10 Lepta

Greece switched from pure copper to copper-nickel for its small coinage in the 1890s partly under pressure from the Latin Monetary Union, of which it was a founding member, and partly to reduce the cost of producing fractional denominations that had been plagued by hoarding and export for their metal content. The two-year window of this issue reflects a short production run before the country's fiscal collapse — Greece declared bankruptcy in 1893 and suspended debt payments, severely curtailing government spending including mint operations.