File:Austria SB1115-39023o.jpg

This specimen was lot 39023 in Stack's Bowers Winter sale (Baltimore, November 2015), where it sold for $646.25. The catalog description^[1] noted, "AUSTRIA. Salzburg. 2 Ducat, 1594. Wolf Dietrich Raitenau (1587-1611). NGC EF Details--Mount Removed. Fr-689. It always helps to have relatives in high places, Wolf Dietrich Raitenau was the great-nephew of Pope Pius IV. He was also a consummate renaissance prince who adhered to the counter-reformation, (at one point expelling all of the Protestants from Salzburg), but who also became a bit more tolerant in his older age. His downfall came after a bitter dispute with Maximillian I of Bavaria which eventually lead to his imprisonment at Hohenwerfen Castle where he died after 6 years of captivity. Struck during a happier time in his reign, the coin offered here displays evidence of mount removal, but retains a remarkable degree of detail. An interesting and historical piece that is exponentially more SCARCE than the silver issues from that same era. Pedigree: Ex: Coin Galleries Mail Bid Sale July 18, 1973, Lot #60."