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400 YEARS OF RUSSIAN COINS AND CURRENCY 

For hundreds of years much of Russian commerce was based on these tiny silver

coins called wire money. The coins were struck by taking a piece of silver wire,cutting it to the proper weight, then smashing it between a pair of dies by astrong-armed Russian. As might be expected, the coins are quite crude and areusually struck partly off-center. The coin shows a horseman, on one side andlegends on the other.

Russian Paper Money — Imperial period

The first russian paper money were printed in 1769 during the reign of 

Ekaterina II. It was forced by the imperfectness of the monetary system, in

which coins were the only payment method. The banknotes were printed on

white paper and had watermarks. The notes were printed in 25, 50, 75 and 100ruble variants. Yet, the 75 ruble note was soon put out of circulation because of 

fraud, as people began scraping out the word "twenty" and writing "seventy"

instead. The second emission notes, dating 1774, had smaller sizes and lacked

the 75 ruble one.

From 1786 the banknotes were printed on color paper, but were still very simple, which causemassive fraud. In the beginning of the 19th century the paper money changed the outlook to aclassicism style one. Architectural images and portraits began appearing on the banknotes in the50s and 60s, along with imperial monograms.

By the beginning of the 20th century many famous painters, like Reichel, Zauerveir and Lundin,took part in banknote design. The 1912 500 ruble banknote is often named as one of the most

beautiful ones in history. All the banknotes of the Imperial period were printed in Russia, with oneexception of a emission printed in the USA not long before the revolution of 1917.

First ruble

The ruble has been the Russian unit of currency for about 500 years. From 1710, the ruble was divided

into 100 kopeks.The amount of precious metal in a ruble varied over time. In a 1704 currency reform,

Peter I standardized the ruble to 28 grams of silver. While ruble coins were silver, there were higher 

denominations minted of gold and  platinum. By the end of the 18th century, the ruble was set to 4

zolotnik 21 dolya (almost exactly equal to 18 grams) of pure silver or 27 dolya (almost exactly equal

to 1.2 grams) of pure gold, with a ratio of 15:1 for the values of the two metals. In 1828, platinum

coins were introduced with 1 ruble equal to 77⅔ dolya (3.451 grams).

On 17 December 1885, a new standard was adopted which did not change the silver ruble but reduced

the gold content to 1.161 grams, pegging the gold ruble to the French franc at a rate of 1 ruble = 4

francs. This rate was revised in 1897 to 1 ruble = 2⅔ francs (0.774 grams gold).

With the outbreak of the First World War, the gold standard  peg was dropped and the ruble fell in

value, suffering from hyperinflation in the early 1920s.

Second ruble, 1 January 1922 – 31 December 1922

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In 1922, the first of several redenominations took place, at a rate of 1 "new" ruble for 10,000 "old"

rubles. The chervonets (червонец) was also introduced in 1922.

Third ruble, 1 January 1923 – 6 March 1924

A second redenomination took place in 1923, at a rate of 100 to 1. Again, only paper money wasissued. During the lifetime of this currency, the first money of the Soviet Union was issued.

Fourth (gold) ruble, 7 March 1924–1947

A third redenomination in 1924 introduced the "gold" ruble at a value of 50,000 rubles of the previous

issue. This reform also saw the ruble linked to the chervonets, at a value of 10 rubles. Coins began to

 be issued again in 1924, whilst paper money was issued in rubles for values below 10 rubles and in

chervonets for higher denominations.

Fifth ruble, 1947–1961

Following World War II, the Soviet government implemented a confiscatory redenomination of the

currency to reduce the amount of money in circulation. This only affected the paper money. Old rubles

were revalued at one tenth of their face value.

Sixth ruble, 1961 – 31 December 1997

The 1961 redenomination was a repeat of the 1947 reform, with the same terms applying. The

Soviet ruble of 1961 was formally equal to 0.987412 gram of gold, but the exchange for gold

was never available to the general public. Following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991,

the ruble remained the currency of the Russian Federation. A new set of banknotes was issued

in the name of Bank of Russia in 1993. During the period of hyperinflation of the early 1990s,the ruble was significantly devalued.

Seventh ruble, 1 January 1998 –

The ruble was redenominated on 1 January 1998, with one new ruble equaling 1000 old rubles. The

redenomination was a purely psychological step that did not solve the fundamental economic

 problems faced by the Russian economy at the time, and the currency was devalued in August 1998

following the 1998 Russian financial crisis. The ruble lost 70% of its value against the U.S. dollar in

the six months following this 1998 Russian financial crisis.

By calculating the product of all six redenominations, it is seen that a seventh ruble is equal to5×1015 original rubles.

In November 2004, the authorities of Dimitrovgrad (Ulyanovsk Oblast) erected a five-meter 

monument to the ruble.

On 23 November 2010, at a meeting of the Russian Prime Minister  Vladimir Putin and the Chinese

Premier  Wen Jiabao, it was announced that Russia and China have decided to use their own national

currencies for   bilateral trade, instead of the U.S. dollar. The move is aimed to further improve the

relations between Beijing and Moscow and to protect their domestic economies in the conditions of 

the world financial crisis. The trading of the Chinese yuan against the ruble has started in the Chinese

interbank market, while the yuan's trading against the ruble is expected to start on the Russian foreign

exchange market in December 2010.

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Russian Paper Money — USSR period

 The paper money of the USSR period underwent many emissions

and changed its outlook very much. Most of it was printed onwhite paper and had watermarks, but the format and style of 

different series varies very much. For example, the 1918-1922series are quite simplistic, while the 1923 one continues thetraditions of the Imperial period. From 1925, the banknotes

contained, in addition to the state symbols, pictures of people and their life (theworker and the farmer reading Karl Marx, a seeder, scenes of harvest, etc.). In1937 for the first time Lenin himself appeared on the notes, and stayed there

until 1992. 

The seven coins in this set were issued shortly before the collapse of the Soviet Union in

1991. The set includes the 1, 2, 3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 Kopecks dating between 1989 and 1991 in

Uncirculated condition. One side of the coin features a hammer and sickle enveloping the

earth. The other side has the date and denomination. It is an interesting and inexpensive

reminder of the "evil empire".

Russian Paper Money — Contemporary Period

Russian money of the new epoque (after 1992) differ from the previousseries by the disappearance of the Lenin portraits (which lasted 55

years). In 1992 another revolution happened in Russia, the single-partysystem was replaced by a democratic system. The money started baringpictures of cities. Until 1993 it was Moscow, and starting with 1995

more (Saint-Petersburg, Vladivostok, Novgorod, Krasnoyarsk, Yaroslavland Archangelsk). During the devalvation of 1998 the value of the noteslost three zeros, but the note design remained the same.

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1992 TRANSITIONAL BANKNOTES FROM

RUSSIA

The sudden and unexpected collapse of the Soviet Union in December of 1991 isreflected in this set of three Russian banknotes dated 1992. The 1000 Ruble featuresLenin and the old Soviet Arms and legends. A blue guilloche and the date 1992 wasadded over the watermark area on the reverse to distinguish the note from the previousSoviet issue. The 5000 Rubles depicts St. Basil’s Cathedral on one side and the Kremlin

on the other, with no symbols of either Russia or the U.S.S.R. The 10,000 Rublesfeatures the new tricolor Russian Flag flying over the Kremlin. All three notes circulated

only briefly, and were replaced with new issues in 1993. It is an interesting and short-lived set marking the collapse of the USSR and the emergence of the Russian Republic.

The ruble has been the currency that Russia has been using for at leastfive hundred years. However, over the years it has been changed andmodified to better suit the countries needs.

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When people from other countries travel to Russia they will first have to get theirmoney converted or it will be no use there. The only countries that use the rublecurrency are Russia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia.