10 Santeem - Haile Selassie I

Ethiopia's coinage under Haile Selassie was tied to a calendar system most Western dealers still misread: the Ethiopian calendar runs roughly seven to eight years behind the Gregorian, meaning the dates struck on these coins require conversion and are routinely miscatalogued. The KM#34 series spanned a remarkably long production window, surviving the Italian occupation's aftermath, the postwar monetary reorganization of 1945, and the creeping political instability that preceded the Derg coup of September 1974.

Selassie was deposed and under house arrest before the final pieces in this date range were issued — making the latest strikes an odd artifact of a reign already ended.