My Other Purchase! Yazdegerd III or Yazdgerd III, the Final Sassanid King! A Nice Sassanid AR with a counterstamp... Anyone know anything about this piece other than what I have above? Edit: I just realized that one of the pictures is upside down Also, More information! Shahanshah Khurso II Hepthalite Counterstamp
WC: I know nothing about these. Anoob will know as will others on this forum. BTW, I am having no problem seeing the images.
I agree. However, that counterstamp is Hepthalite. So overall its fairly similar value, but it is something different than what you were told. Cool coin.
I was hoping the counterstamp was Hunnic I bought this coin on the fact that it was cooler than the cost of $40 (and I thought it was underpriced)...
It was underpriced. These usually run around $100 for my cheap rear. I am leaving on business, but can look up the countermark in Gobl later this week if no one else does.
Fairly common on Peroz and Khusro II coins. A large percentage of hepthalite coins are actually countermarked sassanid coins, especially of these two rulers. There are reasons for this of course, but probably too boring for most of you. They are found, though, on all sassanid coins between Peroz and Khusro II, just in smaller numbers.
While I agree it is Khusro II, it is too early for my mind to tackle reading the reverse. What I see that interests me is what I believe to be a plugged hole or a matching lump on both sides if I am guessing the orientation correctly. These often seem to have the plug and I suspect that they are ancient if not done at the mint. I wonder if they are weight control or repairing defects but it is a subject I'd like to know more about. My coin here (RD - Rayy mint year 25?) has one, too. For the record, below is a Yasdgard III, SK Sakastan year 4, I believe. A year or so ago Frank Robinson had a pile of these many of which having ragged or chippy edges which seems to be a common problem with this king.
On my coin note obverse on the inner circle of dots just right of the king's nose. On the reverse look between the base of the fire altar and the feet of the left attendant. These two raised lumps are back to back on the coin and suggest to me a silver plug was inserted in the coin at that position. There are similar lumps on the OP coin but the obverse one is much smaller. The question is whether they line up. Most Sasanian coins have 3h or 9h axes and allowing for the inverted photo, I suspect they are close.
On my coin note obverse on the inner circle of dots just right of the king's nose. On the reverse look between the base of the fire altar and the feet of the left attendant. These two raised lumps are back to back on the coin and suggest to me a silver plug was inserted in the coin at that position. There are similar lumps on the OP coin but the obverse one is much smaller. The question is whether they line up. Most Sasanian coins have 3h or 9h axes and allowing for the inverted photo, I suspect they are close. Also, I believe that long gouge on the reverse leading into the lump is not an accidental damage. Perhaps someone will have other similar digs on similar coins to show. There are enough similar marks on these coins that I can not accept them as random but I don't have the background to understand them.