Peter III copper coinage type set - finally completed!

[gxseries]

I honestly never thought of the day I would even obtain one of Peter III copper coins because of the scarcity and price, much less obtaining the entire set!

Here are the pictures:







Peter III copper coinages were scarce for a good reason - Peter III only ruled Russia for about 6 months and due to a copper shortage, all copper coins were ordered to be overstruck to be twice of the face value, i.e. 5 kopek coin as 10 kopek, 2 kopek as 4 kopek and 1 kopek as 2 kopek.

This didn't last too long and in the next year, the coins were ordered to be re-overstruck over the next few years.

This is an example:



While Catherine II coins that were overstruck over Peter III coins are common, the same cannot be said for Peter III coins that were overstruck over Elizabeth I coins. As Peter III wasn't a popular Tsar, most of his coins if they did circulate were either overstruck or probably forgotten in people's pocket change, only to be discovered years later.

[Figleaf]

Impressive. It reminds me of Egyptian rulers ordering that all traces of a previous rules be effaced or destroyed.

BTW, another way of recovering such lost coins is if they were in the ground and a metal detectorist found them. Especially in unruly times, when the pockets of those killed are not investigated systematically, a body can disappear completely, leaving only a coin as evidence of what once happened...

Peter (who's not the third)

[ciscoins]

The standards were changed many times during the empire period:

1699 - 12,8 roubles from 16 kg of copper ("pud")
1701 - 15,44 roubles
1704 - 19,2 roubles
1713 - 20 roubles
1718 - 40 roubles
(As you can see, Peter I needed money for his endless wars. And his coins became smaller and smaller.)

1724 - 20 roubles
(The war with Sweden finished.)

1728 - 40 roubles
1730 - 10 roubles
1731 - 8 roubles
(Unstable period after the death of Peter I. The emperors nedeed loyality from the people.)

1757 - 16 roubles
(Some stability, not long before the death of Elizabeth I. The government could start grabbing people again.)

1762 - 32 roubles
(Kind of a suicide by Peter III. He couldn't become popular making such "jokes".)

1763 - 16 roubles
(The enthronement of Ekaterina II was completely illegal from all points of view, so she was trying to achieve loyality.)

1796 - 32 roubles
(Adventure of Ekaterina's lover Platon Zubov; a few months before her death.)

1797 - 16 roubles
(The new emperor Pavel I was sick of his mother and her lovers.)

1810 - 24 roubles
(Alexander I needed money for the war with Napoleon.)

1832 - 36 roubles
1840 - 16 roubles
1849 - 32 roubles
(Nicholas I is generally considered to be a consistent ruler, but here for some reason he hesitated.)

1867 - 50 roubles
(This standard remained unchanged until the end of the empire.)