Catalog
See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration!
or register with email
Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!
Denga - Vasily II the Blind
| Issuer | Moscow, Grand principality of |
|---|---|
| Year | 1425-1433 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Rouble (1381-1534) |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | Log in to see details |
| Diameter | Log in to see details |
| Thickness | Log in to see details |
| Shape | Log in to see details |
| Technique | Log in to see details |
| Orientation | Log in to see details |
| Engraver(s) | Log in to see details |
| In circulation to | Log in to see details |
| Reference(s) | Log in to see details |
| Obverse description | Log in to see details |
|---|---|
| Obverse script | Log in to see details |
| Obverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Reverse description | Within a beaded circular border, the biblical hero Samson is depicted in combat with a lion, shown in the flat, linear engraving style characteristic of early Muscovite hammered silver coinage. The figure of Samson wrestles or subdues the lion in a dynamic central composition. A Cyrillic legend surrounds the device along the periphery of the flan, partially visible given the irregular shape of the planchet. The iconography of Samson and the lion was a motif shared among several early Russian princely mints of the period. |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Log in to see details |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | ND (1425-1433) |
| Additional information |
Vasily II inherited the Moscow throne at age ten in 1425, and the coinage of his early reign reflects the political instability that followed. His epithet — "the Blind" — came later, in 1446, when his cousin Dmitry Shemyaka had him seized and physically blinded during the brutal dynastic civil war that consumed the Muscovite ruling house for decades. The coins of the 1425–1433 window predate that mutilation but were struck against a backdrop of constant succession pressure from rival Rurikid claimants.
Moscow denga of this period were cut from drawn wire rather than cast planchets, giving individual pieces an irregular, lozenge-like shape that varies noticeably from one specimen to the next.