Your Help Needed With An Old Copper Coin

it is unfortunate that the center of the REV is weak in strike, also more than a bit worn and corroded

hard to make anything of the mass directly to the right of the potential pair of dies and below; perhaps the head of a small animal (sheep?) just right of the dies and smiling at the planchet?

it would be great if this is a token from an unknown mint; as such the piece would be quite unusual, also considering its estimated age; but there are still too many loose ends; nowhere near identification

I am very happy to report today the answer to the riddle of these coins

willieboyd2 had a very good idea
this jeton is indeed mentioned by Dugniolle in his monumental work from 1876 "Jetons Historiques des dix-sept provinces des Pays-Bas" under #1948



but I overlooked this lead for weeks, because
* we had no idea of the image on the reverse (before the second piece appeared in the picture)
* Dugniolle leaves completely open the nature of the coat-of-arms on the obv.
* the legend description in Dugniolle for OBV and REV is a bit different from the pieces in this thread
maybe Dugniolle did not see a real survivor of this piece

finding the second piece two weeks ago changed everything
Tim Poelman from Schulman b.v. (Amsterdam) had the great idea to connect the second piece with the satiric jetons made at the end of 1553 after the dispute between Jean Calvin and Michel Servet (Miguel Serveto) in Geneva
(the latter was burned alive on Oct 27 at the stake, a true tragedy)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Servetus


OBVERSE
The better known variant of this satiric jeton (Dugniolle 1934 and variants in higher numbers) has the disputing Calvin and Servet standing; while the legend refers to Luke 6.41, (Why do you look at the speck in your brother's eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye?) This can be interpreted as criticism on the reform movement in Geneva which was seen as a threat for the catholic Netherlands.
In the current two pieces the tension between reform and counter reform is symbolized by changing VERBUM DOMINI MANET IN AETERNUM into VERBUM DOMINI MONET IN AETERNUM (we discussed this on the previous page)

REVERSE
The current pieces in this thread show as legend a riddle that can only be understood by insiders. In the better known variant 1934 with owl, candle and glasses, the legend reads (in 16th century Dutch)
WAT BAT KERS OF BRIL DIE NIT SIEN EN WIL
<i>wat baat een kaars of bril voor wie niet zien wil?</i>

in the pieces of this thread the legend is coded into
W H M LI O P W I NI S WIL
decoded by Dugniolle himself as:
<i>wat helpt mij licht of bril wanneer ik niet zien wil?</i>
translated, both would be
<i>what is the use of candle or glasses for one who does not want to see</i>
one can interpret this as counter reformist critique on the error of thought of the calvinists

To finish a long story, I contacted Paul van der Zee who is building an online database of the Jetons described by Dugniolle almost 150 years ago. His website (http://www.dugniolle.com/index.html) is very inspiring with many photo's of the surviving pieces.

For the satiric Servet/Calvin jetons, go to
http://dugniolle.com/dugniolle1902-2000.html
Interestingly, 1948 had no known survivor, but Paul has proposed to add the photo's of the two mysterious copper coins of this thread under numbers 1948 and 1948a (there is a minor interpunction difference).

Mystery solved! Thanks to the participating and stimulating CCF members; thanks Tim Poelman and Paul van der Zee. The coat of arms is still an open question, but we have a date and a region of origin.

An experience like this makes coin collecting a wonderful hobby !

@1c5d, very well done. I'm glad you followed up with all of the info. This sort of thing does make this a wonderful hobby.

Fantastic information. Thank you very much for following up. I enjoyed the journey.

thanks chafemasterj and Crazyb0 for your comments, much appreciated

but somehow I feel we did not yet make the journey back to the source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_d...n_the_detail

a joke, a satire, a serious accusation
where it was made, by whom
we can only guess