Coins of Alexander II and the monetary system of the country during his reign

2024 Author: Sierra Becker | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-26 03:47

Alexander II was the All-Russian emperor, the great Finnish prince and the king of Poland. He became one of the last and most important representatives of the Romanov dynasty. One of the sons of Alexandra Feodorovna and Nikolai Pavlovich.

A little about the emperor's reforms

His reign and contribution to Russian history is marked by the most important and large-scale reforms, with the help of which he succeeded in transforming, improving and enhancing the internal politics and position in Russia. In the second half of the 19th century, the well-known serfdom was abolished, after which financial reform was legalized. In honor of this, the emperor was awarded a special award - the nickname Liberator. All this laid a strong and stable foundation for the country's capitalist economy.

Transformations and innovations in foreign policy were also crowned with success: the Crimean War ended, and the North Caucasus, part of Georgia, the Far East, Turkestan, Transbaikalia, Central Asia and Bessarabia were annexed. At the end of the 19th century, the last war, the Russian-Turkish war, finally ended, as a result of which a peace treaty was concluded with the Ottoman Empire. Although it was not without damaging consequences that affected the future of the country. Due to economic instability and financial problems in 1867, the United States bought Alaska from Russia.

Coins of Alexander 2

Tsar Alexander II did not leave the country's finances without his attention. Since 1867, he reduced the weight of copper coins, which by that time had not changed their weight and external characteristics for fifty years (that is, until the revolution itself). The design of silver coins has changed, and since that moment they have not changed any more. In addition, an innovation has appeared - a gold coin of Alexander 2 with a face value of three and five rubles.

Silver coins

Silver coins at that time were much more popular and attractive, which is why their design and issue were more beautiful and more diverse than gold coins. The smallest silver coin of Emperor Alexander II was a five kopeck coin.

Further in ascending order were coins of ten, fifteen, twenty and twenty-five kopecks, as well as the ruble and fifty. At one quarter of a penny, the price of a copper coin began. Under Alexander, 2 coins were minted in half a kopeck, one, two, three, five and ten kopecks. In addition to all this, money remained in the system - that was the name of the former dengu due to the fact that it did not go out of circulation. Part of the copper coins of Alexander 2 had the inscription "A2" on the reverse side, and the other part was minted with a double-headed eagle.