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!
Kopeck - Mikhail I
| Issuer | Russian Empire |
|---|---|
| Year | 1613-1617 |
| Type | Log in to see details |
| Value | Log in to see details |
| Currency | Log in to see details |
| Composition | Log in to see details |
| Weight | 0.51 g |
| 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 | The reverse bears a multi-line Cyrillic inscription filling the entire field, arranged in horizontal registers across the irregular flan. The legend, rendered in the archaic Muscovite script style typical of early 17th-century wire kopecks, reads the titles of Tsar Mikhail Fedorovich. The inscription is the sole design element, with no border or decorative device, and is characteristic of the standard reverse type used throughout the reign. The lettering is bold and deeply struck relative to the thin flan, with some letters partially off the flan due to the nature of wire-money production. |
| Reverse script | Log in to see details |
| Reverse lettering | Log in to see details |
| Edge | Plain |
| Mint | Log in to see details |
| Mintage | Log in to see details |
| Additional information |
Mikhail Romanov's accession in 1613 ended the Time of Troubles — a decade of famine, civil war, and foreign occupation that had gutted Russian minting capacity entirely. These early Romanov kopecks were struck by hammer using the same wire-money technique that Russian mints had employed since Ivan III, a medieval method already obsolete across most of Europe. The flans were cut from drawn silver wire and hammered between hand-cut dies, producing the characteristic fish-scale shape.
Mikhail's first years on the throne were financially precarious enough that coin silver purity remained a genuine policy concern, with the state closely guarding the .960 fineness standard inherited from his predecessors.