Kopeck - Peter I

Peter I's wire kopecks — the last generation of a coin type unchanged in basic form since Ivan the Terrible — were struck by hammering silver wire between hand-cut dies, producing the characteristic irregular fish-scale shape. By 1698, Peter was already planning their abolition; the modernized round coinage introduced from 1700 onward made these obsolete almost immediately. Many were melted or restruck within years of issue, which partially explains survival rates.

The 1698 date places this piece in the final stretch before Poltava, before the Table of Ranks, before nearly everything that defined Petrine Russia.