Just to the right of the lower olive branch leaves are a couple raised blobs headed toward the nasty little black spot of an otherwise nice-looking coin. Any idea what caused those spots?
Go to vam world Google it click on 1922 and search all the vams for that year. I've never seen this before but I'm not a expert on Peace dollars. There are photos you can compare with your coin.
Thanks, I had checked those and couldn't find a match. Luckily there were only over 200 to go through, so I may have missed it.
Die chips. There's a good chance it is actually listed at VAMWorld. Look for any more prominent die cracks and you have a good shot at identifying it.
Maybe @messydesk can help. I'm with paddy though as peace dollars aren't my vamming cup of tea yet. Unless it's a planchet issue or minor retained strikethrough. Can't tell from pics but if it's a known vam pup then messy should know
That's a clashing artifact, from the top rear of the head under the R in LIBERTY. I'm guessing you will find die polishing artifacts on this coin; if that clash is visible, the original clash should have included a spike from the eagle's shoulder up towards the N in UNUM. It's not there, meaning the die was likely polished after the clash. Perhaps they chose not to polish that spot because of the chance of erasing the rays.
That's a clash. Doesn't even look like one from those pics. I have to start studying peace dollars more.
Checked obverse between head and R...nothing. A couple faint gouges from eagle's right shoulder toward his neck. Nothing headed to "N" from shoulder. Thanks for all the thoughtful responses, I'll dig through the known VAM list a bit more and consider your responses
Since I was tagged above, I'll also say it was a clash as others have said. That particular clash isn't considered in the VAM listings, since it is rather common.
Guess I will bone up on clashes. The tough part for me is figuring out the die part that clashed, if it isn't obvious...like talons in Ike's forehead.
You accidentally posted an interesting coin for illustrating this. That's a 1921 high relief, which will have different clashing characteristics than the low relief coins. In lowering the relief of the design, in order to keep the design from looking to flat, the field was lowered further in a couple spots, giving the visual effect of sharpening the edge of the design. These spots were the back of the neck, which shows as a spike above the eagles "shoulder" when clashed, and the top of the hair below the R, which shows as the lump by the olive leaves. On a 1921, you don't get these clash marks because the design hadn't been modified to strike well yet.
