Gold-Plated And Silver Plated (Id: Likely Ancient Fourees)

G'day, there are other, less expensive metals and alloys that look like silver, and have been used by counterfeiters.

One alternative is nickel, which is magnetic. See if any of your coins react to a magnet.

There is another alloy, which I have only ever heard called "whitemetal". It is non-magnetic. It is a lot lighter than silver. I don't know what it is composed of. I have some fake Spanish dollars: they weigh about 66% of standard.

Another technique - I don't think that this applies to your coins - is to make a copy in brass or bronze, then rub it with mercury. Some of the mercury will adhere, and give the fake a shiny silver colour. This soon wears off, but the counterfeiter only cares about passing it off once. I have several of these: all British, from 1816~1820. Some of the "silver" is still visible in protected areas of the coin: around the legend, etc.

As long as you don't get ripped off when you buy them, I find contemporary counterfeits to be an interesting part of my collection.

Peter in Oz

Sorry, I somehow missed this thread when it was first posted.


Yes, plated fake coins are known from ancient times. The counterfeiter would make a coin-sized "sandwich" of two thin layers of silver or gold with a base-metal core; this would then be struck with dies, just like a real coin, smashing the layers together into a single piece of metal. Except for the light weight, they would appear quite convincing when first made. Of course, they're normally fairly easy to detect today, because the core normally corrodes faster than the surface layer, creating bubbles and breaks in the surface.

Such coins are known as "fourees". The die-work is often just as good as the genuine coins, and it's even speculated that some of them may have been made in the actual ancient mints, by dishonest mint employees. They're commonly seen in the Roman series, less common with Greek coins, and silver fourees are much more common than gold ones.

Your coins are definitely fakes of some kind, and they look like they might be fourees, but I'm not familiar enough with fourees to be able to tell you for certain whether your particular coins are ancient or modern counterfeits.


Sorry, can't find anything on this one at the moment; the reverse incuse punch looks Greek Archaic, but the obverse design puzzles me - it looks like a crude face.