Nomos 19

HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE, County of Tirol. Sigismund der Münzreiche, Archduke of Austria, 1446-1496. Guldiner (Silver, 40 mm, 31.76 g, 4 h), the first taler-sized coin ever issued, with dies engraved by Wenzel Kröndl, Hall, mintmaster Bernhard Beheim the Elder, 1486. SIGISMVNDVS - ARChIDVX.AVSTRIE. Sigismund, wearing the archducal crown, full armor and a cloak, standing facing, holding a mace-headed scepter in his right hand and resting his left on his sword pommel; in field to left, shield, with the arms of Austria, held by a lion; to right, crowned tournament helmet with peacock feathers; inner border of arcs, pierced by the archduke's head and feet. Rev. Sigismund, wearing full tournament armor, a helmet with the Hapsburg peacock feathers and fluttering ribbons and holding a banner-tipped lance in his right hand, riding a galloping horse, with armor and a fluttering caparison, to right; below horse, 1486; around the edge, beginning at the top right, 16 shields bearing the arms of: Burgau, Upper Austria, Pfirt, Habsburg, Austria, Windisch Mark, Carinthia, large shield bearing the arms of Old-Austria with five eagles, Styria, Krain, Portenau, Montfort-Feldkirch, Tirol, Kyburg, Alsace and Nellenburg. Davenport 8087A. Levinson IV-49a. LHS 95, 2005, 267 (same dies). Moes.-Dwor. 91. Schulten 4424 var. Voglhuber 1/III. Vom Taler zum Dollar 3/10 var. Very rare; a coin of great numismatic and historical importance, very attractively toned and most impressive. Fields smoothed long ago, as usual, otherwise, about extremely fine.

From a Swiss collection.

In 1986 the Münzsammlung in Munich held a fascinating special exhibition, one of the many that fine museum has had over the years (W. Hess & W. D. Klose, eds., Vom Taler zum Dollar 1486-1986. Munich, 1986): it commemorated the 500th anniversary of the introduction of a large-sized silver coin that became the ancestor of the thousands of thalers, talleros, écus, daalders, 8 reales, crowns and dollars that followed, minted all over the world (the Tirolian Mark standard was, however, changed to the slightly lower weight, and more popular, Cologne Mark). And this coin, officially a Guldengroschen because it was the silver-value equivalent of the Goldgulden, is what started it all. In addition, the design of the coin transports us right back to the late Middle Ages: not only is Sigismund shown in full armor on the obverse, he is shown as charging mounted knight on the reverse. The armor he is wearing is of the later 15th century German High Gothic style: somewhat amazingly enough, the armor he is wearing on the reverse of this coin seems actually to still exist: it was made, c. 1484, in Augsburg by Lorenz Helmschmid and it is now in the "Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna" (KHM) where it is on display!