Ah, the beauty of macro-photography! I see you like to study the intricacies of the design as much a I do.
Great Taler, and great imaging. love the overdates
I will agree with you on that.The engravers are over looked as masters of art. Only the great painters were looked at as masters. The painters had a much larger area to work with. What most new numist do not understand. Is that the engraver had to engrave more than one set of dies. During the 15th to early 17th centuries, the metals used for dies were not that hardend. The dies would start to show signs of braking down after 1,500 strikes or less. When the old dies were replaced with new ones, this is were minor and major die varieties would show up. Thats why you can see changes in the hair or face during the same year of issue. It would not be easy for the engraver to make a perfect maching set of obverse or reverse dies. You will see more major obv. design varieties then rev. on Talers. As always, there is much debate on this subject.The evolution in the minting process through the centuries, is a very interesting part of numismactics to me.