Siberianman, a great collection of coins from terrible times. Here is my Vichy 50 cents 1941. http://picasaweb.google.com/Ripley44mag/FrenchBelgiumItalianEmpire#5432606683531127906
By the way, while that is a coin minted during the German occupation, it has the standard "Liberté - Égalité - Fraternité" motto. That design was also used before and after the war, and the motto can still be found on French circulation coins today ... Christian
Are you certain that the right image says "Hapa" on the reverse ? The coin's legends appear to be in the Cyrillic alphabet. If so, that first character is pi, which makes the "p" sound. The third character looks like a "P", but it comes from the greek letter rho and makes the "r" sound. Rendered in English, it would be "para".
Typo? That would be a 50 Heller (German) or 50 haleru (Czech) piece. Yours is well preserved, considering that it is a zinc coin ... Christian
Interesting to see how occupation coins are sometimes the same as, and sometimes very different from, the regular pieces. I have that coin from Czechoslovakia too - not the pre-WW2 issue though, but the post-war issue. So that design was used in the republic for almost 20 years, then in the nazi "protectorate", and then after the war until the currency reform in the mid-1950s ... Christian
I like to collect coins from World War 2. I only have about 7 Nazi Coins but I got several from occupied France, the Empire of Japan, and some Japanese Invasion notes.
A very similar coin was produced by the US for Belgium, by the way. I don't have it, but see here: http://www.muenzauktion.com/pollandt/item.php5?id=612 Both (the one for France and the one for Belgium) were minted in Philadelphia. Minimalistic designs; guess they were meant to be temporary only ... Christian
The Hungarian 2 Pengö coins from 1944 which have been stamped by arrow cross party and other coin later on by soviet supported government. I have two of those. Very interesting. I started to suspect that these may have been striked after the war... Any thoughts?