1832 San Luis Potosi 8R "Possible Overdate"

RealPeso:

It appears that you do indeed have an 1832 3/2 PiJS. On page 350 of Dunigan's Resplandores, such a coin is pictured. It appears from the inset photo of the 3/2 variety that yours matches. The third ray tip is captured in that photo, pointing between the 1 and 8, slightly closer to the 8. Yours appears to be the same. The rays in relationship to the legend letters differ on the non-hubbed dies such as this.

Dunigan calls this die 'Rare' so congrats on a nice die variety find. I only have one 1832 Pi and the third ray points to the inner curve of the left side of the 8 on it.

I noticed another neat feature on the Cap die of your coin. The subscript s in Gs is located directly above the G rather than to the right of it! Apparently the die sinker ran out of room as he approached the ray to the right of the G. Apparently the cap and rays were already punched into the dies prior to the legend being added.

Macro122

I thought I had looked this coin over from top to bottom, side to side and taken into account all of the details but what do you know? I DID NOT notice the superscript S on top of the G! I think this is great little detail and thank you for pointing it out to me.

This actually leads me to a question, exactly what constitutes a different die style? Would something as minor as this be considered a different die style? Or is it strictly when the design itself is different and not the characters or legend?





jfransch

Thank you!
This series of coins is now occupying a large part of my collecting efforts, I love the different varieties it's a rush everytime I get a new coin. Previously I obtained most of my 8R's on ebay but now more of my acquisitions are coming from coin shows, I just can't keep up with the bidders on ebay, I guess people get caught up in bidding wars which drives the price out of my budget limits.

Great coin! I can easily see the 3/2

RealPeso Nice coin - in my opinion real and an overdate too - GOOD FIND!

Regarding die styles - The dies used to make coins at San Luis Potosi were all made from a set of punches not from a single hub. The set of punches were used to make the finished die. The die sinkers followed a pattern but the elements of the design could be slightly re-positioned. The punching of a superscript is a positioning variety - these happen on EACH and EVERY die. This makes each die unique so you would need to know how many coins each die produced and then how many have survived before you could determine any sort of rarity level.

However, certain positioning varieties have been recognized as "significant". The list of significant positional varieties would include the position of Mint Mark superscripts or elements of the date. People also attach more "value" to certain kinds of punching irregularities like repunches involving the assayer initials or dates. There are of course other over-punches and repunches that involve virtually every single letter and number as well as most other die elements. Some are considered as varieties many (most are not).

So, in my opinion, a true VARIETY would be one involving a change of die PUNCHES or an an actual alteration in the style. For example, all of the 1825 and 1826 Zacatecas 8Rs use a LARGE Star before the 8R. I have one example of an 1826 with a much smaller star. That is a variety. The Durango issues with and without periods between REPUBLICA and MEXICANA represent varieties. The number of rays on the cap represents a variety. A new Eagle design represents a variety. The addition of an s superscript to the 8R represents a variety as well. But none of these is a positioning issue - they are changes in pattern or the punch used. The list of varieties would still be almost endless using even this criteria.

In many cases, especially during the early years of production there were often multiple punch sets in use at each mint. The punches were at times interchanged - adding to the number of varieties, but that is the beauty of this series.

Thanks guys for the comments!

Macro122




That makes sense on why the S is in that position.

Swamperbob







Thank you! Now I understand it why this can't be a considered a different variety. The keyword is "positioning".

gxseries




I see what you mean there seems to be something going on with the 2 but I don't think its another overdate, there is no 1832/20 listed in any references and I don't think I am so lucky as to have a undiscovered variety.

That makes sense.

Any reason that you know of why the E in REP and the E in MEX are missing the top portion?

Also the C's are almost complete O's but I think that is probably just the style of the punch used for those letters.

Quote: "Also, I have no knowledge about Mexican coins but can it be possible that the edge is re-edged? To me it seems that it had an edge of "\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" and then re-edged to a flora pattern?"

I'm no expert on these coins also, but maybe you are thinking of the floral pattern that is on a Pillar Dollar. These coins should have a kinda half moon chained together pattern. But I see what you mean about the edge almost looking re-edged?

odentheviking: I don't know too much about re edging and I don't have another early date Pi handy to compare the edges but from what I know none of the Mexican cap & rays had a flora pattern like the Spanish 8R's. The cap & rays have something like this: {{{{{{{{{