Hello everyone, I am new to this site and this is my very first posting. Attached you will find a photo of five coins I think are from Germany. I have looked on many web sites that list German coins and I have not been able to ID these 5. Has anyone ever seen these before? Thank you Gerald
Yes they seem German, but if you realize the emblem is of E. German, and to my knowledge, I don't think East German had the resources to mint proof coins, much less possibility of marketing them. I guess it might be a grimmick product minted by a private company.
Gerald,these are genuine Proof coins from East Germany.Gxseries,East German Proof coins are listed in Krause,but in the back of the German chapter. Some East German Proof coins are priced highly in Krause.Either way,they are historically interesting.By the way,Gerald,welcome to the board. Aidan.
I looked through all 6-7 pages of East German coins and couldn't find any of these designs,including the center one which is a pretty basic theme on their coins.This leads me to believe that these are commemorative medals and not monetized.I might be wrong so if anyone can show me otherwise,please do! EDIT:I just translated the "octopus with deaths head " coin and it reads "scum of humanity" and a quote from an East German official's speech "I love you,each and every one" meaning the citizens.The "stasi" or secret police one reads "memories of the future" which seems like an attempt at sarcasm.This leads me to believe that these were some sort of anti-communist or at least anti East German propoganda pieces.
Thank you for the replies. I should have posted that the one in the middle is the reverse side on all the coins. Those translations are pretty interesting. I had also translated the octopus coin and was surprised by what it said. I did start thinking that perhaps these coins were some sort of fake coin. It would be interesting to figure out who made them and why.
These are not coins but tokens or medals. They look as if they had been issued by East Germany, but they are not. East Germany was the "DEUTSCHE DEMOKRATISCHE REPUBLIK" and these coins are issued by the "DEUTSCHE DEMORALISCHE REPUBLIK" (German Demoralised Republic), an imaginary republic which never existed. The value is not in Mark, but in M.D.N.(whatever this may mean) So, it is logical they don't appear in Krause. bart
MDN (short for Mark der Deutschen Notenbank) was actually the name of the GDR mark until the end of 1967. But as you mentioned, the "country name" indicates that these are not GDR issues but - probably satirical - medals. The year 1989 refers to when the communist regime ended in the GDR. But I guess these medals were made outside the country ... And yes, of course there are GDR proof coins. Most of those pieces were made for collectors in other countries though. Christian
Thank you everyone for taking a look at these. They might not be worth anything, but at least they are neat to look.
