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

Introduction 43
It was upon the last-named description of specie, however,
that the idea of stamping the settled rate was first,
we believe, carried out ;
coins of the lower denominations
were precisely those which passed through the most ignorant
hands ;
and the employment of numerals facilitated comprehension
while it checked deceit. The chronology of the
currency, except in special pieces, designed to signalise an
important event, was as much disregarded by the authorities
during centuries as the standard of exchange ;
it was the
greater frequency of issues, with the diminishing ratio perhaps
of small local mints, and the sense of convenience, which
slowly led to the habitual insertion of the period of mintage.
The principle of authenticating coins as those of a given
prince or moneyer, if not of both, came first ;
then followed
that of publishing the denomination ;
then the date ; finally
the value.
Special attention must be invited to the continental
initiative in dating coins, and to the important series of
pieces bearing the year of production. The earliest examples
commence with the first half of the eighth century, and
belong to the Moorish kings of Granada, many of whose
coins, struck in Europe, bear the year of the Hegira the
;
next, whose origin is also in part Oriental, belong to Apulia,
where we find gold pieces of Roger II. (i 105-54) with the
words An\no\ R\egnt\ X. Germany seems to take the
third place. There is a gros tournois of Aix-la-Chapelle of
1422 the Swiss
; plappart of 1424 and
; also, longo intervallo,
the gold ducat of the Palatinate, 1437, which last is not
very uncommon, and exists in more than a single variety.
But except in priority of time, the thalers of Austria from
1479 to 1518, and the Joachim thalers of Bohemia, with one
or two in ,the Saxon coinage, are perhaps of superior interest.
The piece struck at the marriage of Maximilian I. with
Mary of Burgundy, in 1477, is the first coin of that denomination
of which the chronology can be absolutely fixed,
and the portraits of the young couple render it highly
attractive and desirable, especially in that variety where the
Arch-Duchess appears in a steeple bonnet and veil. The