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Any info on this Coin?
30 Posts
6 Posts
Here is a link about the coin. It's from the USSR. http://www.coinnetwork.com/photo/cccp-50-kopeks-1961lettered?context=latest
30 Posts
Oh, Looking at the lettering it is Very nicely done. Clear and well struck as well.
You wouldn't be able to tell me what it say's would you? Besides 1964. :)
8 years ago
30 Posts
I would have never thought about looking for edge lettering if it were not for the site you linked. Thank you very much!
8 years ago
6 Posts
CCCP is Soviet Russia's abbreviation of the USSR http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CCCP_(disambiguation) And the koneek is the currency https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20070317135935AArzLud
8 years ago
33 Posts
My son, who is 19, actively collects Soviet era Russian coinage. What you have there is a Soviet 1964 50 Kopek, or half a Ruble. Its standard catalog reference is a Y#133a.2. It is the first year of issue for the type, having been reduced that year to 4.4 grams from the single-year previous type of 1961, which was 4.6 grams, both of an alloy of copper-nickel-zinc. Mintage was a Soviet state secret, and finding this information would be a feat of post-Soviet research of dusty old records. The catalogs price it as a fairly common piece.
8 years ago
30 Posts
Thank you all for your help! Now I feel I have to put it on a scale and measure it. :)
8 years ago
33 Posts
All of the 1967 Soviet coins are basically similar to our 1776-1976 commems. 1967 was the 50th anniversary of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution and a time of great Soviet "patriotic" pride. 1967 coins are all single-year types. 1964 was also a year when more subtle changes were introduced to regular circulating Soviet Union coins. Most previous series were interrupted in 1957. 1958 Soviet coinage is all EXTRAORDINARILY rare - hugely important rarities. The hiatus was ended and then abruptly resumed with some 1961 issues. Most series resumed slightly smaller in 1964 and with the 1967 commem exception, continued on until the demise of the USSR and the rise of the Russian Federation in 1991/1992.
When examining any Russian coins, keep in mind that they employ the Cyrillic alphabet, which traces its lineage to the Greek one. The letter we see as "C" is always pronounced as the soft s-like "c" sound, as in "cellar", never the hard "k" sound. When they want the hard "k" they use a "K". Yea obvious! The third letter is akin to the Greek letter "pi" and is pronounced as we would the letter "p". What looks like a "P", as in "CCCP" is actually pronounced as we would an "r". So when you see a word that looks sort of like KOnEEK, it literally sounds out as "kopek". On some denominations in some years, it is shortened to just the first 3 letters.
By the way, the doubled "EE" is a pronunciation without a precise English equivalent. The best way I can describe it is the short "e", as in "neck" or "pen", with a semi-formed "y"- sound, as in "yell" trying but failing to get out of your mouth at the same time.
Some years ago, an issue of MAD magazine once described Russian as a language where most words look like "KAOPECTATE". A little culturally insensitive, but also a little true.
