The Armour Archive

I now know why I like France and England. Germany is complicated.

I found as I was trying to figure out which German coins I would try and offer, that the issue of which coins of the Holy Roman Empire to consider can be vastly more complicated than which coins of France or England. In many ways, the feudal tendencies that were prevalent in France in the 9th through the 11th centuries were very much in operation in the Holy Roman Empire of the 14th century.

Who here focuses on the Holy Roman Empire in the 14th and 15th centuries?

John
Jehan de Pelham, ecuyer and servant of Sir Vitus
www.mron.org

France's coinage was pretty complicated early on too!

On the other hand, there are lots of really neat bracteates from the HRE. <A HREF="http://www.elsen.be/index.aspx">Jean Elsen</A> is a good source of originals.

-Donasian.

Also, around 1300 the Prague Groshen became a dominant coinage in central europe due to it's high silver content. It's a fairly simple design too; the lion's body and back leg was eventually made with a single punch, the other legs, tail, and head had their own punches. I believe the mane was always constructed using multiple crescent punches, but I could be wrong (I haven't studied this particular coin in great depth.) Earlier on they used a higher number of smaller punches plus a decent amount of graver work. I'm not sure on the exact timeline, but I know Ian Cnulle has done an extensive study of this coin. He can probably fill you in on more details than you care to know.

We've made a number of SCA coins that use the same design, since the Lion is very similar to the main charge of the device of An Tir. For example, the An-Tir/West war AS 42 commemorative medallion:

<IMG SRC="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3108/2708830172_480da34fcb.jpg">

http://www.flickr.com/photos/derianlebreton/2708830172/

This coin used the "few large punches" method for the Lion. Ian Cnulle made the die for this side.

-Donasian.

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