Catalog
50 Centavos Countermarked
| Issuer | Cuba |
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| Year | 1872-1877 |
| Type | Standard circulation coin |
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| Obverse description | Host coin obverse of the United States Seated Liberty Half Dollar, engraved by Christian Gobrecht, depicting a draped female figure of Liberty seated left upon a rock, holding a pole surmounted by a Liberty cap in her right hand and resting her left hand on a shield bearing horizontal stripes. Thirteen six-pointed stars are arranged in an arc around the periphery, with the date below in the exergue. Applied to the right field of the host coin is a punched countermark in the form of a skeleton key, the official mark applied by Cuban authorities between 1872 and 1877 to authorize the coin for circulation as 50 Centavos. |
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| Reverse script | Latin |
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| Additional information |
Spanish colonial 50 centavos pieces were officially countermarked by Cuban monetary authorities to validate their continued circulation during a period when the island's currency supply was being reorganized under Spanish fiscal pressure. The countermark program ran across multiple host coin dates, which is why the type spans several years rather than representing a single issue.
KM#R5.3 specifies a particular countermark punch variant — collectors working this series need to distinguish between at least three catalogued punch types, as they carry meaningfully different valuations.