Kopeck - Alexey Mikhailovich о М

These wire money kopecks — chekanka on hand-cut flans hammered between crude dies — were the workhorse coinage of Muscovy during the reign of Tsar Alexis, and their irregular, fish-scale shape was a deliberate product of the minting method rather than carelessness. The years 1650–1655 fall squarely within the economic crisis that preceded Alexis's catastrophic copper coin experiment: by 1656 he would attempt to replace silver wire money with copper kopecks at parity, triggering the Copper Riot of 1662 and the near-collapse of the monetary system. These silver pieces, still trusted by the population, were hoarded aggressively once the copper issues flooded the market.