Widow’s mite jewelry is made from one of two similar coins minted during the time of Judean king Alexander Jannaeus, from 103-76 BCE, the first Jewish king to use the eight-rayed star on coins.

The two coins used in widow’s mite jewelry are the lepton and the prutah. The lepton is tiny - less than 1 cm in diameter on average. The prutah is somewhat larger and worth more. Both coins feature the eight-rayed star in a diadem on one side and anchor or blooming lotus scepter on the reverse. Some widow’s mite jewelry is made with the obverse showing, and other widow’s mite jewelry is made with the converse showing.

The word “mite” comes from the King James Version of the New Testament. The mijt was issued in the Netherlands during King James’ time, and they were the smallest copper coins. During the 1600s worshipers felt obligated to give a silver coin at church collections and only those who were desperately poor could get away with giving a mijt, or mite, so the translation was made for a then-modern readership.

The mite was the coin referred to in the story in the Gospel of Mark in which the widow gives her last two mites - all her wealth - reckoned by Jesus to be the greater donation compared to the many silver coins given by wealthier people that only represented a small fraction of their wealth. Today widow’s mite jewelry is especially treasured by Christians familiar with the passages in Mark about the widow.

The lepton - the most likey “true” widow’s mite in Jesus’ time - was irregularly round and sometimes nearly square due to the crude method with which the coins were struck. The markings were often off-center as well.

The prutah, also used in widow’s mite jewelry, is larger and in some cases it is possible to see the lettering, which is in Greek on the obverse and in Hebrew on the reverse, both of which refer to King Alexander Jannaeus.

The various interpretations of the parable of the widow’s mite in the New Testament all are underscored with the significance of the widow’s mite coins and widow’s mite jewelry as a reminder of the humility taught by Jesus. This makes widow’s mite jewelry a meaningful gift for Christians, allowing them to not only carry a rich bit of history with them, but to be reminded of the importance of humility and charity in the Christian faith.

Widow’s mite coins are small bronze coins issued under Jewish King Alexander Jannaeus, from 103-76 BCE. The true widow’s mite coins are believed to be examples of the lepton, the smallest coin of that era, and possible the smallest denomination coin ever minted. There was another, slightly larger bronze coin from the same era called a prutah, which is also called a widow’s mite and which was made with similar markings under King Alexander Jannaeus.

Most widow’s mite coins were not well struck and haven’t been preserved well enough to allow the Hebrew lettering on them to be legible. In some ways, that is part of their appeal: knowing that they passed through the hands of countless average people in the marketplaces of the time. Widow’s mite coins are often irregularly shaped, ranging from “roundish” to roughly rectangular, and the designs are quite often off-center. In fact, you should be suspicious of widow’s mite coins that look too regular and well-struck, as they may well be fake.

Minting widow’s mite coins involved taking a piece of bronze and shaping it into a long, thin strip. The end of the strip was placed between two die, the design was struck, and the strip of bronze was moved on a little further so that the next one could be struck, and so on. When an entire strip had been struck with the designs, then the individual coins were separated, so you can see why widow’s mite coins were so often irregularly shaped. The larger of the two coins referred to as widow’s mites, the prutah, is less than 1 cm in diameter, and the lepton is even smaller - about the diameter of a pencil eraser.

The significance of widow’s mite coins to Christians comes from a reference to them in the Gospel of Mark of the New Testament, in which Jesus teaches at the Temple in Jerusalem a parable of a desperately poor widow giving her last two mites to the church. The word “mite” didn’t exist in the time of Jesus, but is rather a product of the era of the King James translation of the bible in the 1600s. In England and Europe of that era, the “mijt” was the smallest denomination Dutch copper coin, one that Christians of that era could relate to in the context of the parable.

Today, widow’s mite coins are made into numerous types of jewelry, including rings, pendants, and cuff links, that are very dear and treasured by Christians from everywhere.