by Bill Snyder
There are five types of Double Strikes. They are: dramatic Double Strikes, flipped Double Strikes, indented 2nd Strikes, rotated Double Strikes, and Slight and Just-Barely Double Strikes.
(There is a word about Overstruck coins at the bottom of this page).
Dramatic Double Strikes
The name says it all. No need to get out the magnifying glass for these.
Rotated Double Strikes
(This English farthing was struck normally, then rotated a full 180 degrees and struck again. Notice that King Charles is looking in two different directions at once).
Flipped Double Strikes
Flip Double Strikes are struck normally, then turned up-side-down (and perhaps rotated) and struck again. This Russian kopek shows a horse on each side (The horse is at the lower right side of the image on the left and at the center of the image on the right). Also, the date '61' appears twice.
Indented 2nd Strike
Indented second strikes show the second strike on only one side because a blank planchet had slipped in between the other die and this struck coin. In this Italian example (above), the reverse die struck the reverse a 2nd time, imparting a second date. Yet on the other side (the obverse), the flared out portion from K-5 to K-8 only shows a smashed legend.
Slight and Just-Barely Double Struck
In these two examples, the English shilling (above) has the letters in the legends shifted about 1/2 letter height. I think of this as a slightly Double Struck coin.
The ruble (below) was struck a 2nd time, 95% o/c, on the obverse at K-3. (A magnified view of that section is shown below the coin). This is my 'just barely' Double Strike.
Coins that have been re-issued by Overstriking often look like coins that have been Double Struck. (They have, of course, been struck twice, but on purpose and with new dies).
It was common practice in some countries to re-use coins, without melting them down first. Both new and worn coins would be overstruck with new dies and new information. Nobody seemed to care if parts of the old legend or image showed through. Overstriking was done for one or both of these reasons:
(1) to revalue the money. A common example of this is the French 5 centimes pieces of the 1790's. All 5 centimes were overstruck into 10 centime (1 decime) pieces. The same obverse image of Liberty was used on the 5s and the 10s, so these coins look like double strikes. (In a way, they are, but intentional ones).
(2) To hail the new leader (and obliterate all reference to the old monarch). This was commonly done in Russia during the 18th century, for example, where each of the many Tsars and Tsarinas was busy obliterating all mention of their predecessors.
Some collectors specialize in Overstrikes, and they do indeed make a really nice collection. However, my interest is in accidental Double Strikes.
Back to DoubleStrikes