Russia. Peter the Great. Beard token. 1705. Original narrow beard variant (non Vorodel). Traces of gold plating. Gold plated VF. Very rare. Obverse: "money taken" (ДЕНГИ ВЗѦТЫ) Reverse: "Year 1705" (҂АѰЕ ГОДѸ) As part of his attempt to modernize the Russian empire along European standards, Tsar Peter I the Great forced his male subjects to shave off their beards. To placate resistance from those insisting of keeping their beards, Except for peasants and religious officials, Russian men will be required to pay a tax to maintain their beards. As proof of payment, they will be given this token and required to be carried in public. If caught without these tokens, police can publicly shave them. Given only a handful of men are willing to pay the tax, these tokens had limited issues making them rare. Coupled by the fact most were melted to mint new coins, original versions are very rare. Also, Novodels or official restrikes were minted for collection during the 19th century. This specimen was gold plated, illustrating the degree of value placed upon this by the original owners.
Eventually it must have worked, not many men in Russia wear a beard these days, but even Tsar Nicholas II wore a beard.
Wow... nice! Yours even has a counterstamp. I think that means the Owner had paid another fee to renew and then the token was counter-stamped.
Thanks.. Actually all are counterstamped as a form of officiating the coin.. Mine however was originally gold gilted indicating the owner really did treasure his beard and token to have it coated as such.
Haha.. Peter wanted to modernise Russia in the inage of Europe. One that was fashionable at the time not to have beards..It eventually died off..
They also have a latter reissue known as Novodel or restrikes. Basically later Russian nobility found these pretty intriguing and had restrikes issued to them. Novodels are more common and better conditioned sometimes in silver.
I've read quite a bit about Petr I and he is indeed a fascinating character. He travelled extensively - highly unusual for anyone, particularly an autocratic leader of a large nation to do in that time. In his extensive travels in Poland, Germany, France, Netherlands and the United Kingdom - I wonder how exposed to actual non-noble personages he was. I know that in his time in the Netherlands that he worked in a shipwrights shop to acquire the ship building skills that he would take back to Russia. I wonder, were all the men building ships in Rotterdam clean shaven?
There were exceptions such as clergy..Most were happy to just pay to keep.. Perhaps not that expensive or widely enforced..Naturally it did not last very long..
Petr I generally is held in high regard because of his pro-European westernization. What many other than academics know about him is minimal. He condemned his sister Sofia to a convent, also his first wife Eudoxia was similarly condemned. He lived with a Lithuanian peasant girl for years outside of marriage while he was still legally married to Eudoxia - he would later marry the peasant girl and she would become Ekaterina I after Petr's death in 1725. While all this was going on, his son Aleksei from his first marriage was traipsing around Europe with a girlfriend ignoring his father's orders. He was lured back to Russia where Petr I is believed to have ordered his death. Petr I was no saint. But he did have the Russian mint issue the first decimal coinage - the first nation anywhere in the world to have done so.
