What does mmd and spmd mean in coins. The rarest and most expensive coins of modern Russia - list and prices

special mint designation is a company logo. In each country it can be different, there are no uniform standards. As a rule, these are abbreviations for the name of the city where the mint is located. But it can also be various graphic elements that distinguish a city or country. A coin of the same design may have different designations. mints, depending on the place of minting and the year of issue. Sometimes there are coins without a designation, but these are error coins, and they immediately become rarities.

Distinctive hallmark of the Russian Mint

FSUE Goznak is an enterprise entrusted with research, development and production of state signs, mainly coins and banknotes. AT this moment Russian coins are minted in the Moscow and St. Petersburg mints.

How to determine the mint on Russian coins?

One of the first questions of a novice numismatist. In fact, there is nothing complicated here. mint mark can be both in the form of individual letters, and their combinations. They are usually very small and magnifiers may be needed. To make it easier to distinguish Mint of Russia I'll tell you more about them.

If you look at the obverse of the coin in denominations of 10, 5, 2 and 1 ruble, then under the left paw of the eagle there will be a sign SPMD or MMD.

If you look at the obverse of the coin with a face value of 50, 10, 5 and 1 kopeck, then under the front left hoof of the horse there will be the letter M or S-P.

On coins previous periods there were also designations L and M.

Mint mark on some coins of Russia

More details about the location and designation of the mint on coins:

Looking closely at the designations on the coins, you can see the abbreviations SPMD and MMD. But what do these symbols mean and what are their differences? Let's analyze this issue in more detail.

Definition

SPMD coins- coins produced by the St. Petersburg Mint.

Coins MMD- coins minted by the Moscow Mint.

Comparison

The St. Petersburg Mint is considered one of the largest mints in the world, minting both ordinary and commemorative and commemorative items made of precious metals. It also serves as a place for the manufacture of insignia, medals, orders and other products from non-ferrous metal alloys under the state order. It was founded on the territory of the Peter and Paul Fortress in 1724. It is one of the most famous and oldest St. Petersburg enterprises. The main difference between the coins of the St. Petersburg Mint is the abbreviation SPMD, on modern Russian coins, located under the right foot of the bird. AT different time they also had other letter designations: SP, SPM, SPB, SM, LMD, L.

Left - MMD; right - SPMD

The Moscow Mint is also one of the leading producers of coins, various insignia and medals. Carries out minting of coins by order of foreign states, works with private customers. It issues investment, commemorative and precious coins, which become a collector's item for numismatists. The year of foundation of the Moscow Mint is officially considered to be 1942. Together with the St. Petersburg Mint, he serves as a member of an association called the State Sign. On the coins of the Moscow Mint, under the right paw of the eagle, there is the abbreviation MMD or simply the letter M. On penny coins, the abbreviations of one or another mint are placed under the hoof of the horse.

Sometimes there are coins that do not have any letter designation. They are considered defective and are valued at several times their face value. These coins include, for example, five-kopeck coins produced in 2002 and 2003.

Findings site

1. SPMD coins are coins produced by the St. Petersburg Mint.
2. MMD coins are coins minted by the Moscow Mint.
3. Old coins of the St. Petersburg Mint can also be designated with the symbols SP, SPM, SPB, SM, LMD, L. Products of the Moscow Mint have only two designations: M or MMD.
4. The coins of the Moscow Mint can be produced by individual order, while the products of the St. Petersburg Mint are produced exclusively by the state order.

First in Russia Mint appeared in 1534 in Moscow. In the period from 1697 to 1701, 5 enterprises for minting money already existed in Moscow. In 1724, by decree of Peter I, the same enterprise was founded in St. Petersburg, which after 1826 becomes the only one in Russian Empire. In Moscow, the minting of coins was resumed only in 1942 at a newly built enterprise.

In the Soviet Union, coins were produced at the Moscow and Leningrad enterprises. They were minted without a sign until 1991. In 1991, the trademark of the enterprise that minted the coin appeared on the obverse. The letter “M” is the designation of the Moscow Mint, and “L” is the designation of the Leningrad Mint. The signs were located in the lower part of the obverse of the coin to the right of the coat of arms of the USSR.

After the collapse of the USSR, a monetary reform took place, the appearance coins, their weight, and some other denominations appeared. On the first coins of the State Committee for the State of Emergency, the trademark was put on the reverse under the face value, and the designations of the hallmarks remained the same. In mid-1991, new hallmarks began to appear on coins of 1 ruble and above, namely “MMD” - Moscow Mint and "LMD" - Leningradsky. Now the coins were minted with different letters: “M”, “L”, “MMD”, “LMD” depending on the denomination. This continued until 1993. In 1993, after another monetary reform, the mint mark “M”, “L” finally disappeared.

After the renaming of Leningrad to St. Petersburg, the stigma also changed. Since 1997, they began to mint coins with the sign “SPMD”, which meant St. Petersburg Mint. The designation of Moskovsky remained the same - “MMD”. Each minting enterprise began to stamp two samples on the side of the obverse. On a trifle up to 50 kopecks, Moskovsky puts “M”, and St. Petersburg S-P and it is located under the raised hoof of the horse. From 1 ruble and above - “MMD” and “SPMD”, respectively. On these denominations, the sign is placed under the right paw of the eagle.

On modern commemorative coins, the mintmark is in different places, depending on the denomination. On the coins of 2 rubles and 5 rubles, it is located on the reverse on the right side between the curls of the branch. On a bimetallic coin with a denomination of 10 rubles - in the center on the reverse under the face value of the coin. On ten-ruble brass-coated steel coins issued since 2009, the sign is placed on the reverse side on the right side under the branch next to the year of issue.

Gallery of signs

Since the founding of the Russian Empire, there have been many enterprises for minting money. Each company had its own designation. Below are the names and signs of the mints of Tsarist Russia.

• AM - Anninsky
• BC - Krasny, Naberezhny
• BM - St. Petersburg
• VM - Warsaw
• EM - Yekaterinburg
• IM - Kolpinsky (Izhorsky)
• KD - Red
• KM - Kolyvansky, Suzunsky, Kolpinsky (Izhora)
• M, MD, MDD, MDZ, MM, MOSCOW - Kadashevsky
• MMD - Red
• MW - Warsaw
• ND, NDD, NDZ - Embankment
• SM - Sestroretsky (on nickels 1763-1767)
• SM - Petersburg (on coins of 1797-1799)
• C - Bank (on gold and silver money 1799-1801)
• SM - Suzunsky (on the money of 1798)
• SP - St. Petersburg
• SP - Bank (on gold and silver coins of 1800)
• St. Petersburg - St. Petersburg (on the money of 1724-1796 and 1805-1914)
• SPB - Bankovsky (on gold and silver coins of 1801-1805)
• St. Petersburg - Paris and Strasbourg (on a change of silver in 1861 without a minzmeister sign)
• SP - Birmingham (on copper coins 1896-1898)
• St. Petersburg - Rosenkranz Petersburg Plant (on coppers 1899-1901)
• SPM - St. Petersburg Mint
• SPM - Kolpinsky (Izhora) (copper 1840-1843)
• TM - Tauride

If you decide to get carried away with numismatics, you should carefully approach the selection of items for your collection. To quickly and correctly determine the market value of a banknote, you will need knowledge about mints. The point is that the same banknote, released by different yards, can differ in price several times.

Before you start looking for an emblem, you should determine the year of manufacture. If the date could not be found, most likely this coin was issued back in the days tsarist Russia, and only an experienced collector will be able to determine the belonging to the mint. The fact is that earlier there were about thirty mints in the country.

Today, the question is relevant: how to determine the mint on a coin? However, in modern Russia unlike the times of Tsarist Russia, there are only two mints - Moscow and St. Petersburg, whose emblems are displayed on the surface of the coins.

How can I find out what mint issued a coin? On products, their names are minted in the form of MMD and SPMD monograms. The letters M and S-P are displayed on penny coins.

If there are no mint emblems on the coins, they are a real find for collectors, and the value of such defective items will increase significantly. As surprising as it may sound, defective items are actually valued much higher due to their rarity.

Not every novice collector knows where the mint is indicated. In fact, this is not such a complicated procedure. To understand which court a coin belongs to, it is enough to take a magnifying glass and carefully examine its surface. Also, some collectors use a scanner or a camera.

Sometimes it is difficult for beginners to figure out how to distinguish between mints. On the coins that were issued by the Moscow Mint, the inscriptions are more rounded. This is one of the main differences.

On 10-ruble coins, the mint mark is located on the obverse, immediately below the face value. If the banknote was issued in the early 90s, then the emblem should be looked for on the front side. But on penny coins, the sign of belonging to the mint will be depicted under the front hooves of the horse on which the rider sits. In modern coins, the emblem is located on the reverse on the right side under the eagle's paw.

For those who do not know how to distinguish a mint, these features will be quite enough to independently determine the ownership of banknotes.

Very often, when we read professional literature on numismatics, we come across terms of incomprehensible meaning. Many abbreviations and abbreviations confuse the novice collector. Just like now, I very often began to see the obliterations of MMD and SPMD without decoding, as if everyone already knows what it is and “what it is eaten with”, and they also write that they need to be distinguished. So what are these mysterious letters? Let's take a look in detail.

To begin with, we will make a reservation that in the article we will consider only coins of the period of Modern Russia, i.e. from 1997 to the present day. Why is this important when talking about determining the differences between SPMD and MMD. The fact is that the abbreviations MMD and SPMD are nothing more than Moscow Mint and St. Petersburg Mint, respectively. It is in the form of such a pair of abbreviations that they are currently known, while earlier SPMD had the name LMD (Leningrad Mint) due to the former name of the city, and there were several “Moscow” mints in history, and so as not to make a dissertation from a short and understandable article we set a clear and understandable framework - we consider only coins of modern circulation.

Let's get down to business. Why is it important for a person who is keen on collecting coins to distinguish at which mint the coin was minted? There are two answers to this question:

• firstly, according to the mint, the coins receive the number of varieties, i.e. if, for example, a coin was minted only at MMD, then it has one variety in the mint, and if it was minted at both, then two, respectively. In a full-fledged collection, it is considered normal to have all varieties of collected coins, but if not all of them are collected, then the collection is considered incomplete;
• secondly, very often the price of a coin variety is extremely different depending on the mint of the manufacturer or even puts the coin in a number of rarities. Suppose a certain coin was minted on SPMD in the amount of 100 million copies (by numismatic standards, this is a lot), and on MMD - only 10 thousand pieces. Instantly, the price of "Moscow" copies will soar to very high limits, while "St. Petersburg", on the contrary, will practically not be appreciated.

So, why distinguish coins by mints, we sorted out, in principle, there should be no questions. Now closer to practice. I repeat, all modern coins are minted in our country at two mints: MMD and SPMD. Almost all coins (!!! there are very rare exceptions !!!) to determine the mint of the manufacturer bear a special stamp - the monogram (sign) of the mint or letter designation. The Moscow Mint corresponds to - the monogram "MMD" or the letter "M", St. Petersburg, respectively - "SPMD" or "S-P".

Where can I find the mint mark (monogram) on a coin? To do this, we need a good eye or, if necessary, a simple magnifying device (Magnifier, it is also a magnifying glass, in extreme cases, grandmother's glasses are suitable. Asking your son to steal a Microscope from a biology class is NOT NEEDED! ;) The following two figures show modern coins . In the first row there are images of coins "in full height", the red "marker" highlights that part of the coin field, which we will consider with magnification. The second row shows the enlarged part of the corresponding coin, i.e. the place where the sign (monogram) of the mint is depicted.

What do we see in the first picture? As you may have guessed, here are the coins of the Moscow Mint. For clarity, the usual lottery 1 kopeck and 1 ruble are also presented here, but there is also a golden George the Victorious. Probably, you have already noticed that the monogram on the Ruble 1997 differs from the mint's monogram on the fifty-ruble coin. That's right, the Moscow Mint really changed the images of its trademark and this happened at the turn of 1997 and 1998.

In the second picture, respectively, all the coins are "St. Petersburg", completely different signs (monograms) tell us about this. Definitely, the St. Petersburg monogram often looks smaller and harder to read, but with some practice, you can learn to distinguish them without any optical devices. Well, now you, like me, as well as many other numismatists, know how to distinguish MMD from SPMD, why be able to do this, and even a little more. My advice to you, dear readers: do not be lazy, take out the coins you currently have and practice, and you can also combine this with a parallel view of coin price lists, this can be very useful occupation, because even among the usual small change there is a chance to find truly rare coins, you just have to start!