Ruble - Pavel I

Pavel I abolished the portrait convention that had defined Russian coinage since Peter the Great, replacing the imperial effigy with a text-only design — a deliberate break from his mother Catherine II's numismatic tradition, whom he despised. The decision was almost certainly personal rather than aesthetic.

His reign lasted just four years and three months before he was strangled in his bedroom at Mikhailovsky Castle in March 1801, almost certainly with the knowledge of his son, the future Alexander I. The compressed production window across just three mint years keeps absolute mintages low.