W. C a r e w H a z l i t t Coinage of the European Continent

Descriptive Outline of the Coinages of Europe 297
butes to satisfy us that it was in principal measure of
municipal or other local origin, even where the coins pay
titular homage to the sovereign or suzerain for the time
being and the circumstance is a fortunate
; one, since it has
been instrumental in preserving a countless variety of types
and in the transmission of many interesting social and
popular traits.
The feudal coinage of Germany and the rest of the
Teutonic family may be considered the not unnatural result
of the dismemberment of the unwieldy and incongruous
empire of Charlemagne and its partition among several
rulers, of whom none possessed sufficient power and weight
to establish another great central authority. Charlemagne
himself had begun to feel
the growing influence of the larger
territorial proprietors, both clerical and secular, and had in
some cases associated his name with theirs on the local
currency ; but, on the whole, he found it
possible to replace
the lax Merovingian system, by which coins were struck at
an enormous number of places without an indication of any
supreme jurisdiction, by one which reduced the aggregate of
mints, and made the imperial name the most conspicuous
feature on a piece, wherever it was produced. It is difficult
to determine to what causes such a phenomenon may be due ;
but, although the immediate successors of that great prince
promptly betrayed their unfitness to fill his place, it is not
till the tenth century that we seem to discern very clearly
the symptoms of political disintegration so far as the coinage
of the Franco-German Empire is concerned, and find documentary
evidence of the investiture of a host of vassals of
the Crown with a right alike politically and commercially
valuable.
In treating the German series it may be more convenient
to follow the modern classification which has been our guide
in the Catalogue of Mints and we shall ; accordingly survey
this and the other succeeding fields of research and material
in the order adopted by M. Blanchet, making
it our aim to
draw attention to every object of more than usual interest
under each head from different points of view, and seeking