How Far Back Can We Go? Sixth Edition! Ended At 1380 Waiting On 1379

That milreis is marvelous, @pepactonius!

France 1720, 1 livre d'argent, Louis XV, Paris (A).



This oddity of a coin, 3.74 g of pure silver instead of the ordinary 917/1000 used for French silver coins, was minted during two months in 1720. It was intended as the highest denomination in metal in what was to be a paper money based economy implemented by the Scotsman John Law.

1720 saw the culmination and downfall of John Law's "system," where gold and silver as means of payment were to be replaced by banknotes. Law - apparently intelligent and charming as well as adventurous - had attained almost unlimited power over French finances: He ran the banknote issuing Banque Royale and had become minister of finance, after having convinced the Duke of Orleans, regent for the 10 year old Louis XV, that paper money was the way out of bankruptcy for the hard pressed French government. The problem was that the financial backing for the banknotes was purely speculative fortunes to be found in the newly established French colony of Louisiana. That was ran as another of Law's ventures, the Compagnie des Indes, the business of which he freely mingled with those of the bank. When the fortunes failed to materialize, the "system" broke down, the banknotes losing most of their value. (Google "John Law Compagnie des Indes" if you want to know more about this rather fantastic episode.)

Needless to say, France returned to metal money. Banknotes, regarded with the highest suspicion, were not introduced anew until the end of the century.

I will have better pictures soon for this one.

1720 - Southern Netherlands - Jeton (silver)
Leopold Philippe d'Arenberg



The Duke's castle (Château d'Arenberg/Kasteel van Arenberg) survives to this day in Heverlee, near Leuven, in Belgium.

Sweden, Ulrika Eleonora, 1 öre kopparmynt, 1719-20.

I'm not sure if the date on this one is 1719 or 1720, so I'm posting it today just in case.

My next dated photographed coin is 1717, then 1710 and 1699, I think. I'll probably have to check.

@paralyse, that is a very cool jeton on several levels. I suppose @1c5d could provide the historical context (I have no clue what "Fast, but Within the Law" refers to), but I will just note (a) it seems strange for a token from this part of the world to have a legend in Italian (not Latin), and (b) d'Arenberg is also the name of a famous Australian winery, named after the founder's wife, who I assume was a member of this family. (Maybe @princetane also knows their wines?)

My last 18th century copper from Papal States - Ferrara, this 1/2 baiocco from regnal year XIX of Clement XI , November 1718-November 1719.
Perhaps too much vino for the diemaker, who blundered some spelling on the reverse legend.

Philippe d'Orleans was perhaps more interested in the fine arts than in the French finances. So how convenient when John Law showed up, ready to take care of those, swiftly and lightly.

In 1718, Law's "system" had run for two years and had two more years to go, before its crash.

France 1718, ecu, Louis XV, Paris (A).




Between the 5th reformation (overstrike) of coins in 1715 and the 6th in 1720, a new set of gold and silver coins were introduced in 1718. They had lower weight than the 1715 issues, so could not be manufactured by overstriking older coins. The 1715 ecus weighed 30.6 g, the new ones only 24.5 g. Still, their value was set to 6 livres, the same as the old ecus. The value was stepwise increased, as was customary during the financial chaos that had reigned for decades, until they topped at 12 livres in 1720. That same year they were demonetized and overstruck with the 1720 design (which I showed three days ago), but then handed in for the original value of 6 livres.

1718 -- Kingdom of Sweden, 1 daler (emergency coinage):

1717 -- Kingdom of Sweden, 1 daler (emergency money):

Gorgeous coin ... and great hair



Thanks for the correction on the translation, and for the background. Legge is one of those Italian words where the meaning depends on the part of speech: legge the noun means law, but legge the adverb means lightly (in modern usage, it would be leggermente). Similar to the words light/lightly in English.
When I first saw it, I was reminded of musical terms (like allegro con brio), but then thought the "law" meaning made make more sense if it were a political token.