Mex War Of Independence Insurgent Counterstamps.

ElleKitty have we weighed your 2nd coin at the meeting? At the same time weigh the 1st coin too. I'll e-mail you something that got me searching for other examples

ElleKitty The Morelos stamp as seen on the various SUD issues needs an entire volume by itself. Several researchers have attempted to do so but I do not own any of their books unfortunately.

I became interested in the SUD coinage for a very brief period of time while I was in High School but with me it never really caught on because of the endless minute varieties of the series and the fact that well known forgeries were often treated as real by collectors and dealers alike. I prefered the forgeries that passed undetected - the 8Rs.

These SUDs were very popular as souveniers and keepsales after the war was over. But the supply of originals was never adequate to meet the demand. So a cottage industry developed around these coins and numerous "new" varieties and fantasies started to appear almost from the outset. The fact that they have virtually no intrinsic value and the crudity of the dies made them easy targets.

The stamps on the photos look like typical "originals". But always be aware that the technology needed to produce great forgeries of this type is within the grasp of most high School kids that take metal shop...

jfransch, I believe you are correct about the Villagran stamp. When compared to known examples I was able to find, you see the differences clearly. As you've mentioned, there's no sign of the inner circle of dots along the edge. Also, position of the letters is wrong - on the stamp I've seen, first "L" in "VILLA" is positioned in between "R" and "A" in "GRAN". OSORNO monogram is very well done (too well, actually) however on the original stamps I was able to find the leg in "R" has more of a sharp angle which takes it further out away from the rest of the monogram.

swamperbob, when I included the close-ups of some peculiarities on the coin, I was hoping you'd be able to match the host to a known type. Your knowledge in this field is unparalleled! I couldn't find an explanation for all the coarse and multi-directional (especially in the Villagran case) die surface marks and your explanation was a nugget of knowledge I'll file away for future references :)

Thank you for taking time and providing your opinions on these 2 coins. This is what the hobby is all about, in my mind.

ElleKitty, as was mentioned by swamperbob, there are a lot of varieties to the copper SUD series. Until his post, however, I didn't know why. From what I've seen, there's nothing that would raise a red flag for me. However I would love to hear fcrazo's opinion on the matter.

Regards,

Roman.

TwoK: The "Norte" counterstamp is often attributed to Vicente Guerrero, not to Lopez Rayon. The counterstamp is found, as you have seen in the Ponterio Catalogs, usually in 1 or 2 reales coins that have been "flattened" completely. Even though Guerrero was active the whole 11 year period, the coins are often associated with the last period of the war, 1817-1821. So it being on an 1813 Zs assayer RP coin would be rare and on an 8 reales even rarer. As pointed earlier the general configuration is adequate but the design is wrong. The combination with a Lopez Rayon's SJGN would almost be impossible as this counterstamp is from 1811-1814. Also as you pointed out, the accepted design is within a circle.

Additional info that should be useful in identifying suspicious coins, in regards to your second coin TwoK, is the fact that counterstamps are generally found on low cast planchet silver coins (called tepuzque) or another revolutionary emergency issues or period coins. Earlier than 1811 are a "wrong" normal dates to find War of Independence Counterstamps.

In regards to the Morelos SUD coins, SwamperBob would you remember the reference about them being in high demand as souvenirs and being extensively copied after the independence war, it must be an interesting read!

To add to the knowledge base, those SUD coins were extensively forged and copied in the Morelos' War of Independence period of 1811 to 1814. Morelos issued a decree in 1813 that all coins, including the forgeries, would be counterstamped to re-validate them as legal currency so the owners would not lose their money, so infinite varieties exist...

Unfortunately, the weight would not be a characteristic that determines if they are "good" or not, I have seen them from a "normal" planchet to a twice as thick planchet.

interesting note on the weights. I think in the 1950's or early 1960's Numismatists, there was an article on this subject that was compiled with other latin numismatic articles. Unfortunately, I just loaned that book to another friend.