Russian Coins and Historical Medals. Catherine II, 1762-1796 Rouble 1770 over 69 СПБ-ТI-ЯЧ over CA. 24.84 gm. Bit 209, Diakov 245, Sev 2043, Uzd 1030. Light gray. Extremely fine This rare and unusual overdate-overinitials coin poses a mystery as to the actual sequence of dies and production. Stepan Afonasiev (CA) was mintmaster from 1764-1770. At some point at the end of 1769, it would seem that new dies were prepared for the next year which included his initials (less likely is the scenario that these new dies were prepared during the first weeks of 1770, but not impossible). Hence it was assumed Afonasiev would be mintmaster in 1770. There are 1770 Rubles with the initials CA, but these are quite Rare and we must surmise that the emission was very small or that most of it was destroyed. At some point in 1770, Yakov Chernishev became mint master. So Afonasiev died in office, had to leave unexpectedly or was removed abruptly. Chernishev had no time to prepare new dies, but production was required, so he took the 1769 dies and cut the new date and his initials over the previous. Why didn’t he use the 1770 CA dies and just cut over the initials? Asking this question would lead us to believe that these dies had already been destroyed. The other possibility, and that is an outside one, is that after the overdate overinitial issue, when new dies were cut, the old initials CA were used in error. And when the error was discovered, the emission was stopped and the die removed from usage. This intriguing coin certainly welcomes further research.
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