High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Touch pieces are coins and medals that have attracted superstitious beliefs, such as those with 'holes' in them or those with particular designs. Such pieces were believed to cure disease, bring good luck, influence people's behaviour, carry out a specific practical action, et cetera. What most touch pieces have in common is that they have to be touched or in close physical contact for the power concerned to be obtained and/or transferred. Once this is achieved the power is permanently present in the coin which effectively becomes an amulet. Coins which had been given at Holy Communion could be rubbed on parts of the body suffering from rheumatism and they would effect a cure. Medallions or medalets showing the 'Devil defeated' were specially minted in Britain and distributed amongst the poor in the belief that they would reduce disease and sickness.