Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 2012. Estimate $5000.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $3000. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

RUSSIA. Alexei Mikhailovich. 1645-1676. AR Half Yefimok (Jefimok) (14.63 g, 2h). Dated 1655. A taler of Friedrich V of Brunswick-Lüneburg-Celle, halved and countermarked with two punches: horseman right with monogram below in dotted circle (Type I) and date in plain rectangle (Type II). Coin: Davenport 6492; KM 146.1; Countermarks: Efimki 870 (this coin); Kaim I p. 129; KM -. Coin and c/ms VF, toned, flan crack from re-striking. Very rare.($5000)

Ex Willy Fuchs Collection (Sotheby's, 24-25 April 1997), lot 65; purchased from L. Södermann 5 April 1967.

The half yefimok is a problematic issue. There is no documentary evidence for its production, and its extreme rarity, with approximately twenty examples known, suggests it was not a regular issue. It has been proposed that the fractional yefimiki were used to balance a shipment of full yefimiki, when light weight talers caused a batch to be slightly under the normative value. It has been noted that most half yefimiki were cut prior to re-striking, but that some genuine examples are known that were cut after the countermarks were applied.