1000 Roubles Belarusian Ballet

Belarus issued a series of large-format gold pieces in the 2000s aimed squarely at the international collector market, and this 155.5g piece is among the more substantial of them. The Bolshoi Ballet of Belarus — based in Minsk, not Moscow, and formally distinct from its more famous Russian counterpart — has operated continuously since 1933 and survived wholesale relocation during the Nazi occupation of the city in World War II, when the company evacuated to Kaunas and later Gorky.

Mintages on these Belarusian collector issues were typically very low, often under 500 pieces globally. At five troy ounces of .999 gold, acquisition was never incidental.