Salzburg 1550 guldiner Dav-8168
This specimen was lot 2577 in Künker sale 384 (Osnabrück, March 2023), where it sold for €850 (about US$1,098 including buyer's fees). The catalog description[1] noted,
"Ernst von Bayern, 1540-1554. Guldiner 1550. Mit Kreuz am Anfang der Vorderseitenumschrift. Hübsche Patina, leichte Prägeschwäche, vorzüglich. (archbishopric of Salzburg, Ernest of Bavaria, 1540-54, guldiner of 1550, with a cross at the start of the obverse legend. Handsome patina, slightly weakly struck, extremely fine.)
Ernst, *13. Juni 1500, war der dritte Sohn Herzog Alberts IV. Er wurde 1517 Bischof von Passau, 1540 Erzbischof von Salzburg. Da er die Annahme der Weihen auch nach einer ihm gestellten Frist von 10 Jahren weiterhin ablehnte, legte er am 16. Juli 1554 seine Würden nieder und zog sich zuerst nach Hallein, später auf die von ihm 1549 erworbene Grafschaft Glatz in Schlesien zurück, wo er am 7. Dezember 1560 starb. (Ernest was born in 1500 as the third son of Albert IV, duke of Bavaria. After his father's death in 1508, he was educated by the famous historian Aventinus. Since his father had decreed the indivisibility of Bavaria with a primogeniture law in 1506, Ernst was appointed to the clergy against his will. He refused to receive the higher priestly ordinations and therefore became administrator (rather than bishop) of the bishopric of Passau in 1517. Because Bavaria had supported Archbishop Matthäus Lang in the Peasants' War, Ernst was elected administrator of Salzburg after his death in 1540. The usual archbishop's insignia is missing on his coins and the formula "confirmed archbishop" usually appears as a title. After Ernst had allowed a second papal deadline to receive priestly ordinations to elapse, he abdicated in 1554 and retired to the Silesian county of Glatz, which he had acquired in 1549, and he died there in 1560.)"
The Archbishopric of Salzburg was an ecclesiastical state between Bavaria and Austria and usually ruled by a Hapsburg client. This type is listed for 1540, 1546 and 1549-54. A rare double guldiner (Dav-8167) was struck in 1551. Ernst was made archbishop without ever taking holy orders and finally abdicated in 1554 to Silesia after repeated deadlines from the pope. In the seventeenth century, Salzburg was blessed with a number of productive silver mines and the prince-archbishop was a prolific issuer of coins, particularly thalers. The archbishopric was secularized in 1803 and passed to Austria in 1814.
Recorded mintage: unknown.
Specification: silver, this specimen 28.58 g.
Catalog reference: Dav-8168; Probszt 361; Zöttl 395.
- Davenport, John S., European Crowns, 1484-1600, Frankfurt: Numismatischer Verlag, 1977.
- Craig, William D., Germanic Coinages: Charlemagne through Wilhelm II, Mountain View, CA: 1954.
- Helmut Zöttl, Salzburg Münzen und Medaillen, 1500-1810, 2 vols. Salzburg: Verlag Fruhwald, 2008.
- [1]Künker, Fritz Rudolf, Horst-Rudiger Künker, Ulrich Künker and Andreas Kaiser, Katalog 384: Münzen, Medaillen und Marken von Salzburg - Die Sammlung Professor Dr. Franz Schedel, Osnabrück: Fritz Rudolf Künker GmbH & Co., AG, 2023.
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