Salzburg 1594 2 ducat Fr-689
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. 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. Ex: Coin Galleries Mail Bid Sale July 18, 1973, Lot #60." The Archbishopric of Salzburg was an ecclesiastical state between Bavaria and Austria and usually ruled by a Hapsburg client. In the seventeenth century it 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 1813. Friedberg lists this type for 1587-97.
Recorded mintage: unknown.
Specification: 7 g, .986 fine gold.
Catalog reference: Friedberg 689.
- Friedberg, Arthur L. and Ira S. Friedberg, Gold Coins of the World, From Ancient Times to the Present, 9th ed., Clifton, NJ: Coin and Currency Institute, 2017.
- Craig, William D., Germanic Coinages: Charlemagne through Wilhelm II, Mountain View, CA: 1954.
- [1]Ponterio, Richard, and Todd McKenna, The November 2015 Baltimore Auction, World Coins and Paper Money, featuring the Ray Czabor Collection and selections from the Strong Museum, Santa Ana, CA: Stack's Bowers LLC, 2015.
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