Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/716

Rh 658 NUMISMATICS [GERMANY. II., the conqueror of Constantinople, interesting works, lacking Pisano s technical skill. In the later age Cavino executed a wonderful series of imitations of Roman sestertii, which have been frequently mistaken for originals. In art these Italian works fre quently surpass the originals in spite of a degree of weakness in separable from copies. A comparison of the Italian with the Roman pieces is thus most instructive. The works of Pastorino of Siena are especially charming. Historically the Italian medals supply the defects of the coinages of Florence and Rome, and in a less degree of Venice. The papal series is invaluable as a continuous chronicle of art. Germany. The money of Germany is like that of Italy far too various for it to be possible here to do more than sketch some of its main features. The metrological systems are Merovingian, Carlovingian, that of the bracteates, and those of the later mediaeval and modern issues in a complicated form. There are several classes, the coinages of the emperors, the electors, the smaller lords, the religious houses, and the free towns. The art is behind that of Italy in time, and on the whole far inferior to it in merit. Some of the later mediaeval examples are of good style, and the Renaissance is ushered in by some beautiful pieces. Yet other coins of this very time are surprisingly barbarous, and there is an immediate decline in the better works. The imperial money, even when limited to what is strictly German by the exclusion of the issues of the French and Italian mints, forms a large series. It begins with the deniers of Charlemagne ; and, except the solidus of Louis I., for a long time there is no gold. The true bracteates begin under Frederick I. ; the money of Frederick II. is chiefly of Sicily and Italy, and his gold Sicilian coins do not belong to the German series. Under the house of Austria there are fine dollars of Maximilian I., and a splendid double dollar on which the emperor appears as a horseman. It is after this time that art declines. Passing in review the currencies of the chief states, e are arrested by the historical dollars of Louis I., king of Bavaria, which have the merit of an excellent purpose. The series of Brandenburg, ultimately merging in that of Prussia, is not note worthy but for some fine early medals. Brunswick shows the ex ceptional great mining-thalers, generally spread coins, multiples of the dollar 1|, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, and 10. Cologne has a representative series. Striking under the Merovingian kings and the Carlovingian emperors, it continued an imperial mint until the reign of Otho IV, (1198-1218), The archbishops began to coin under Bruno (953-965), and only ceased in 1801. The city had also the right of coinage after the emperors ceased to exercise it, but her money is unim portant. The wealthy mart of Hamburg is chiefly remarkable for the great gold pieces of the 16th and 17th centuries, of the weight of 2^, 5, and 10 ducats, with the types of the city and the fleet and allegorical subjects. The city of Magdeburg shows a variety of bracteates. Mainz has the same features as Cologne, Merovingian and Carlovingian money, the imperial mint going on to the reign of Sigismund, who granted the city the right of coinage in 1420, so that a few civic coins were issued before the privilege was sur rendered to the archbishops in 1462. The archbishops have a series of coins from 1021 to 1813. These comprise remarkable large bracteates of the 12th century, with curious ecclesiastical types, combining figures of saints and prelates with architectural detail. Of Nuremberg there is a long gold series, but the artistic fame of the city is not supported by her coinage. The electors palatine have a series in which we note the florin of Rupert IV. (1356-1390), followed by ducats. The money of the archbishops of Salzburg comprises some early pieces, but ranges mostly from the end of the 15th century, and is strong in gold. The Saxon lines are well represented. They begin with large bracteates of the 12th or 13th century, but the most interesting coins are of the age of the Reformation, bad in style and execution, but bearing characteristic portraits. The grandmasters of the Teutonic Order struck money second in importance to that of the knights of St John issued at Rhodes and Malta. The archbishops of Treves coined similar issues to those of their brethren of Cologne and Mainz to the year 1803. German The German medals stand in importance next to those of Italy, medals. They have this distinctive peculiarity of origin, that their first artists, instead of being, as in Italy, painters or sculptors, were gold smiths, the craftsmen of Nuremberg and Augsburg. Consequently minute work and love of chasing make them technically inferior as medals to the Italian works, though these qualities are balanced by great vigour and truthfulness. Later in origin than the rival school, the German dates from the early part of the 16th century. Albert Diirer is the greatest medallist, and his medals are wholly superior to those of a mere worker in metal. Heinrich Reitz is next in merit. The portrait of Albert Diirer s father by the artist, and a female bust in very low relief, are of high excellence. For historical interest the heads of Luther, Erasmus, Charles V., Maxi milian and Mary of Burgundy are very noteworthy. The subject of German medals has not yet been sufficiently studied. Norway, The coins of the Scandinavian states, Norway, Denmark, and Denmark, Sweden, are almost wholly regal, there being few ecclesiastical ind and civic pieces. The origin of the types is clearly English and Sweden, due to the Danish conquest of England. The Norwegian series begins with the pennies of Harold Hardrada, slain at Stamford Bridge ; there are next bracteates, and then coins of the Danish kings. The money of Denmark begins with pennies of Cnut (Canute), which are like his English mintage ; so also are those of Hardi- canute, but Magnus and Svend Estridsen have some very Byzantine obverse types, which is curious in connexion with the relations of the Norsemen to the Byzantine emperors. Later coins are of German types and barbarous work. A good mediaeval style begins with Erik of Pomerania. Later coins are not remarkable. Sweden has very few early coins, their denominations being the penny and the bracteate. There are good mediaeval coins of Albert of Mecklen burg (1363-1387). The money of Gustavus Adolphus is historically interesting. Under Charles XII. there is highly curious money of necessity. The daler is struck as a small copper coin, sometimes plated. The types include the Roman divinities. At the same time and later there was a large issue of enormous plates of copper, stamped with their full value in silver money as a countermark. The Russian coinage begins in the 15th century. It consists of Russia, very curious little silver pieces struck under Byzantine influence. Poland, Gold is common in the reign of Peter the Great and of fair style, and though the silver is at first of the old barbarous type. Nicholas Hungar introduced a platinum coinage of about two-fifths the value of gold. The series of Poland begins in the llth century with bracteates. There is a regular coinage from Uladislaus Jagello (1382-1434). The town of Dantzic, while part of the kingdom, is remarkable for the issue of large gold pieces with the kings portraits and civic reverses, the most important being of the 16th and 17th centuries. Hungary has its own coinage from Stephen I. (1000-1038). Under Charles Robert of Anjou (1308-1342) the florin is introduced, and appears also with the type varied as a ducat. The money of the illustrious John Hunyady as regent is of high interest. The abund ance of gold about this time and onwards shows the metallic wealth of the land. The Hungarian money of the house of Austria presents no noteworthy features. The coinage of the Transylvanian princes of the 16th and 17th centuries is chiefly of ducats, witnessing, like the Hungarian, to the wealth of the soil. There are early coins of the patriarchate of Aquileia and of the kingdom of Servia, now revived after four centuries and a half of subjugation, whence the only interest of the modern money as well as of that of Roumania and Greece. There is a most interesting class of coins struck during the Crusa- Middle Ages within the limits of the present Turkish empire, ders. the money of the Crusaders and other Latin princes of the East. The multitude of states thus designated have been classed by Schlumberger, the authority on the subject, in the following order, the chief divisions of which are here given : first group, princi palities of Syria and Palestine, counts of Edessa, princes of Antioch, kings of Jerusalem, counts of Tripoli, fiefs of Jerusalem, crusaders who struck imitations of Arab coins, kings of Cyprus, lords of Rhodes, grandmasters of the order of St John at Rhodes, to which may be added the later grandmasters at Malta ; second group, Latin emperors of Constantinople, Frank ish princes and lords of Greece and the Archipelago whose power was due to the crusade of 1204, snch as the princes of Achaia, the dukes of Athens, Neapolitan kings who struck money for their Eastern possessions, Latin lords of the Archipelago, the Genoese at Chios, the Gattilusi at Mytilene, the Genoese colonies, the Venetian colonies, the Turko man emirs of western Asia Minor who struck Latin coins. The most important currencies are the copper of the counts of Edessa, the billon and copper of the princes of Antioch and the kings of Jerusalem, the silver and copper of the counts of Tripoli, and the gold imitations of Arab dinars, the currency in that metal of the crusaders of Palestine. These Bisantii Sarraccnati, or Saracen bezants, are at first imitations of Fatimite dinars, known to have been struck by Venetian moneyers at Acre, and probably at Tyre and Tripoli also. After these coins had been current for nearly a century and a half they were forbidden on account of their Moham medan aspect by Pope Innocent IV. The Venetians then issued gold and silver coins with the same aspect but with Christian in scriptions. The kings of Cyprus issued a really good coinage in the three metals and in billon. The last money of the kingdom is the fixed currency of the gallant Bragadin during the war which lost the island to the republic. The coinage of the order of St John begins on the conquest of the island of Rhodes and the suppression of the Templars ; the earliest coins known are of Foulques de Villaret, the first grandmaster at Rhodes in the earliest years of the 14th century, and the last of the Rhodian series are of Villiers de I lsle-Adam, the gallant defender of the island who was forced to capitulate to the Turks and sail for a new home in 1523. The coin age is of fine gold, silver, billon, and copper. On the establishment of the order at Malta in 1530 it is resumed there till the capture of the island by the French at the close of last century ; it has little interest except as showing the wealth of the order. The other currencies of the crusaders, notwithstanding their great historical interest, are far less remarkable numismatically. Of the money of America little need be said here. Neither the A meric coinages of the Spanish and Portuguese dependencies, and of the