A ruble portraying an emperor who never reigned
Obverse of the 1825 Constantine pattern ruble in the Hermitage collection; the page identifies it as a pattern, not a regular issue.
After Alexander I died in 1825, trial silver rubles portraying Constantine Pavlovich were produced in St Petersburg. He was expected to take the throne but renounced his rights in favor of his younger brother Nicholas. The coin remained a pattern rather than a normal issue for circulation.
The popular account that all these rubles were melted down is wrong: genuine trial examples survive. The State Historical Museum describes its coin as one of seven known patterns and also names the Hermitage and Smithsonian among the institutions holding examples. The portrait records an expected reign that never happened. [1, 2]