I picked up a coin recently from my mail order coin dealer that I couldn't stop thinking about. It's small, old and worn. Nothing flashy about it. But once I started digging into what it actually was, I fell down a rabbit hole for the better part of an evening.
It's a 6 Stuivers Arendschelling from the city of Kampen in the Netherlands. Dated somewhere between 1612 and 1619. Four hundred years old give or take a few years.
The name alone got me. Arendschelling. It translates to Eagle Schelling. Flip it over to the reverse and there's your answer, a crowned double headed eagle staring back at you with the Holy Roman Emperor's title running around the edge. On the obverse, the crowned arms of Kampen and a Latin legend that translates roughly to "Silver coin of the Imperial City of Kampen."
Here's where it gets interesting. At least to me.
The Netherlands was in the middle of the Eighty Years' War against Spain when this coin was struck. It was an active, shooting war. And yet sitting right there on the coin is what looks like a Spanish coat of arms. You'd think that's a contradiction. It's not. The Spanish Habsburgs and the Holy Roman Emperor were branches of the same family tree it seems. They had been on Dutch coins for generations before the revolt ever started. Nobody swapped it out because frankly, it was good for business. Merchants across Europe recognized those arms. A coin that looked familiar moved goods. Commerce beats politics every time. Seems times don't change.
The city of Kampen had its own mint. So did a handful of other Dutch cities. The problem was they kept cutting corners on weight and silver content. The provinces complained for decades. Eventually the authorities shut all the municipal mints down before the century was out. So this coin comes from a mint that was already living on borrowed time.
Weight is about 4.95 grams at 0.500 fine silver. It is half silver. That was standard for the denomination and honestly part of why the authorities back then were so annoyed about it.
The thing about coins like this. They're not just metal. They're history. Trade wars, monetary policy, dynasty politics, a city trying to stay relevant in a changing economy. All of it sitting in something smaller than a modern quarter.
Anyway. That was my evening.
If you have any further information about this coin you would like to add, like historical information I left out or want to correct any I may have gotten wrong, please drop it in the comments.
Thanks for reading,
Joe
References:
CoinVarieties.com. "Kampen (1612-19) 6 Stuivers." https://coinvarieties.com/index.php/Kampen_(1612-19)_6_stuivers
Habsburg Spain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habsburg_Spain
Numista. "6 Stuivers Arendschelling, Matthias I, City of Kampen." https://en.numista.com/catalogue/pieces71163.html
The ANS (Australian Numismatic Society). "Dutch Coins in Australia." http://the-ans.com/library/Conf2012MT1.html
Notes:
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