Devices on Novgorod Coins: A Reappraisal (M. Lvov)

The fifteenth century Novgorod coins bear a characteristic device, composed of two figures, one on the left, depicted in robes, with a crown and a sword or a staff, and one on the right, naked and pleading.

After an examination of some thirty different interpretations of this device, the author puts forward the theory that the design is purely an emblematic one and that its exact meaning, in all probability, will never be discovered.