I added this coin dated 1682 to my collection this last weekend. I don't have a listing for it in my catalogs. To be honest, I'm really weak on the geography & history associated with this coin. Any information you can give me would be appreciated. From the Internet I gleaned that the coin depicts the Great Elector Fredrick William of Brandenburg, Prussia. From what I can gather, the coin is from somewhere between Brandenburg in modern day NW Germany and Lithuania which would place this coin from the area that is now modern day Poland. Is this right? Fredrick William was supposedly the Duke of Prussia & the "Great Elector" of Brandenburg during the period from 1640-1688. The coin is very thin and it rings when tapped with a wooden pencil so I believe it is a struck coin. I did not weigh it but the diameter is about 29 mm. Thanks for letting me share & I appreciate your comments on the coin.
When that coin was issued, Brandenburg-Prussia was further east than the state of Brandenburg is today. This map shows Brandenburg-Prussia in the 17th century. See the city of Königsberg, in the upper right area? That is where the piece was minted (the initials "HS" refer to the mintmaster Heinrich Sievert). Today's Brandenburg is one of the 16 states of the Federal Republic of Germany (see this map). It is in the east of the country. Königsberg became part of the RSFSR and the Soviet Union after WW2, and the city's name has been Kaliningrad since 1946. Today the city and the district (oblast) are a Russian exclave; the neighboring countries are Lithuania in the north and Poland in the south. Christian
