Salzburg 1728 1/2 thaler
This specimen was lot 3086 in Künker sale 384 (Osnabrück, March 2023), where it sold for €360 (about US$465 including buyer's fees). The catalog description[1] noted,
"Leopold Anton Eleutherius von Firmian, 1727-1744. 1/2 Reichstaler 1728. RR Patina, Felder leicht bearbeitet, sehr schön +. (archbishopric of Salzburg, Leopold Anton Eleutherius von Firmian, 1727-44, half thaler of 1728. Fields lightly tooled, choice very fine.)"
The Archbishopric of Salzburg was an ecclesiastical state between Bavaria and Austria and usually ruled by a Hapsburg client. This type was struck 1728 only and is only half thaler of Leopold Anton Eleutherius. The next half thaler would not be struck until 1752 (KM 387.1). 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 14.43 g.
Catalog reference: KM 327, Probszt 2146; Zöttl 2589.
- Craig, William D., Germanic Coinages: Charlemagne through Wilhelm II, Mountain View, CA: 1954.
- Michael, Thomas, Standard Catalog of World Coins, 1701-1800, 7th ed., Iola, WI: Krause Publications, 2016.
- 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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