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

The Coins of Europe
republican interval (1869-70), these ancient bearings,
charged since the advent of the house of Bourbon with the
o
fleurs-de-lis, have remained as memorials of the sources of
the national unity and greatness. The paschal lamb, with
the flag,
which had been brought into vogue in France
under Louis X. (1314-16), was here more immediately
borrowed from Toulouse, but was an experiment which was
not repeated. A peculiarity in this series strikes the observer
in the crowned initial or name of the reigning sovereign,
as shewn in the engraving of the paschal lamb coin,
LEON AND CASTILE: JOHN II., 1406-54.
/-
s^p
4 1/JP "fv
A, KO/^;) '.IV'-v:
and in a second of the same epoch with the castle on reverse
and John (for Johannes) crowned on obverse. The portraits
on coins, which often have their own story to tell, underwent
a good deal of modification in treatment from time to
time, and Arragonese influence is perceptible in those which
accompany the cornadi of Sancho IV. (1294-95) and
Alfonso XI. (1312-50), and in the profile within a tressure
of Henry IV. (1454-75), which materially
varies from the
full-face likeness on other examples of that prince. It is
curious that Ferdinand and Isabella, in their well-known
type with the busts vis-a-vis, reproduced one which had
existed in Visigothic times, and which subsequently commended
itself to Germany and (in one instance) England,
when the latter was marked out by Philip II. as a Spanish
colony or appanage. It may be pointed out that in the
legend of a gold escudo of Philip much posterior to the
death of Mary the word Hispan appears to have been
altered into H. isp :
Aug., to suit it for issue in the to-be-subjugated
country. We are sometimes accustomed to think
and speak of Spain as a great nation of former days but
;