendship.

Thanks for your participation!!!

Here is the one hundred ninety-fourth selection:


Example #1: diameter 12.5 mm


Example #2: diameter 13 mm, weight 0.94 grams


Example #3: diameter 14 mm, weight 0.97 grams


Example #4: diameter 15 mm, weight 1.04 grams. Scan slightly reduced in size.


Example #5: diameter 14.5 mm, weight 0.94 grams. Scan slightly reduced in size.

What's really interesting about these coins is that the edges are seriously upturned and very wide, on average 1-1.5mm, sometimes 2 mm wide! That really gives the coin a three dimensional look. And till today nobody has figured out exactly how they were made this way.

laurentyvan

If you gave me $1,000,000,000 to identify this coin in 5 minutes I would be no wealthier than I am now

1jester

Civitas will know.

Askari

I'm glad he will, because I certainly don't!

satootoko

I know!



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It's old.

1jester

Roy is right~!!! It's old. In fact, it's about 1000 years old. These coins were used in the 10th-11th centuries.

I guess Civitas has better things to do than peruse these threads...

1jester

I added scans of 4 more of these coins. Each is different, but they all are of the same type of coin that was basically the first circulating coin of Poland. They are called Cross Denars, for each features a Maltese cross on the reverse, as well as another cross on the obverse.

A very strange features of these coins is their upturned edge, which ranges from 1-2 mm wide. Nobody knows how this was done.

oldshep

Why - Those are casts of the same animal tracks in the snow behind my house
Shep

spoon

What I find more amazing than how bracteates were made.. is how the hell people can tell them apart!!

I've seen some cool ones (Breslau, etc) with clear strikes, but most would get you put in an insane asylum if you let the average person know you collect them.

But these ones here are cool, being the first Polish coin. Do you mind mentioning how much those are worth for curiosity's sake?

1jester

These are not brakteats, but rather denars. Brakteats were usually one-sided only, and usually have a concave surface, and are micro-thin. They are usually larger in diameter, too, but not always. They are very brittle and finding good ones is not easy. They tend to be very pricey for the nice ones.

These denars are heavier (although there are some heavier brakteats than these denars) in general, and are two-sided. Also, they have that strange upset rim that I've never seen on any brakteat.

These Cross Denars are not exactly the first Polish coin, but they are far and away the most common of the first circulating coins of Poland, and represented the bulk of coins in circulation from the earliest days of Poland (986 AD) into the 11th century.

As for price, I think I saw one on Civitas' website for $50 a while back. They can cost as much as $100 or more for different varieties. These are different versions of the common varieties. Also, it's next to impossible to find them in better condition than these. I've never heard of any better than these, but they might exist.

Bruce

"If you gave me $1,000,000,000 to identify this coin in 5 minutes I would be no wealthier than I am now "

That is exactly what I was thinking as I looked at the pics. Way before the era that I collect.

MacCrimmon

What are the design elements symbolic of?