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Message:: [QUOTE="Orielensis, post: 3496344, member: 96898"]What: “Hand heller” (German: Händleinheller, Händelheller, Handheller) Who, where, and when: Holy Roman Empire, imperial mint at Schwäbisch Hall (Swabia, southwestern Germany), ca. 1156–1396 AD. Imitated by different other mints in southern Germany. Design: The obverse of a hand heller shows an opened right hand (or glove) with five fingers. The earliest coins have a border of dots around the hand, earlier coins often have a line border. Coins from before ca. 1300 tend to have a legend (usually HALLA, AHLLE, or similar) interspersed with strokes and crosses, which is almost never fully legible and mostly consists only of blundered small remains. In many cases, the legend is missing completely. [ATTACH=full]926218[/ATTACH]Schwäbisch Hall, imperial mint, heller, mid-13th c. Obv: Hand in line border, remains of blundered legend (HALLA-type). Rev: Cross with forked ends and pellet in each end in lined border, remains of blundered legend. 17.6mm, 0.55g. Ref: Raff 8 or 9. On the reverse, we see a cross with forked ends and a pellet in each end. As with the obverse, earlier examples often have a border. The earliest issues show the legend FRISA for Fridericus Romanorum Imperator Semper Augustus (Raff 1–2), an abbreviated version of HEINRICVS (Raff 3–4), or a variant of MONETA (Raff 5–6). Later examples have no legend or a blundered combination of strokes, dots, and crosses. [ATTACH=full]926219[/ATTACH]Schwäbisch Hall, imperial mint, heller, late 13th c. Obv: Hand. Rev: Cross with forked ends and pellet in each end. 17.4mm, 0.54g. Ref: Raff 17. A hand heller weighs ca. 0.5g, everything between ca 0.4g and 0.6g constitutes normal variation. There is a probably unsolvable discussion on whether lighter examples should be considered half-hellers (Hälblinge) or ‘Kevin specials.’ Weight does not change significantly over time, silver purity does, though. Earlier hand hellers are generally struck on more or less round flans, later types are struck on square flans hammered into a somewhat round-ish shape by the four-stroke-method (Vierschlag). Many examples dating to the second half of the 14th century have a mintmark in the form of a letter on the palm of the hand. Iconography: The hand (or better: glove) is a legal symbol. The Saxon Mirror, a book of German customary law compiled ca. 1220–1235 AD, states that “nobody shall establish a market or a mint without the consent of the judge in whose district it is situated. According to the law, the king shall also send his glove to indicate his approval” (Nimant en sal markt noch munze erhebin ane des richters urlop, in des gerichte das lit. Ouch sal der kunig durch recht sinen hantzchen dar senden zu bewisene, das is sin wille si). The illustration below comes from a 14th c. illuminated manuscript of the Saxon Mirror and shows a mint worker giving out coins next to a cross with a glove, which serves as a symbol for a legally established mint and market. The hand hellers belong into this context of legal iconography: the hand on their obverse is a glove and symbolizes the right to mint coins and have a market. Often, this coin is sold as showing the “hand of God” – this interpretation lacks any historical basis and should be considered a clever advertisement somewhat analogous to offering Tiberius denarii as “tribute pennies.” [ATTACH=full]926220[/ATTACH](Dresden, SLUB, Mscr.Dresd.M.32, fol. 28v.) Apart from its religious significance, the cross on the reverse, together with the glove, might have served as an emblem of imperial power and law, pointing to a conjunction of secular and divine justice in the Holy Roman Empire. Since the cross had been present on different German coins since the 10th century, it likely had some recognition value, too. Historical background: The hand heller was the dominant trade coin of southwestern Germany in the 13th and 14th centuries. In the 12th century, the economically important and increasingly urbanized regions at the Upper Rhine needed a reliable anchor currency, and this need was met when a market (the Michaelsmarkt) and an imperial mint were established in the Swabian city of Hall. It’s not absolutely clear when the mint started to operate: the market was established in 1156 AD and the first written document mentioning money struck at Hall dates to 1189 AD. Somewhen between these dates, the first hand hellers must have been produced. Schwäbisch Hall had become wealthy by trading in salt yet didn’t have its own silver mines. The silver needed for the plethora of hellers came from melting down other coins – apparently a very profitable business. In the 13th century, the heller’s design even made it into Schwäbisch Hall’s civic coat of arms: [ATTACH=thumbnail]926221[/ATTACH] Originally under imperial control, the flourishing Hall mint changed hands a couple of times. Albrecht I (r. 1298–1308), for example, temporarily leased it to a group of Florentine merchants. In the first half of the 14th century, different other German cities, including Munich (1310), Speyer (1324), Frankfurt, and Nuremberg (1320s), began to strike hand hellers. When late hand hellers are attributed to Hall, this should thus be taken with a grain of salt: it is virtually impossible to distinguish the products of the different mints. The heller, whose name derives from “Hall,” basically was a pfennig (in Latin sources: denarius). Yet, the weight of the German pfennige varied strongly depending on the region – for example, one Cologne pfennig (ca. 1.461 g) was worth about for Basel pfennige (0.365g). The weight of the heller, a bit more than 0.5g, was about the standard for most southern German pfennige. Since the competition between the different cities minting hellers led to a decline of silver purity, emperor Charles IV (r. 1346–1378) in 1356 issued the “Sulzbach Heller Edict.” In theory, a heller now had to weigh 0.634g and contain 0.211g of silver. Additionally, each mint had to mark their coins with an individual sign, usually a letter in the palm of the hand. Due to these mintmarks, late hellers can be identified quite easily. The attribution of the mintmarks is in some cases up for debate, though. In 1385, Wenzel IV (r. 1376/8–1400) effectively halved the value of the heller and gave the right to mint this coin to the imperial mints in Hall, Augsburg, Nuremberg, and Ulm. This devaluation accelerated the decline of the heller, which had lost its importance by the beginning of the 15th century. In Hall itself, the right to mint coins was passed to the city in 1396. This marks the end of the heller and the start of civic coinage from Hall. Reference works: The best and to my knowledge only specialized monograph and catalogue is Albert Raff: Die Münzen und Medaillen der Stadt Schwäbisch Hall. Freiburg im Breisgau: Kricheldorf-Verlag 1986 (in German, with plates). There is a large number of German articles on different mintmarks and hoard finds – if someone is interested in this, Raff’s bibliography is a good starting point for further reading. Rarity and value: This is a very common type. For regular and problem-free examples like the two shown above, I’d expect a price tag somewhere between $10 and $30, depending on how nice the coin is, on whether it is fully attributed, and on how fast the dealer wants to sell it. Hellers are more commonly offered by European sellers than in the US, e.g. on ma-shops. If correctly identified, the earliest examples with the FRISA legend can be considerably more expensive, and specific later mintmarks might command a premium. At European coin shows, one often finds pick bins were a hand heller bargain or two can be made. As usual, there are always some hand hellers offered online at fantasy prizes and advertised as rare – caveat emptor![/QUOTE]

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