stupid question, i know the answer. (now everyone will chime in)

agentjim007

I got the day off and I'm having fun with my newly discovered ability to take close ups with my camera and loop. When I first saw this (and I am probably correct) I thought "oh great... scratched initials". But the more I looked at this coin I thought that is alot of metal pushed up from a scratch. Look at the the 1 and 8 overlaps on the basket on the obverse, I don't think scratches do that. Or on the reverse the way the second 8 (the first less so) overlaps on the donkey's hip, how does a scratch do that? Opinions...

lathmach

Just raised metal from the knife that was used to dig the graffiti into it.
Shows up more in the softer metals.
Edited: Think in terms of how a plow furrow looks, then look again at it.

Ray

agentjim007

Ya I figured that. I'm thinking the center lines were worn away on the numbers that look solid.