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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;Collect89, post: 1872625, member: 15445&quot;]I’ve got an example of this historic medieval Venetian coinage.&nbsp; These popular World commerce coins have the image of Jesus Christ seated on a throne. Here is some background information:</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>For a very long time the pfennig was the coin circulating in Europe. It had apparently spread all over the area as either the German pfennig, Latin denarius, French denier, English penny, and the Italy denaro. All these different flavors of pfennigs were issued in different weights but they all kind-of &amp; sort-of traded everywhere. Like all money in history, they progressively got lighter &amp; the precious metal content became more diluted over time.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>At this time in history, the Muslims were in Palestine &amp; Jerusalem and the crusaders mustered in Venice Italy.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>By this time of the crusades, the pfennigs were not worth very much which made it difficult to pay for major military actions &amp; purchases. In Italy the purchasing power of the denaro had dropped so that paying for crusades with denaro became very complicated. Italy began issuing a silver coin (grosso) that initially weighed about 2 grams and was supposedly worth about 12 to 20 denari. These grosso coins (like my coin) became prolific during the period between 1200 and 1400. Early grosso coins emulated the designs of the previous coins. However, the reverse of grosso like mine began depicting Jesus Christ on a throne. The Grosso apparently became a World commerce coin much as other famous coinage like (1) the tetradrachem, (2) the piece of eight and (3) the US dollar from some years ago. These grosso are the forerunners of the groat coins that subsequently prevailed in the European money scene.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>The first grosso may have originally been issued in Milan around 1200. My coin was minted much later in Venice between 1275 and 1280. Note that the leader of Venice was called the “Doge” or “Duce” (Dux in Latin &amp; Duke in English). My coin originates from 1275-1280 under the reign of the Doge Jacopo Contarini. As noted, the reverse depicts Jesus Christ on a throne. The obverse depicts Doge (Jacopo Contarini) together with the Venetian city’s Saint Mark. The Doge is on the left receiving a tall flag from St. Mark on the right.</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>Jacopo Contarini was the 47th Doge of Venice, from 1275 until his abdication in 1280. The last Doge of Venice was Ludovico Manin, who abdicated in 1797 when Napoleon came to town.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]316269[/ATTACH] [ATTACH=full]316268[/ATTACH][/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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