An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

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Gam3rBlake
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An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

#1 Unread post by Gam3rBlake »

Not long ago I made a post sharing a tiny obol from 6th century BC Miletus and I thought that coin would be the smallest coin
I ever owned.

Welll....I was wrong.

Allow me to introduce you all to my newest, oldest and smallest coin:
A 1/24th stater from 650-600 BC Ionia!
chf3.jpg
chf4.jpg

Here are some zoomed in photos:
chf1.jpg
chf2.jpg
NOTE: The incuse punch on the reverse was meant to show that the coin was pure right down to its core.

Interestingly, despite it's tiny size this coin would still have been a significant amount of money. A little more than a day's wages!
The average worker at this time made 1 gold stater per month and this is 1/24th stater or 1/24th of the average monthly pay.
So this isn't a coin that would have been spent on small daily transactions but most likely a coin that would have been
kept as a form of savings/wealth preservation and spent on large purchases.

The thing I find the most incredible about this coin is that this coin goes back as far as the invention of coinage itself.
You would be hard pressed to find an older coin and the ones that do exist are only a few decades older at most.
Every other coin minted after it owes it's existence to coins like this one.

One thing most people point out is how easy this coin must have been to lose due to its miniscule size.
That's true! I imagine that's probably the reason why later coins (such as the drachma and denarius both of which represented
a days wages like this coin) were made larger by making them of nearly pure silver instead of a gold/silver alloy. Since there was no gold the intrinsic
value of the coin needed to be met with silver. Since silver is less valuable than gold it required a larger silver coin than an electrum coin of the same value
which was perfect since they were less likely to be lost than the tiny electrum coins.
Last edited by Gam3rBlake on Tue Dec 28, 2021 11:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Triple C
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Re: An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

#2 Unread post by Triple C »

Wow, pretty awesome! Thanks for sharing! 👍

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Re: An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

#3 Unread post by Gam3rBlake »

Triple C wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 10:56 pm Wow, pretty awesome! Thanks for sharing! 👍
Thanks for looking! :)
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Re: An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

#4 Unread post by Daniel »

Nice!

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Re: An even older, teenier, tinier, itsier, bitsier coin!

#5 Unread post by Earle42 »

👍Amazing little piece of history!
Common grading company shortcomings & resulting co$tly mi$take$ to collectors (using Kennedy No FG halves):
https://tinyurl.com/y7rksxu8

How much squash would a sasquatch squash if a sasquatch would squash squash?

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