Coin Encyclopedia
Search and identify coins from around the world — with country, denomination, metal, mint, history, and how to tell them apart.
Valens Siliqua
A thin silver siliqua of Valens, eastern Roman emperor who died at the disastrous Battle of Adrianople against the Goths in 378 AD.
Ancient
Seleukos I Nikator Tetradrachm
Silver tetradrachm of Seleukos I Nikator, founder of the Seleucid Empire, often showing elephant and Nike-and-trophy imagery celebrating his eastern campaigns.
Ancient
Continental Dollar
A large 1776-dated piece bearing a sundial, 'MIND YOUR BUSINESS,' and a thirteen-link chain, long debated as either an intended Continental Congress dollar or a contemporary satirical piece.
United States
Mithradates VI Pontos Tetradrachm
A Hellenistic silver tetradrachm portraying Mithradates VI Eupator of Pontos, Rome's fiercest eastern rival, with his distinctive wind-swept diademed portrait and a grazing stag reverse.
Ancient
Colombian 8 Escudos Gold (Popayán)
A large colonial gold doubloon struck at the historic Popayán mint in present-day Colombia, prized by collectors as one of the classic Spanish colonial gold coins of South America.
Latin American
Galerius Follis
Reform-era bronze follis of Galerius, Caesar and later Augustus of the eastern Tetrarchy, remembered for early persecution of Christians and his later Edict of Toleration issued just before his death.
Ancient
Massachusetts Oak Tree Shilling
The second design in Massachusetts Bay's colonial tree-coin series, showing an oak tree, more available than the earlier Willow Tree type but still a scarce early American colonial rarity.
United States
Bolivia 8 Reales (Potosi Mint)
A major Spanish colonial and early Bolivian silver dollar struck at the legendary Potosí mint, fed by the immense silver deposits of the Cerro Rico mountain.
Latin American
1851 Silver Three-Cent Piece
The first-year issue of the tiny Type I silver three-cent piece, nicknamed the trime, created to ease a national shortage of small change and postage-stamp coinage.
United States
Talbot, Allum & Lee Cent
A merchant token issued by the New York trading firm Talbot, Allum & Lee to help ease the shortage of small change in the 1790s, featuring a sailing ship on the obverse.
United States
Two-Cent Piece
A short-lived Civil War-era coin notable as the first U.S. coin to bear the motto 'IN GOD WE TRUST,' issued to help ease a wartime coin shortage.
United States
Japanese Bunkyu Eiho (cash coin)
A late Edo-period Japanese cash coin worth 4 mon, larger than the common Kan'ei Tsūhō, issued in the final years of the Tokugawa Shogunate to help ease chronic small-coin shortages.
Asian
Moroccan Rial (Alawi Dynasty Coinage)
Silver rial coinage struck by Morocco's Alawi sultans in the pre-colonial era, following Islamic coinage tradition with Arabic legends and no ruler portrait.
Africa & Oceania
US Bicentennial Quarter (1976)
A special dual-dated quarter struck to celebrate the 200th anniversary of American independence, featuring a colonial drummer boy on the reverse in place of the usual eagle.
United States
Netherlands Lion Daalder (Leeuwendaalder)
A large silver trade coin of the Dutch provinces showing a knight and a rampant lion, widely circulated in colonial North America and the Ottoman world as the prototype 'lion dollar.'
European
Peru 8 Reales (Lima Mint)
The flagship silver dollar-size coin of colonial and early republican Peru, struck at the historic Lima mint from cob and pillar types through crowned-shield busts.
Latin American
1858 Victoria Five Cents (silver)
The first Canadian five-cent coin, a tiny sterling silver piece struck for the Province of Canada in 1858 when decimal currency was introduced to replace older colonial money.
Canadian
Spanish-Philippine 8 Reales Counterstamped Dollar
Spanish colonial 8 reales silver dollar officially countermarked for circulation in the Philippines, a hybrid of Spanish American and Philippine monetary history.
Asian
Colombia 8 Reales
Silver 8 reales struck first under Spanish colonial rule in New Granada and later, after independence, in the name of the new Colombian republic.
Latin American
Colombian 8 Reales (Nueva Granada)
The classic Spanish colonial "piece of eight" struck at the mints of Bogotá and Popayán, continuing in modified form after Colombian independence before decimal reform.
Latin American
Pine Tree Shilling
Colonial Massachusetts silver shilling struck by John Hull and Robert Sanderson, famous for carrying the fixed date 1652 for roughly three decades of actual production.
United States
Philippine Peso (US Administration, 1903)
Silver one-peso coin struck for the Philippines under early American colonial administration, part of a new US-designed coinage system introduced in 1903.
Asian
Half Farthing
A tiny copper coin worth one-eighth of a penny, struck mainly for use in colonial Ceylon during the reigns of George IV, William IV, and Victoria.
British
Spanish Gold Doubloon
A popular name for large Spanish colonial gold coins, typically two, four, or eight escudos, forever associated with pirate treasure and sunken Spanish galleons.
World