Jefimok Rouble - Alexey Mikhailovich Countermarked over 'Pfalz Thaler'

The jefimok was not a new coin — it was a foreign thaler forcibly conscripted into the Russian monetary system. In 1655, facing a severe shortage of silver bullion, Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich ordered that Western European thalers be countermarked with a horseman punch and a date punch reading "1655" to certify them as valid currency at 64 kopecks. The Pfalz thaler beneath this countermark originated in the Palatinate, one of dozens of German and Low Countries issues that flooded eastward through Baltic trade routes.

The experiment lasted less than two years. Countermarked thalers were demonetized in 1659 amid the broader copper rouble crisis that triggered urban revolts.