THE COIN COLLECTOR - World eBook Library

CONTINENT OF EUROPE
formerly flourished numerous powerful feudatories prac-
tically independent of the imperial authority, pros-
perous cities and towns, almost equally autonomous,
and a host of minor seigneurs, of whom all have trans-
mitted to us proofs of their importance, wealth, and
taste in a huge volume of ohsolete money in the various
metals, of infinitely diversified types, of countless deno-
minations ; and each trouvaille adds to the aggregate
and to our knowledge of the several series.
There are many excellent compilations and mono-
graphs dealing with the coinages of the Northern and
Southern Netherlands. Of the latter, the prominent
divisions in ancient times were Brabant, Namur, Liege,
Limburg, Reckheim, Luxemburg, Flanders, Hainault,
Artois, Saint Pol, and Boulogne. These fiefs or states
constituted sources during a very lengthened period of
great numismatic activity. Liege was not only a busy
episcopal mint, but (with Maestricht) a very early and
leading one of the emperors. Loos and Runnnen, even-
tually merged in the See of Liege, produced a variety
of money in all metals, of which some is of extreme
rarity. Brabant, Luxemburg, and Flanders, under
their respective dukes or counts, attained in their
coinage a wealth and splendour absolutely regal.
In the north we have the great feudal houses of
s'Heerenberg and Bronkhorst in Gronsfeld, the latter
associated with the illustrious family of Brederode,
with many other baronial and seigniorial centres, of
which it is necessary to specify the Counts of Holland
and West Friesland, the Counts and Dukes of Gueldres,
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