I remember my grade nine English class, (not my favorite subject) we took the "Merchant of Venice". I remember the merchant Antonio borrowed 3000 Dukats from a money lender (Shylock) Back then I was just getting into collecting Canadian small change. So the term "Dukat" was foreign to me. Now, I have over 400 AV Dukats/ multiples/ fractional coins in my collection. Also I know that the City State of Venice was ruled by Doges, and the money in circulation where zecchini/ fractions down to a Quarter upto really big 105 zecchini. So, he should have borrowed 3000 Zecchini/ but since it was a big amt. 300 ten zecchini gold coins. Here is one of mine from Antonios era Add your coins where movies/ books got it wrong....
Did you guys hear what he said ? The guy's an animal !!! Why he's got more of those things than I used to have !! As for the name, yeah, it can be said that Shakespeare got it wrong. But at the same time he also got it right, depending on one's perspective of course. I say that because of this. "In 1140 AD, Roger II of Sicily, Duke of Apulia, struck a coin in silver known as a ducat. It bore the inscription Sit tibi, Christe, datus, quem tu regis, iste ducatus - Lord, thou rulest this duchy, to thee be it dedicated - thus the name. Little did he know what it was that he had started, for the ducat was to become possibly the single most important coin the world has ever known." http://www.winsociety.org/newsletter/ducats/ducats.html That's the origin of the coin's name, and whether minted in gold or silver and regardless of the specific country's name for the coins, the coins were commonly called ducats. And pretty much every country in the known world minted ducats after that. But panzerman's right, in Italy it was technically a zecchino. But also with the common name of ducat. And I share something with panzerman, the source, the very beginning, of my interest in ducats, although I was a bit younger when it began. And mine wasn't Shakespeare, mine was the old movies he refers to, particularly the old pirate movies from the 30's and 40's. They were constantly referring to ducats in those movies. And I wanted to know what a ducat was ! We now return you to your scheduled programming of finding ooopses in movies and books
and........there is probably nobody R$CH enough to have a complete collection of them Another point/ from the first ones ever struck, the value stayed the same till 1933. The Yugoslavian issues where stilll at 3.49g. Here is my 1931 ex. with "Ahre" countermark (Serbia)
They're still making the Netherlands gold ducats even today. "The coins are made of the long-time Dutch ducat standard of .983 fine gold. The single Gold Ducat weighs 3.494 grams and is 21 mm in diameter, " https://coinweek.com/world-coins/netherlands-to-issue-2021-gold-ducats-by-reservation-only/
Another ducat from Venice: Venice Ducat, Doge Pasquale Cicogna, 1585-1595 Gold, 20 mm, 3.50 gm Obverse: Left Saint Mark, standing and facing right with banner, right, the Doge kneeling S M VENET DVX PASC CICON ("Sacra Moneta Venetiae Dux Paschalis Ciconia" or "Sacred Money of Venice Duke Pasquale Cicogna") Reverse: Christ standing with Book of Gospels, surrounded by stars and oval SIT T XPE DAT QTV REGIS ISTE DVCAT ("Sit tibi, Christe, datus, quem tu regis, iste ducatus" or "O Christ, let this duchy, which you rule, be dedicated to you") Doge Pasquale Cicogna died in 1595 and by 1598 William Shakespeare had written the play "The Merchant of Venice".
Yes, very true/ same for the UK Sovereigns/ but basically intended not for general circulation. The Yugoslavian Dukats were made for circulation/ probably most where stashed away. The Austro-Hungarian ones where used for commerce, since the mintage numbers are very high. They sure made a wide variety of denominations/ some really obscure (Salzburg) values....44/36/28/24/16 Dukaten. These had no "value" on the coin, I guess they figured that people knew what they had in their pocket by guessing the weight? Myself, I could not tell the difference between a 9 Dukat from a 10 Dukat The Bohemia 1629 AV 100/ 50/ 40 Dukaten had a value number on coin. For me, it would not have been a problem/ I would have kept these aside for my collection in 1629
The closest I can come to that masterpiece is a potato chip thin 1986 ducat - I still like it, but it doesn't compare to the 15th century version.
