Silver Plated Unit Hayling Moon Head Contemporary Counterfeit

Contemporary counterfeits of Gallo-Belgic and British Iron Age coinage are surprisingly well documented — produced not by criminals in any modern sense, but almost certainly by local communities operating outside whatever centralised issuing authority existed. The silver plating over a bronze core was a functional fraud: enough surface silver to pass at speed, light enough to suggest debasement rather than outright fabrication. At 0.67g, this piece has lost most of whatever plating remained, which is typical of the type.