I recently obtained an 1862 silver rupee. In hand, the coin appears to exhibit nice bands of mint luster. On close examination, however, I noticed a pattern of marks across the surfaces. They seem to be more in the fields than anywhere else. I own a couple "whizzed" coins and this coin doesn't look like them, but...being new to modern coins I'm wondering if the marks on this rupee are normal mint luster, or if they are cleaning marks, or whizzing marks. Thanks!
They appear (to me) to be under not across the letters. If so, that would be something with the die, such as polishing.
They might be radial flow lines (caused by die deterioration), but I'm not quite sure. Are the areas with the "lines" more lustrous/shiny?
That’s what I think, too, die polishing reaching the surface and shallow devices but not the deeper areas of the die.
That makes sense. It is pretty much restricted to the fields and doesn't appear to hit the edges of the lettering or go over it, like you'd expect with whizzing. Hard to tell, but I think so. Would this be from microscopic fractures in the die surface?
It's similar to dirt erosion during a heavy rain. As the metal flows to fill the design, it slowly "erodes" the dies.
The erosion causes the dies to be etched with microscopic lines. Light reflects off those lines causing a "cart wheel" effect on BU coins. But they are microscopic. I'm not sure they wil show at all on an image.