The first thing a novice numismatist should learn is to identify the mint where the coin was made. This skill will come in handy more than once, because... In many ways, the value of a coin is determined by where it was minted and in what quantity.
You will need
Instructions
Determine the year of issue of the coin
First, determine what year the coin was issued. Mints appeared in Rus' back in the 11th century, but they did not immediately begin to indicate their emblems on coins. Quite often the initials of the master who made the coin were simply indicated. So, look for the minting date on your coin. If you could not find it, but assume that the coin was issued during the times of Tsarist Rus', then in most cases only an experienced specialist can determine the mint. The fact is that before the beginning of the 20th century, about three dozen mints functioned in Russia, and often their letter designations coincided. Difficulties will also arise if the coin was issued in Soviet times, because pre-1990 emblem mint it was simply not indicated.
Where to look for the mint emblem?
So, you are convinced that the coin was issued between 1990 and the present, the next step is to find where the emblem of the mint, or the abbreviation of its name, is indicated. On coins from the early 1990s, as well as on modern commemorative coins with a face value of 10 rubles, the mint mark should be looked for directly under the denomination. On coins from 1 to 50 kopecks, the mint emblem is indicated under the left front hoof of the horse, and coins from 1 to 10 rubles have a mark under the paw of a double-headed eagle on the right side. Thus, the mint can be indicated on the coin in three places, and inspect them.
A magnifying glass will help you examine the mint mark
What types of emblems are there?
Today there are two mints in Russia - St. Petersburg and Moscow, and they are usually designated by abbreviations. The Moscow Mint has the following abbreviations: M (coins with a face value of 1-50 kopecks), MMD (coins with a face value of 1 ruble). The St. Petersburg Mint is indicated as S-P (1-50 kopecks), SPMD (on coins from 1 ruble), L or LMD (on Soviet-style coins). You can only see abbreviations well with a magnifying glass, but most often it is enough to simply understand the first letter.
What if there is no logo?
If you carefully examined the coin from all sides and did not find the treasured emblem anywhere, this is also good sign. If there really is no abbreviation, it means marriage. Yes, this happens at the mint too. But do not be discouraged in any case, because due to their rarity, such coins are valued higher than ordinary ones.
By carefully studying all the available coins for sale, it appears best opportunity for a decent choice. Many coins are distinguished by the presence of the abbreviation SPMD, as well as MMD. What are the differences? What is important to pay attention to when studying symbols?
SPMD and MMD coins: what are they?
- SPMD is a designation that indicates production in St. Petersburg.
- MMD indicates official release in Moscow.
SPMD and MMD coins: general information about the difference
SPMD is one of the most famous and largest institutions of this format in the whole world. It is planned to mint various commemorative and anniversary items, as well as ordinary products using precious metals. The main focus is initially on coins. In most cases, government orders are carried out.
Successful activities started in 1724, and currently glorify St. Petersburg throughout Russia and neighboring countries. Manufactured modern products are offered with the abbreviation SPMD, which is the main difference. Modern coins boast an abbreviation under the bird's right foot. Previously, coins were issued with other designations in the form of letters, and their number turns out to be quite large (7 options). 
MMD is one of the most famous manufacturers coins The company is engaged in minting coins, fulfilling orders from foreign countries and private customers. Products include investment, commemorative, and precious metals of interest to numismatists. The institution has been successfully operating since 1942. The Moscow Mint, like the St. Petersburg Mint, is a member of the state association "Gosznak", which corresponds to current situation On the market. However, on the manufactured products, under the eagle’s right paw, one can note the presence of the abbreviation MMD or M, which indicates a different manufacturing institution.
On penny coins, the abbreviations MMD, M are placed under the horse’s hoof. This rule applies to both mints. In addition, occasionally coins do not have any letter designation because they are defective items and cannot be valued at face value. 
SPMD and MMD coins: important differences
- SPMD coins are produced by the St. Petersburg plant, MMD by the Moscow plant.
- Old coins issued in St. Petersburg have different designations, despite the fact that Moscow products are presented in only two designations.
- The Moscow Mint carries out only individual orders. At the same time, the St. Petersburg Mint operates only on the basis of government orders.
It is important to note that both institutions are not limited to just issuing coins, so the range of products is wide and varied.
Valuable coins MMD and SPMD
All numismatists know which items turn out to be the most valuable. In most cases, the following options are expected to be highly popular:
- SPMD 5 rubles (2003). The average cost is 6,000 rubles. The circulation is characterized by minimal volumes. The coin is made in regular design. Expect no wide edges, offset lettering, or unique patterns. The only difference is the manufacturer's abbreviation.
- MMD 1 ruble (1997). This version of the coin has a wide edge. In this case, the edge can be flat or protruding (steps on the reverse, as well as on the obverse). Flat products are less common. The cost is 5000 – 8000 rubles.
- 2 rubles (2003) SPMD. The limited edition led to a cost of 8,000 rubles.
- 1 ruble (2003) SPMD. The average price is 10 thousand rubles. Minimum circulation expected. As a result, the cost of coins significantly exceeds their face value.
- 1 ruble (2001) MMD. The coin is valued at 30 thousand rubles. In Russia, there are several design options in use. Despite the official release of everyday life, the appeal started. The number of pieces produced is unknown, but it indicates the rarity of the coin. The maximum cost for a product in perfect condition reaches 30,000 rubles.
- 2 rubles (2001) MMD. Official minting has not started. 2-ruble coins managed to get into circulation, but without an official indication of the issued quantity. The right to become the owner of valuable products will cost a couple of tens of thousands of rubles.
- 50 kopecks (2001) MMD. The price starts from one hundred thousand rubles (most bad condition products), but if you want a better copy, it is recommended to count on an additional 20 thousand rubles to the initial cost. There is no reliable information, at least about single sales of released products.
- 5 rubles (1999) SPMD. The price exceeds 250,000 rubles, which indicates the most expensive domestic products. Currently only one copy exists. Unique design It is almost impossible to repeat, and it is this that gives the coins their special value.
Every numismatist is able to choose exactly the offer that actually suits his needs and financial capabilities.
If you look closely at the symbols on the coins, you can see the abbreviations SPMD and MMD. But what do these symbols mean and what are their differences? Let's look at this question in more detail.
Definition
SPMD coins– coins produced by the St. Petersburg Mint.
MMD coins– coins minted by the Moscow Mint.
Comparison
The St. Petersburg Mint is considered one of the largest mints in the world, engaged in the minting of both regular and commemorative and anniversary items from precious metals. It also serves as a place for the production of insignia, medals, orders and other products made from non-ferrous metal alloys. government order. Founded on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress in 1724. It is one of the most famous and oldest St. Petersburg enterprises. The main difference between the coins of the St. Petersburg Mint is the abbreviation SPMD, located under the right foot of the bird on modern Russian coins. IN different time they also had other letter designations: SP, SPM, SPB, SM, LMD, L.
Left - MMD; on the right - SPMD
The Moscow Mint is also one of the leading producers of coins, various insignia and medals. Mints coins commissioned by foreign states and works with private customers. It produces investment, commemorative and precious coins that become collectibles for numismatists. The year 1942 is officially considered the founding date of the Moscow Mint. Together with the St. Petersburg Mint, it serves as a member of an association called Gosznak. On the coins of the Moscow Mint, under the right paw of the eagle there is the abbreviation MMD or simply the letter M. On penny coins, the abbreviations of a particular mint are placed under the horse’s hoof.
Sometimes there are coins that do not have any letter designation. They are considered defective and are valued at several times their face value. Such coins include, for example, five-kopeck coins issued in 2002 and 2003.
Conclusions website
- SPMD coins are coins produced by the St. Petersburg Mint.
- MMD coins are coins minted by the Moscow Mint.
- Old coins of the St. Petersburg Mint can also be designated by the symbols SP, SPM, SPB, SM, LMD, L. Products of the Moscow Mint have only two designations: M or MMD.
- Coins of the Moscow Mint can be issued according to individual order, while products of the St. Petersburg Mint are produced exclusively on state orders.
Very often, when we read professional literature on numismatics, we come across terms of unknown meaning. Many abbreviations and abbreviations confuse the new collector. Just like now, I very often began to see the obreviations of MMD and SPMD without decoding, as if everyone already knows what it is and “what they eat it with,” and they also write that they need to be distinguished. So what are these mysterious letters? Let's take a closer look.
To begin with, let’s make a reservation that in the article we will only consider coins from the period of Modern Russia, i.e. from 1997 to the present day. Why is this important when talking about determining the differences between SPMD and MMD. The fact is that the abbreviations MMD and SPMD are nothing more than the Moscow Mint and the St. Petersburg Mint, respectively. It is in the form of such a pair of abbreviations that they are known at the present time, earlier SPMD had the name LMD (Leningrad Mint) due to the former name of the city, and in general there were several “Moscow” mints in history, and so as not to make a dissertation from a short and understandable article We set a clear and understandable framework - we consider only coins of modern circulation.
Let's get down to business. Why is it important for a person who is passionate about collecting coins to distinguish at which mint a coin was minted? There are two answers to this question:
- firstly, by mint, coins receive the number of varieties, i.e. if, for example, a coin was minted only at the MMD, then it has one variety per mint, and if it was minted at both, then there are respectively two. In a full-fledged collection, it is considered normal to have all types of collected coins, but if not all of them are collected, then the collection is considered incomplete;
- secondly, very often the price of a type of coin is extremely different depending on the mint of the manufacturer, or even puts the coin among the rarities. Let's say a certain coin was minted on the SPMD in the amount of 100 million copies (by numismatic standards this is a lot), and on the MMD - only 10 thousand pieces. Instantly the price of “Moscow” copies will skyrocket to very high limits, while “St. Petersburg” copies, on the contrary, will have practically no value.
So, we have discussed why we should distinguish coins by mint; in principle, there should be no questions. Now closer to practice. I repeat, all modern coins are minted in our country at two mints: MMD and SPMD. Almost all coins (!!! there are very rare exceptions!!!) to identify the manufacturer's mint bear a special mark - a monogram (sign) of the mint or a letter designation. The Moscow Mint corresponds to the monogram "MMD" or the letter sign "M", the St. Petersburg Mint, respectively, to "SPMD" or "S-P".
Where can you find the mint mark (monogram) on a coin? To do this, we will need a good eye or, if necessary, a simple magnifying device (Magnifying glass, also known as a magnifying glass; in extreme cases, grandma’s glasses will do. Asking your son to steal a Microscope from a biology class is NOT NECESSARY! ;) The following two pictures show modern coins . In the first row there are images of coins "in full height", the red "marker" highlights that part of the coin field that we will examine with magnification. The second row shows the enlarged part of the corresponding coin, i.e. the place where the sign (monogram) of the mint is depicted.
What do we see in the first picture? As you may have guessed, here are coins from the Moscow Mint. For clarity, the usual circulation 1 kopeck and 1 ruble are presented here, but there is also a gold St. George the Victorious. You have probably already noticed that the monogram on the 1997 Ruble differs from the mint monogram on the fifty-ruble coin. That's right, the Moscow Mint really changed the images of its trademark and this happened at the turn of 1997 and 1998.
In the second picture, accordingly, all the coins are “St. Petersburg”; completely different signs (monograms) tell us this. Definitely, the St. Petersburg monogram often looks smaller and difficult to read, but with some practice you can learn to distinguish them without any optical instruments. Well, now you, like me, as well as many other numismatists, know how to distinguish MMD from SPMD, why you need to know how to do this, and even a little more. My advice to you, dear readers: don’t be lazy, take out the coins you currently have and practice, and you can also combine this with parallel viewing of the Price Lists for coins, this can be a very useful activity, because even among ordinary small change there is a chance of finding truly rare coins, you just have to start!
Hello, dear readers. In this article we will talk about how to distinguish mints by their designations on coins. Already a novice collector, looking at catalogs, sees that coins of certain years are distributed into the “MMD” and “SPMD” groups. Most limit themselves to looking at the price tags, noting that coins with “S-P” written under the horse’s hoof and “” written under the eagle’s paw are sometimes more expensive than their Moscow sisters. However, those who intend to study the issue deeper should understand that most varieties of the catalog are based on exactly how the initials of the Russian mints are located on the field of the coin relative to other elements of the design.
Designation of mints on coins of modern Russia
Minting of metal payment tokens for cash payments after monetary reform In 1997, both mints began working in full. To mark penny denominations we decided to use mint initials- letters "M" and "S-P". They decided to leave the location traditional: on the right side of the lower half of the coin field. Since on kopecks with the date “1997” and later the obverse is occupied by St. George the Victorious, slaying a snake, it turned out that the letters ended up under the rearing hoof of the hero’s four-legged companion. They look quite harmonious there. Ruble denominations are no longer decorated with letters, but logos mints.
The elongated logo of the St. Petersburg Mint almost imperceptibly survived the transformation from LMD to SPMD. But the emblem of the Moscow court has evolved somewhat. In 1997, a monogram containing three letters " " was inscribed in almost smooth circle. The emblem looked large and took up quite a lot of space on the coin field. Apparently for unification, since 1998, the Moscow emblem appears in a flattened version and in more modest sizes. However, it still looks more rounded than the SPMD logo.
For commemorative coins, one of the sides is completely given over to the design, so issuer designation"Bank of Russia" moves to the side where the denomination is located. The mint logo is also sent there. For bimetallic ten-ruble coins, it is located in the center of the lower half of the coin field under the inscription “RUBLE”. This is important to know because coins with the same design may have different different price depending on which mint issued this or that copy.
The case where there is no mint designation deserves a separate discussion. It is necessary to distinguish when this is a recognized variety (5 kopecks 2002 or 2003 or an anniversary two-piece with Gagarin), and when the letter or logo is missing as a result of a banal unminted coin (50 kopecks 2007 or bimetallic tens). In the first case, you have enough in your hands valuable coin. The second case is a common coin defect and big money not worth it).
Let's look back through the pages of history. IN Soviet times Most of the coins were minted at the Leningrad Mint, so the issue of designating the place of minting became actual only with the connection of the Moscow mint to the mass issues of the annual circulation. The exception is anniversary ruble“30 Years of Victory”, where a careful look can detect the elongated LMD logo to the right of the pedestal on which the grandiose monument “Motherland” is installed.
"MMD" and "LMD" on gold coins of the USSR
Mint abbreviations are also present on gold chervonets, which the Goths began to mint in the mid-seventies with the expectation that they would be purchased by wealthy Western tourists who came to the Moscow Olympics. Here we should pay attention to the Leningrad chervonets of 1981, which is a recognized rarity, while the Moscow coin with the same date does not stand out from the rest.
In the late eighties, experienced numismatists easily distinguished yards by date numbers. But 1991 revealed the letter designation “L” or “M” to the right of the coat of arms of the USSR (depending on whether the Leningrad or Moscow Mint minted them). We will see the same letters on coins of 10 and 50 kopecks new coin series, nicknamed by collectors "GKChP". Ruble denominations have already acquired courtyard logos. Fives from 1991 have to be placed in albums in two versions. But the situation with bimetallic tens is more interesting. The elongated LMD logo separates ordinary coins from very rare specimens, where we will see the rounded MMD emblem.
And for fives and rubles with the date “1992” there are already three slots prepared in the albums. The Moscow Mint first minted coins with the logo, but later the letter “M” appeared instead. In Leningrad, they initially began to mint these denominations exclusively with the letter “L”. Of the trinity of fives of a given year, coins with the emblem are found less frequently, although even they are not so difficult to find when systematically scanning the heaps in those regions that were serviced by the Moscow Mint.
Designation of mints on coins of Tsarist Russia
Let's look even deeper into history. If we take the fourteenth century, then cities such as Ryazan, Novgorod, Pskov and Tver could boast of having a mint. True, crude blacksmithing technologies were mainly used here. The dominance gradually passed to the state mint, created in 1534 in Moscow. And under Alexei Mikhailovich, the activities of non-resident mints were temporarily stopped, and the coin business was concentrated in Moscow. In 1697, the Red Court, also called the Chinese Courtyard, opened because of its location near Kitay-Gorod. A century of life was measured for him, and during this period the coins issued at his facilities received the designations “KD”, “MD” and “MM”. Among the Moscow courtyards, we also note Kadashevsky, which also had the designations “MD”, but in addition also “MDZ”, “MDD”, “M” and “MOSCOW”. For the minting of kopecks from silver and copper coins on the territory of the Moscow Kremlin in the first quarter of the eighteenth century, the Embankment Mint, designated as “ND” and “NDZ”, operated.
But now St. Petersburg has been rebuilt, receiving metropolitan status, where the St. Petersburg Mint opened in 1721. Since 1724, it was he who was given the right to mint silver coins. Initially it was located right in the Peter and Paul Fortress, but by the nineteenth century it was moved to Sadovaya Street, allocating him the area of the Assignation Bank, and then to a special building in Petropavlovsk. Over the years of its existence, it received the following designations: “BM”, “SM”, “SP”, “SPM” and “SPB”.
The vast expanses of Russia did not allow transporting a sufficient number of coins, while the need for them only increased in connection with the successful expansion to the east. It was necessary to establish the minting of money in the newly acquired territories. This is how they appear mints in Yekaterinburg ("EM"), the village of Anninskoye, Perm province ("AM"), Sestroretsk ("SM"). The Suzunsky Mint ("KM" and "SM") also worked successfully. The Siberian lands were provided with money by the Kolpino court (in different years- “IM”, “KM” and “SPM”). On the southern borders, coins were minted from Tiflis and, for a very short time, Feodosia (“TM” - “Tauride coin”). Poland, as part of Russia, had a fairly large degree of independence, including its own mint in Warsaw. Coins minted there are designated "MW", "WM" (Warszawska mennica) and "VM" (Warsaw coin).
Just don’t confuse the mint designation with with the initials of the mintzmeister. Traditionally, on small and medium denominations, the letters indicating the first and last name of the mintsmeister were placed on the obverse under the eagle, and we will see the affiliation with the mint on the reverse under the denomination designation. In determining the value of coins of Imperial Russia, the initials of the mints are important. A coin of the same denomination with the same date could be minted en masse by one mint, while another would produce it in an extremely limited edition. For example, 42,450,000 copies of two kopecks with the date “1812” and the letters “IM” were minted; in Yekaterinburg (designation “EM”) as many as 132,085,700 coins were made, while only 250 thousand coins received the letters “KM”.
Graphic and letter designations on foreign coins
In conclusion, a few words about foreign coins. For European weather, sometimes the mint is also crucial. So complete collection of euro two-room apartments must include five copies of the same German coin, differing only by a single letter: A (Berlin), D (Munich), F (Stuttgart), G (Karlsruhe) or J (Hamburg). In the USA, on modern cents and dollars, mints are also distinguished by a single letter: D (Denver), O (New Orleans), P (Philadelphia), S (San Francisco) and W (West Point - precious metals only).
However, not all countries use letter designations. So Paris Mint France uses the cornucopia as a designation, and we will see the caduceus on coins Royal Mint Netherlands. However, here too one should not confuse the mint logo with graphic designation its director, which may change periodically when the position changes hands.