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Spanish Cob? ID Assistance Please

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Cameron K's Avatar
United States
9 Posts
 Posted 03/01/2016  9:12 pm Show Profile   Bookmark this topic Add Cameron K to your friends list Get a Link to this Message Number of Subscribers
Greetings! Glad to find this forum. I came across this in a 'mystery box' not too long ago. I suspect it's some kind of Spanish cob, but I don't know a whole lot about them.

It's 17mm in size, pings like silver when dropped. I increased the brightness in photoshop about 60% to bring out the detail.

Any opinions? Thanks in advance!

Cam
Durham, NC

Spanish-Cob?-ID-Assistance-Please
Valued Member
Pistareen's Avatar
United States
309 Posts
 Posted 03/02/2016  10:21 pm  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add Pistareen to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
I think it is interesting. I see stylistic elements of South American silver, one real, cobs including Pillars and Waves and Cross with Castles and Lions (of sorts), but things fall apart when trying to make sense of the legends. It seems to imply a date of "01" perhaps intended as 1701, but they added a third digit then "701" for 1701,figuring folks could determine which millennium they were in. Missing and seemingly nonexistent are important clues of mint mark, assayer, "PLVS VLTRA" denomination (perhaps intended as "8"?) all of which should be present to some degree, but instead the coin clearly shows gibberish. It may be a very old counterfeit that might well have passed back before too many people were Latin literate.
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Cameron K's Avatar
United States
9 Posts
 Posted 03/03/2016  9:01 pm  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add Cameron K to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
Thanks for the opinion. Yes, the inverted "N" threw me off too as it looks mirrored. The coin pings like silver, so maybe it is a contemporary counterfeit?
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RogerRamjet's Avatar
United States
172 Posts
 Posted 03/04/2016  11:34 pm  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add RogerRamjet to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
Without knowing what it is, it looks like an authentic old debased silver coin to me. I wouldn't assume it's a counterfeit without knowing what it was trying to resemble. Here's a clue that someone may find useful: Wikipedia says that a backward N is one of the Slavic letters of Cyrillic script. Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_(Cyrillic)
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Cameron K's Avatar
United States
9 Posts
 Posted 03/07/2016  7:49 pm  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add Cameron K to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
Thanks. Hadn't thought Cyrillic... The cross seems Latin rather than Orthodox but I'll definitely follow up!
Pillar of the Community
Russian Federation
5172 Posts
 Posted 03/07/2016  8:42 pm  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add january1may to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
I do not recognize any Cyrillic on this coin (in particular, it most definitely does not look like any issue of the Russian Empire). I suppose in principle the backwards N could be Cyrillic, but the surrounding letters don't seem to assemble into anything remotely similar to Russian words.
I agree with the OP - the design is that of a Spanish cob, except even cruder. But I don't know much about Spanish cobs either (aside from seeing lots of pictures of them on CCF).

(You sure it's silver? Both the color and the blue, um, patina make it look suspiciously like copper.)
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Cameron K's Avatar
United States
9 Posts
 Posted 03/08/2016  12:04 am  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add Cameron K to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
Re: copper/silver, no I'm not sure. It's got a 'ring' to it when dropped that sounds to me like silver, but that's not authoritative!

At 17mm square, it weighs 2.1 grams. It's quite thin too... approximately 1mm.

As to the color, it's actually grayish. I bumped up the brightness and contracts 60% in photoshop to bring out the detail of the coin. The scan attached here is closer to the original coloring of the coin.

Spanish-Cob?-ID-Assistance-Please
Valued Member
RogerRamjet's Avatar
United States
172 Posts
 Posted 03/08/2016  12:53 am  Show Profile   Bookmark this reply Add RogerRamjet to your friends list Get a Link to this Reply
I agree that the blue-green oxidation, or verdigris, suggests the presence of copper, but debased silver, or billon, is silver debased with another metal, usually copper.

I'm going to double down on my bet that it's Cyrillic because I think https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tshe is the character that follows the backward N. Though not exact matches, it's possible that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Komi_Tje is the character to the left of the backward N and that https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pe_(Cyrillic) is the character below it and to the right. I'll be darned if I can figure out what it says though.

The cross with four equal length arms and "winglets" at the tips is similar to many representations of the cross of Constantine, which is commonly seen on Portugese coins with the motto "In hoc signo vinces". The cross of Constantine wouldn't be out of place on any Eastern Orthodox territory's coin.

Because several of the letters appear to be Slavic, consider the various Slavic regions highlighted here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_(Cyrillic).
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