Featured A copper minted by Guy de Lusignan as King of Jerusalem. But where?

Guy de Lusignan is generally ill-regarded historically, some of which is deserved, some just a result of things beyond his own control. But what is true and acknowledged by all is that under his rule the Kingdom of Jerusalem lost the Holy City and most of its knightly elite. On the other hand, Guy was the center of a coalition that started the siege of Acre, a fight that would soon rally the most powerful kings in Europe -- Philippe II Auguste and Richard Coeur de Lion -- to join the Third Crusade. He was hated by the German interests but rather liked in the Angevin quarters, being an old vassal of Henry II Plantagenet and, from 1191, of Richard I.

His coinage is well known, from de Saulcy to Schlumberger, Metcalf and Malloy, but one aspect that I think is still unclear is where was the copper coinage bearing his name actually minted. Malloy assigns this coinage to the Latin Kingdom, but he is not sure whether it is pre-Hattin or minted by a military mint during the siege of Acre (Malloy p. 57-8).

Although interesting, these coins are not really much to look at.



This spec is ex Baldwin's London Sale 2, Lot 58, 04/17/2000, ex Jean Elsen Auction 133 Lot 662

AE18mm, 0.90g, copper fractional denier or pougeoise
+ REX GUIDO D; bust facing, wearing crown with pendilia, pellet to l and r.
+ E IERVSALEm; Church of the Holy Sepulchre with rounded dome.
Malloy 32a, Schlumberger III 25, de Saulcy IX 4, 5, Metcalf 628.


Let's check out the hypotheses about the origins and circumstances of this issue:

1. It might be a heavily debased denier/fractional/pougeoise minted at Jerusalem for King Guy between his coronation in the summer of 1186 and his capture at Hattin in July 1187.

2. It might be an issue of necessity, minted under his authority at the siege of Acre around 1189-1191.

3. It might be a pougeoise issue, minted in the Holy Land for Guy but for use in Cyprus where he was instated as Lord with Richard Plantagenet's support in 1192, an issue of similar scope and struck at probably the same time with Henry de Champagne when he began minting his copper coinage at Acre.

4. It was minted in Cyprus for Guy between 1192 and 1194.

Any of these possibilities might be true, with some being more likely than others. For instance the minting during the siege of Acre by a crusader coalition is not very likely as the conditions in the crusader camp were hard and not very suitable for a minting operation. Also the written sources mention nothing about such an endeavor.

The minting of these copper coins during the reign of Guy as King of Jerusalem before Hattin is, again, not impossible, but not very likely, as the kingdom had its immobilized billon coinage, which had started under King Amalric in the 1160s. The type was continued after the death of Amalric in 1174 by his heirs until around 1187 and then re-started around 1200, in lower standard and dimensions, and kept as the Kingdom's regular coinage until around the early 1230s.

The more likely hypotheses are 3 or 4, or even a combination of both: a type that started around May 1192 or even earlier(?) alongside the coinage for Henry, after the crusaders had regained Acre in July 1191, and then was moved to Cyprus as the official coinage of Guy as Seigneur.

There are 3 variations of this type, which might suggest a more consistent use, and three different issues. These coins were also found both on the crusader mainland and in Cyprus.

Guy had to give up the coastal kingdom as a result of the death of Sybilla and their two daughters in the pandemic that swept both the Crusader and the muslim camp from late summer 1190 to early 1191. He did maintain his position as leader of the Crusader coalition until Richard reached Acre and he was also present in Cyprus, where he took part in its conquest by Richard (early summer 1191) and attended the wedding between Richard and Berengaria de Navarre on May 12 1191 in Limassol.

Guy ended up with the island in 1192 after it had been returned by the Templars, and Guy was forced to relinquish all claims to the mainland Latin Kingdom. He ruled it as Seigneur (Lord) until 1194.

 

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Ah the guy from Kingdom of Heaven, just tried looking coins of him up and can't find any for sale. How much is something like this ?

 

They are not very rare but not common either. Also, after Kingdom of Heaven, Guy became some sort of a celebrity historical figure, which might prompt some dealers to ask more for his coins.

Last time I have seen his coins offered was at the Munzen und Medaillen GmbH Auction 47, where the collection of Erich Waeckerlin was auctioned off in May 2019. There were three of his coins there -- 2 of this type sold for 90 and 220EUR and one of him as King of Cyprus (or better yet the King in Cyprus, as the Kingdom of Cyprus had not yet been recognized and Guy ruled as Seigneur until his death in 1194), which sold for 110EUR.

 

That is a very interesting little coin, thank you for posting Seth. I will be adding it to my want list. While I don't actively collect Crusader coinage, I am looking forward to the MEC volume that covers the Latin East.

 

I'm also looking forward to it. Hopefully it gets released soon. We need an updated view on Crusader and generally Latin coinage in the Levant.

Robert Kool is one of my favorite scholars, he has been doing great work on the coinage of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.

 

Another clue in establishing with certainty where this type was struck (or at least where it started before possibly moving with Guy to Limassol in the summer of 1192) is the related coinage of Henry of Champagne, which was struck at Acre.


17mm, 0.85g copper pougeoise, minted at Acre, ca. 1192.
+ COmES HEnRICVS; cross pattee with annulets in 3rd and 4th quarters
+ PVGES DACCON; fleur de lys
cf. Malloy 33 (annulets in the cross quarters), Metcalf 199-200, Schlumberger III, 28


In the spirit of his antecessor and first ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, although elected king, Henry ruled without the royal title, which is irregular. His coinage in his name is actually unusual on both fronts: on the obverse the ruler is named 'Count' instead of King and on the reverse it gives the denomination - pugesa (or pougeoise) a fractional part of the billon denier. The denomination is certainly inspired by the large-scale issues of copper fractional coinage at Tripoli and Antioch (and less at Beirut and Sidon) and was very likely minted as soon as the minting operation for Guy de Lusignan stopped (or was moved to Cyprus) once his rule in the rump Latin Kingdom became untenable. The two coinages -- for Guy and Henry -- are very similar, not in iconography but in overall style, materials and very likely face value. The m in COmES for instance is the same as in Guy's IERVSALEm, meaning that it is very probable that the dies were cut by the same cutters, very likely working on site in Acre (or perhaps starting even before the capture of Acre for Guy in 1191).

Guy de Lusignan ca. 1191-2


Henry of Champagne ca. 1192:

 

Cyprus in ancient times was the source for copper. I am not sure how active the mining activities were in Guy de Lusignan's time, but it would make economic sense to produce the coins for distribution elsewhere from Cyprus if indeed the Crusaders were getting their copper from that island. It is possible, as well, that the copper coins were produced by melting existing coins.

Just a couple of idle thoughts....

 

got these from my wife and mother in law for Christmas. I'm blessed.

 

The best would be to check if some of these copper coins have a provenance, if specimens have been found in archaeological digs and where. At the Israel Antiquities authority, Robert Kool is the curator for medieval coins. I attended recently a conference he gave about crusader coinage found in Israel, but I do not remember he talked about these copper coins.

 

The relation between the two types and the fact that the pugeoise of Henry states the minting place clearly might hint to Acre as the initial place where the copper coinage of Guy started originally, before being moved to Limassol with Guy when he went to rule there in the summer of 1192. Metcalf (if I am not mistaken) proposed that the type was minted in Cyprus, on account of more finds coming from the island, but the affinity between the two coinages could point to an earlier phase at Acre, before April 1192, followed before mid 1192 by the new pugeoise of Henry.

 

Fascinating discussion, @seth77. Many thanks to @GinoLR for bringing it back. ...@GinoLR, you were at a conference with Robert Kool. I have to breathe.
(...Meanwhile, Oh, Rats, I can't even find pics of my examples of Guy and Henry. ...But 'Kingdom of Heaven' was easily the best Hollywood treatment of the period I've ever seen --by a wide enough margin to actually make it worth sitting in front of.)

 

Yes, why does it seem so amazing?
BTW I also much appreciated Kingdom of Heaven, but I think this movie defames the Knights Templar. The bad guy (and complete idiot) was Renaud de Chatillon, not the Templars who had honest relations with the Muslims. There is an Arab testimony about this, by Usama ibn Munqidh.

 

Probably because his research on the deniers of AMALRICVS is top notch and actually answers some questions regarding the evolution of the type and its possible status as an immobilized coinage, not to mention the further advance in the breaking down of the different lettering styles.

 

It's been a while, but I want to recall the movie having treated Renaud no more charitably than Guy.
Renaud was a xenophobic moron who probably contributed at least as much to inciting Saladin's Hattin campaign as Guy did to its less than stellar prosecution on the Frankish side. Usama ibn Munqidh is very generous toward the permanently settled Franks generally, secular as well as religious. His most dramatic contrast is between both groups and the newly arrived, literal crusaders, who conspicuosly acted like complete boors. (Cf. the semantics around 'Viking:' were they an ethnicity or a vocation ...or merely either /both, depending on the context?) ...I have to wonder whether one key to the durability of the Principality of Antioch was that its princes, originating in Norman Apulia, already had plenty of experience dealing with, and actively appreciating the local Moorish and Jewish populations.

 

These 2 coins have been found in North Jordan, a few km North of Zarqa.



Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, Amalric I, denier, AR 17 mm, 0.96 g. 1163-1174
Obv.: AMALRICVS RЄX :, cross in dotted circle, o in quarters 2 and 3.
Rev.: + DЄ IЄRVSALЄM, Holy Sepulchre in dotted circle.
Metcalf 170, Malloy 22-23.



Nur al-din Mahmud b. Zanji, AE dirham (?), AE 25 mm, 5.82 g, 12 h. Damascus 1148-1174 ?
I cannot decipher the Arabic legends too well... On obv. the central inscription must be al-malik al-adil, but I cannot read the circular legend. On rev. it must be [Mahm]ud ibn Zanji, thus the attribution to Nur al-din.

They are contemporaneous, and the find-spot was 10 km North of the border between Frankish territory (Amman) and Islamic territory (Bosra).

 

Brilliant, @GinoLR. The Amalric denier is better than any I have (I was just lately looking for an upgrade); the the Nur al-din is a fantastic complement. You get hearty commiseration from here about not being fluent (in my case, literate) in Arabic.

 

I posted a bit about this type here.

 

Thank you for sharing these images. I noticed the earlier posts were in 2019 until today you added more. I watch the movie 'Kingdom of Heaven' often certainly Guy is one that is easily disliked! Thanks again!

 

In the Frankish states of Outremer (the Levant) the locally-minted coinage, like the deniers of Amalric, circulated together with equivalent coinage from Western Europe. Silver or billon deniers from Italy and South France are frequently found in all the countries: Israel, Palestinian territories, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. There is even a written source about it: The chronicle of Raymond d’Aguilers lists the coins used by the first crusaders, coins from Poitiers, Le Mans, Lucca, Valence, Melgueil and Le Puy.

A friend of mine in Gaza has a large collection of ancient coins he bought from local dealers, all found in the Gaza strip. He is so proud of his collection that he even published a book about it. The humblest coin in this book is a worn and holed denier of Angers minted c. 1160-1190. What was such a coin from Western France doing in Gaza? Very probably it came in the purse of one of Richard Coeur de Lion's men when he retook Gaza and the coastal towns and fortresses in 1191/2. Richard was not only King of England but also Duke of Normandy and Aquitaine, Count of Anjou, Maine and Touraine, his army was mostly from Western France. Similar coins from Angers have rarely been spotted in the region, one specimen in Acre, another one in Jerusalem.

 

Thanks for pointing that out, @GinoLR. The old but good Maskukat website for Isamic and Frankish coins has examples both from France, found in the Middle East, and local imitations of some of the commoner types.
http://medievalcoins.ancients.info/crusader_kingdoms_of_the_levant.htm
Once I found out about the imitations, I had to go trawling for an example. This purports to be one, of the very common southern French issue of Melgueil.


Here's my best example of the prototype.