Unknown Token or Coin

[Ken Clad]

I've been hanging onto this for several days hoping to post what my find is. The more I run it through AI searches the less I know about it. I have an appointment with a reputable coin dealer for further evaluation. Here's what I know: Weighs 4g, non magnetic. Max. dimensions 22.77mm x 23.95mm, Thickness 1.65mm. I have NOT cleaned it other than a tap water rinse. The caveat to this is I was working an area where the Grand Strand beach replenishment project (26 miles and 2 million cu.yd. of sand) is completed. The dredge ship is usually ~ 500 yards off the beach. AI has suggested Mexican, Spanish, Ottoman Empire, Islamic religious token.

What's the collective wisdom? I hope to have a more definitive (written/certified) assessment soon.

 

[airbornebob]

Good luck witht he eval... could be Spanish something...

 

[Ken Clad]

The verdict is in:
FAKE!
It is a replica Spanish Escudo (Escudo = Shield). The weight and the edge were the tip off that it was junk. Apparently it was popular to throw these overboard while sport fishing off the coast of the southern states in the 1970's. Imagine have so little to occupy your little, pea sized brain that you'd produce and distribute such an item.

Just like that… into the "cool but worthless finds" slot of my pens & pencils organizer in the top desk drawer. I'm not daunted and I'm going back out to try again soon. Sucks to be me.

 

[Voriax]

Looks like an imitation of a Spanish reale.

Voriax

 

[DuboistownDan]

I didn't want to be a dream squasher. I found one at a park a few months back. Mine is only 2.8 gm, but just as much a replica.

 

[Ken Clad]

So, back to AI, specifically "ChatGPT". Notice, that one source cited came from this forum! @FelixtheCat was that you??? It's long but interesting.

I think your dealer's story has a legitimate historical context, even though we still cannot substantiate the specific claim that fishermen were deliberately throwing them overboard.

The big find: Goldak​

I found a real 1969–1974 advertising trail for a company called Goldak Company, Inc. of Glendale, California, a manufacturer of metal detectors.
Their advertisements explicitly offered:

a gold-plated replica of a Spanish doubloon "found off Cape Kennedy"

for $1, including a pouch.
This isn't somebody's recollection from a forum. It's sitting in period publications. The advertisement appears repeatedly from 1969 through at least 1974.
And the advertising connection to what you're doing is almost comical:
Goldak marketed the replica alongside its metal detectors specifically for treasure hunting and beachcombing.
The 1971 advertisement says the detector was suitable for "buried treasure," coins, Civil War relics and beachcombing, immediately followed by the $1 Spanish-doubloon-replica offer.
So there really was a commercially distributed, gold-plated Spanish-doubloon replica being sold to the exact population interested in finding treasure with metal detectors.
That is a hell of a coincidence.

And there's another fascinating connection​

I found a 1971 Pepsodent "Find the Treasure" promotion that produced six different imitation Spanish/pirate coins.
One of them is a Spanish Gold Doubloon:

• 1971
• 26 mm
• 8.47 g
• base-metal promotional token
• Spanish royal design
• specifically catalogued as an imitation coin.

Another of the six was a Gold Cob Pistole:

• 22 mm
• 4.67 g
• 2 mm thick
• irregular shape
• base metal
• plain edge.

That latter one is strikingly close to your measurements:

Your find	Pepsodent 1971 Gold Cob Pistole
Weight	4.00 g	4.67 g
Width	22.77–23.95 mm	22 mm
Thickness	1.65 mm	2 mm
Shape	Irregular/rounded square	Irregular
Magnetic	No	presumably base metal
Era	unknown	1971

I don't think your piece is necessarily the Pepsodent token—the design needs to be compared directly—but this establishes that very lightweight, nonmagnetic Spanish "treasure" replicas in almost exactly your physical size were being mass-produced in the early 1970s.
That's a significant lead.

Detectorists have definitely been finding these things​

This part is also much stronger than I expected.
A 2016 thread on the Friendly Metal Detecting Forum from a detectorist in Vero Beach, Florida describes a fake Spanish doubloon found on a beach. Another Florida detectorist comments:

"That sucks that people in FL always seem to be chucking fakes into the surf"

And another says he bought a Spanish-gold replica at the Montauk lighthouse gift shop.
That's not proof of the 1970s fishermen story, but it establishes that Florida beach detectorists have a long-running phenomenon of finding deliberately or accidentally discarded fake Spanish treasure coins.
There's another TreasureNet example from South Florida where an experienced beach hunter immediately identifies a Spanish-looking piece as a tourist souvenir, shiny gold nickel-plated pot metal.
And another detectorist reports having received fake Spanish coins with newly purchased detectors—which is especially interesting because it demonstrates one perfectly legitimate mechanism by which these things got into the detecting ecosystem.

Toys, games and "treasure" trinkets? Absolutely.​

This rabbit hole gets deep.
The Spanish-doubloon/pirate-coin design has been used for:

• toy treasure
• pirate play sets
• promotional giveaways
• movie props
• tourist souvenirs
• game pieces
• detectorist promotional items
• beach/tourist-shop trinkets
• Disney pirate tokens

For example, Walt Disney World had brass replica pirate doubloons dating to about 1973–78, associated with its Pirates of the Caribbean pirate-coin stamper attraction.
And modern collectors are still encountering the same general phenomenon. One metal-detecting discussion had someone find a fake Spanish cob underwater; another detectorist said his friend had found the exact same fake, and someone else reported finding four of them on a remote Florida island.
There's also a particularly revealing modern beach-detecting thread where somebody found a plastic token on West Palm Beach, and another detectorist said:

"The troll coins are out there in force, from Florida to New Jersey!"

That's obviously informal detectorist commentary, but it shows how widespread the phenomenon has become.

Here's where I think we're at​

I would now divide your dealer's story into three pieces:
1. "These replicas existed in the 1970s."
Confirmed.
Goldak was selling them beginning no later than 1969, and Pepsodent was distributing imitation Spanish treasure coins in 1971.
2. "They were associated with treasure hunting/beachcombing."
Strongly supported.
Goldak literally advertised the replica alongside a metal detector promoted for beachcombing.
3. "Sport fishermen were throwing them overboard off the southern states."
Not established yet.
But given what we've now found, I am considerably less inclined to dismiss your dealer's statement as somebody's colorful old detecting tale.
There were inexpensive fake Spanish treasure coins specifically circulating in the treasure-hunting/beachcombing world during exactly the period he mentioned.
And there's one particularly delicious possibility:

Your 4-gram measurement may be a clue to the manufacturer.​

Your piece is almost exactly the size and mass of some of these 1970s promotional/toy treasure pieces.
So I'd like to take the next step and try to find catalogs, advertisements, collector pages, and photographs of the actual Goldak replica and compare its design and dimensions to your two photographs.
If we can establish:
"This exact ugly little bastard was Goldak's 1970s doubloon replica,"
then we've gone from "your dealer says these were around" to having a pretty solid historical identification of the object itself.
And that would make the fishermen story a lot more interesting.

 

[FelixtheCat]

So, back to AI, specifically "ChatGPT". Notice, that one source cited came from this forum! @FelixtheCat was that you??? It's long but interesting.

Probably. I have found those fake replicas before as well.

 

[metaladdict]

Looks 100% fake with the nice edges.

 

[Kansashunter]

Agreed, nothing looks right about this coin.

 

[Ken Clad]

Agreed, nothing looks right about this coin.

My problem is always the same. Out on the beach, my glasses always have a nice haze of salt mist on them, and everything looks like junk. I'm not gonna lie, I'm not any sort of coin guru. Since I don't know what a real coin, in good shape looks like, how am I supposed to know what something I dig up is? Sure, I use Google Lens and other AI when I get home, but I've got to tell you those are all crap. I used three AI searches and got 3 different answers…all of which were wrong.

There's a ton of people here that probably forgot more than I'll ever know about items we dig up. That's why I came here, to learn things.

 

[markinmichigan]

Bummer brother, better luck next time