I know that older coins were counterstamped to assure others that the coin was real and a guarantee by the stamp. My question is why do people of today counterstamp coins. I have a wheat cent stamped with a Z and a 1973 Jefferson stamped with a 5. Do people actually collect these counterstamped coins ? Dave
There was a bit more to it than that. Typically a coin was countermarked/counterstamped to indicate either a change in its face value, or an acceptance of that coin at a declared value, often less but sometimes more than its face value, by a govt., country, or entity other than the one that issued the coin to begin with. Today it is done as more of a whim by private individuals, or by a company trying to advertise. Though for the most part companies stopped doing that a few decades ago.
Often because someone just got a new set of punches and they cant wait to try them out. A coin often makes a convenient test object. The older counterstamps that can be traced to a particular issuer, yes. Anonymous letters or symbols, old or modern, usually not.
Yeah, kinda sorta. But chop marks aren't really countermarks, not in the sense that they are usually thought of.
Is there any way to research counterstamped/marked coins? We have one we are curious about. 1941 quarter, marked with P35, then another P on the head of George Washington....
Start a new thread with pictures, there is a regular poster here who specializes in counterstamped coins. Just based on your description we'll probably never know.