I recently acquired this beautiful little silver minor from a member on the PCGS forums. It arrived yesterday, and I thought it might be a fun old coin for a guess the grade. Luster is booming in hand and the fields are nearly prooflike. There are some signs of filled dies and the beginnings of a die crack above the rearing horse. For those of you who like history, this little coin was issued by Ernest August, Duke of Brunswick-Lueneburg (1661-1692) and after this coin was issued, later the Elector-designate of Hanover. If you follow British lineage at all, Ernest August was the father of the eventual George I of Great Britain. He was married to Sophia of the Palatinate - an heir through the Stuart line of the British royal family. All of the Hanover line of British Regents from George I through the last Queen Victoria were descendants of Ernest August. As for the coin - it is a two year type (1681 and 1686). The Mariengroschen is a division unit of the Hanover Thaler. There were 36 Mariengroschen to the Thaler - thus this coin had a value of 1/9 of a Thaler. The legends read: SOLA BONA QUAE HONESTA - The only good things are those which are honorable. ERN:AUG.D.G.EP:OSN.D.B.&L. - Ernest Augustus, by the grace of God, Bishop of Osnabrueck, Duke of Brunswick and Lueneburg.
I'm not very good at this, but I said AU58. I see, what I think is, wear on the horse, rope & beads. By the way, it looks like the horse's right foreleg is detached, probably from overpolishing. Changed "chain" to "beads".
Sometimes when I post photos here I think they must be compressing them or doing something a bit odd to them - they often show up a bit fuzzier than the originals. Here are the straight out of the camera photos of the coin, cropped (and 25% downsize).
I saw that too. Those areas on the design are a little on the soft side, as it is. I think those areas are just accentuated on this coin, as against the corrosion that set in on the rest of the body. Those are the high points on that obverse, though, so AU58 is plausible. Tell you what, let's split our differences, AU64. If there ever was one, this one is it.
Clearly a difficult little coin to grade from photos. I agree with the NGC grade, about as close to a gem little coin as you can get. There is no rub on the horse or beads. There is some die degradation (rust) on the body of the horse, and the planchet is not completely struck up on the very highest of areas that people are perceiving as wear. The die has the beginnings of a crack just above the horse body. The coin has booming luster, with some nice toning in the hidden areas. This coin was likely stored in an envelope or coin cabinet for a very long time. The centering on this is superb for the era (they come very often off-center, dentils missing on one side, etc.). I'm very happy to add this ~340 year old coin to my collection. For reference, below is the example imaged in the Krause catalog:
For what it's worth, I just guessed 63. The booming luster you describe is not translating well in the pictures. The fields look rough, but that may be due to the manufacture. In any case, it appears to be an extraordinary example, and clearly superior to the Krause image.