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Kopeck - Alexey Mikhailovich о М
| Issuer | Russian Empire |
|---|---|
| Year | 1645-1650 |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Technique | Hammered (wire) |
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| Obverse lettering | о М |
| Reverse description | The reverse bears a multi-line Cyrillic inscription filling the entire field, arranged in compressed horizontal registers across the irregular flan. The text presents the full imperial titulature of Tsar Alexey Mikhailovich in Old Church Slavonic: «ЦАРЬ И ВЕЛИКИЙ КНЯЗЬ АЛЕКСЕЙ МИХАЙЛОВИЧ ВСЕЯ РУСИ» (Tsar and Grand Prince Alexey Mikhailovich of All Rus). The lettering is characteristic of mid-17th century Muscovite die-engraving, with angular, tightly spaced characters. No border or decorative elements frame the legend. |
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| Additional information |
Alexey Mikhailovich came to the throne in 1645 at sixteen years old, and these wire money kopecks — hand-struck on irregularly cut flans in the medieval Russian tradition — were already an anachronism by the time he inherited them. The technology was unchanged from Ivan the Terrible's monetary reform of 1535, and it would remain so until Peter I forcibly scrapped the whole system in the early eighteenth century. Alexey's reign would eventually see the catastrophic copper riot of 1662, a direct consequence of debasing the kopeck by minting copper coins at silver face value.