Johnston R.A. All Things Medieval: An Encyclopedia of the Medieval World

Подождите немного. Документ загружается.

Clothing Accessories

170

repeating geometric designs or engraved with mottos. Some had designs

cut out of the leather or metal decorations riveted on. The end of the girdle

often had a decorative silver piece that acted as a weight to keep the girdle

hanging straight.

Decorative rivets, generally called mounts, came on girdles, straps, and

harness of all kinds. They were also attached to furniture, book covers, and

caskets. Some were made of wrought iron, while others were punched from

sheets of copper or iron. They were domed or ﬂ at, plain or stamped with an

additional design. The most basic mount shape was a circle, which could be

stamped with a heraldic design: star, sun, lion, ﬂ eur-de-lis, or shield. The

most expensive were enameled; the cheapest were a small, simple dome.

There were lobed variations on circles: the trefoil, with three round lobes;

the quatrefoil with four; the cinquefoil with ﬁ ve; and the sexfoil, septfoil, oc-

tofoil, and multifoil. The trefoil, quatrefoil, and cinquefoil were very com-

mon decorative mount shapes. They could be formed to look more like

ﬂ owers in many cases. Another simple mount design was square. As with

round, square or rectangular mounts often had heraldic designs to dress

them up. Most expensively, mounts could be shaped into leaves, shells, stars,

ﬂ eur-de-lis, or other interesting shapes.

Jingle bells were fashionable girdle accessories in the 14th century. There

are many illustrations showing little round bells hanging from ribbons on

Brass efﬁ gy engravings tell us much of what we know

about later medieval clothing. This 12th-century

English earl wears a typical man’s girdle over his mail

and surcote. It is decorated with brass or copper

mounts. Its long strap has been secured with a large

knot; most images of men’s girdles show this kind of

knot. He has a second strap over his shoulders,

probably to hold his sword, but perhaps as part of a

purse. (Duncan Walker/iStockPhoto)

Coal

171

courtiers’ girdles. Tumblers and jesters had been wearing bells on their hoods

for the previous century. With this association, it seems most likely that

courtiers’ bells were festival decorations, perhaps for holiday dancing.

See also: Cloth, Clothing, Jewelry, Hats.

Further Reading

Freese, Barbara. Coal: A Human History. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Books, 2003.

Gimpel, Jean. The Medieval Machine: The Industrial Revolution of the Middle Ages.

New York: Penguin, 1976.

Coins

The Roman Empire had minted coins and spread the custom of their use,

and all former Roman lands continued to use either old Roman coins or

their own crude imitations. More backward regions of Europe in the early

Middle Ages still used either barter or gold and silver treasures for pay-

ment of goods. Their acceptance of coins came with the acceptance of

Christianity and its closer ties to mainstream Europe. Places that were far-

ther away were the slowest to adopt the use of coins; Finland and Russia did

not fully adopt currency until the close of the Middle Ages.

During the classical period in both Greece and Rome, the technique for

striking coins used heated gold or silver planchets (blank disks). They used

well-carved dies and were able to achieve accurately struck coins with letters

and designs in high relief. These coins have held up well over the ages. In

medieval Europe, this technique was lost, and mints struck coins out of cold

sheets of silver with badly carved dies. The dies were made of iron cylinders

with the design cut into them with punches and other engraving tools. These

die-cutting punches were formed like wedges, circles, and bars, and the let-

ters and images were formed from these shapes. The relief was not high,

and surviving coins can be badly worn down. Letters were sometimes cut

backward. By the 15th century, coin-minting technique had improved.

The value of a coin was based on its weight, since it was deﬁ ned as a cer-

tain weight of gold, silver, or copper. The words for weight and money were

identical in many cases (the English pound, the German mark). Unless a

Coins

173

merchant had an accurate balance for weighing coins, he would not be able

to tell whether a coin was accurate. The dies used to strike coins were nearly

always circular, but the coins were not. A medieval coin often bulged be-

yond the edges of its stamp. This provided an opportunity for a dishonest

trader to shave the metal down to the stamp, or even just inside its circle, and

collect the shavings for resale. If a mint had made a coin improperly, it

could be heavier than it needed to be. In medieval Germany, private indi-

viduals were not permitted to own balances out of fear they would ﬁ nd the

heavy coins and trim them for proﬁ t. Coins could also be made from im-

pure metal. The ruler who authorized the coin was supposed to guarantee

the metal’s purity, but coins could be forged, and even some rulers were

dishonest.

When a type of coin was considered debased because too many had been

shaved, the coins had to be recalled back to the mint, where they were

melted and restruck. The mint skimmed a fee, issuing fewer coins than it

had taken in, and the overseer of a mint could become very wealthy. The

right to operate a mint granted a very lucrative favor.

There were more coin designs across Europe than anyone could keep

track of because coins were reissued with a new design for every new king.

Not only that, but every region had several mints, and each might make

its coins a little bit different. The map of Europe was much more compli-

cated during the Middle Ages than it is now. Any single modern nation, no

matter how small, was cut into smaller units: counties, principalities, and

duchies. The Netherlands, one of modern Europe’s smaller nations, was di-

vided into the counties of Friesland, Holland, Zeeland, Flanders, Hainault,

and Limburg; the duchies of Gelderland and Brabant; and the bishoprics

of Liège and Utrecht. Each count, duke, and bishop could mint his own

coins.

In any given time, at any given place, coins from many places were in cir-

culation. Coins from Islamic regions have been found in Scandinavia. The

coins of England and Ireland circulated freely with full value after the En-

glish conquered Ireland. Certain coins were more popular at certain times,

and these foreign coins might be preferred in trade over the local coins. At

major trade fairs and market towns, coins of all denominations were in use.

By the time of the Crusades, there were specialists in international cur-

rency exchange. During the late Middle Ages, large commercial ﬁ rms main-

tained branches in multiple cities and used currency exchanges to disguise

interest on loans. They could lend in one currency and receive in another.

Most medieval coins were struck from silver. Silver had been mined

around the Mediterranean for many centuries; it existed in deposits of lead

and copper and had to be separated and puriﬁ ed. Deposits of silver were

discovered in Germany and Bohemia during the Middle Ages. Gold had

Coins

174

to be imported from outside Europe and was much more valuable. By the

13th century, rising prosperity in the Italian republics prompted them to be-

gin issuing gold coins. These coins were worth much more than silver coins,

so they could be used more efﬁ ciently for large volumes of trade.

Most European coins used the Latin alphabet and spelled proper names

as Latin words. Roman numerals were the only numbers until the 15th cen-

tury, when a Swiss coin ﬁ rst used the new Arabic numbers. Coins from Mus-

lim Spain used Arabic, and Byzantine coins were in Greek. Some European

moneyers in Christian countries struck coins with Arabic inscriptions, in-

tending them to be used in trade with Spain or North Africa. Anglo-Saxon

coins from the early Middle Ages used runes to spell a king’s name, as did

Swedish and Norwegian coins. Primitive Russian coins used Cyrillic letters,

and, rarest of all, some Jewish moneyers in Poland struck coins with He-

brew letters.

Countries and Their Coins

Italy’s coin history stretches back to the Roman Empire, whose coins be-

came the model for all later coins. Italy, like the rest of Europe, became

fragmented into many principalities during the years of barbarian invasions,

ﬁ rst Goths and then Lombards. The only strong kingdom in medieval Italy

was not of Italian origin; invading Normans had created the kingdom of

Sicily, which included most of Italy south of Naples, as well as the island

of Sicily itself. But the real centers of power became the commercial cities:

Milan, Genoa, Venice, Florence, Pisa, and others. The doge of Venice pro-

duced a ﬁ ne silver grosso, of greater value than previous coins, for trade

connected with the Fourth Crusade. Venice’s grosso was copied by other

cities, which attempted to keep its value the same but with an added local

design, such as a lily for Florence. Gold coins produced in the 13th century

became the international standard of European trade, including the gold

ﬂ orin of Florence and the gold ducat of Venice.

In the early Frankish kingdom, under the weak Merovingian kings, local

barons struck coins in both the king’s name and their own names. There was

no central control over coins. Around 790, Charlemagne reformed Frankish

currency in a way that deﬁ ned European coinage for a thousand years. He

created a silver penny, the denarius (denier in later medieval French), such

that 240 of them weighed a pound. The solidus was an intermediate value,

worth 12 pennies; 20 solidi (shillings in English) made a pound. The only ac-

tual coin, though, was the denarius, or penny. Carolingian pennies were

struck with high-quality dies, with very high relief in the images. Charle-

magne wished to have the coins all minted at his capital, Aachen, but instead,

coins were minted regionally, in places like Rheims, Rouen, Paris, Lyon,

Strasbourg, Maastricht, Milan, Pavia, and others. After the Carolingian dy-

Coins

175

nasty’s power weakened, minting again became decentralized. Duke, counts,

bishops, and even abbots minted their own coins. These coins were of un-

even value; dishonest moneyers could mix a lesser-value metal into the silver

or gold.

After 1000, the French kings began to regain central authority and took

back the mints. Louis IX ordered that only his coins would have value

throughout the kingdom; local mints had only local value. The royal coins

were better regulated and were struck with better designs, and they intro-

duced a gold coin. However, after the French kings were weakened by the

Hundred Years’ War with England, local dukes and counts again took back

coinage. All through the Middle Ages, coin production, and the power it re-

presented, shifted back and forth between the king and his lords, and it was

not fully centralized until after the end of the Middle Ages. Around 1300,

King Philip of France devalued the currency three times. Each time, coins

were recalled and made smaller so that more coins could be made from the

same gold and silver. The people rioted as prices soared.

The new wealth of the Italian cities spurred them to create new coins that were worth

more than the usual silver pieces in European circulation. One of the ﬁ rst was

Florence’s gold ﬂ orin. The ﬂ orin remained one of the primary currencies well into the

Renaissance. (Museo Nazionale del Bargello, Florence, Italy/The Bridgeman Art

Library)

Coins

176

Germany was originally part of the Frankish kingdom, and its coin tradi-

tions were the same as France’s. In the 15th century, a huge silver deposit

was discovered in the Tyrol region of Germany. At the close of the Middle

Ages, in 1500, the German king began to issue new large silver coins, called

talers, to compete with the Italian gold coins.

Under Anglo-Saxon rule, many different small kingdoms minted their own

coins, but after the Norman conquest, coins were more centralized. There

were still many mints, usually one in every large regional town. During the

13th century, some kings tried to reform and regulate the currency. King

Henry III ordered a coin design in 1247 that extended the arm of a cross right

to the edge of the coin so people could tell if it had been clipped or shaved.

His son, King Edward I, ordered a new coinage in 1279 and created new

halfpennies and farthings to prevent people from actually cutting silver pen-

nies. All his new coins bore the same well-designed image, which was subse-

quently copied all over Europe. He also centralized coin minting so coins

no longer bore a mark of each mint but were more regulated in their pro-

duction than before. King Edward III introduced a gold coin, the noble,

in 1344. By the end of the medieval period, English coins came in nobles

(six shillings and eight pence), shillings, groats (four pennies), pennies (also

called pence), halfpennies, and farthings (quarter pennies).

The dominant coin of the Mediterranean region was the Byzantine gold

solidus, or nomisma. Its minting remained very standard from the period

of early Byzantine power through the 11th century. The front of the coin

showed an image of the empire, and where Roman coins had showed a pro-

ﬁ le, these coins showed a face looking straight out from the coin. The other

side showed another member of the imperial family, a design of crosses, or

an image of Jesus or Mary. As the empire declined, its coin became debased

and also changed its shape, becoming ﬂ atter and wider. After 1100, three

The silver penny was medieval Europe’s

most universal coin. Coins were stamped

with the current king’s image or symbol,

or with a date in Roman numerals, so that

coiners could keep track of how old a

coin was. Old, devalued silver coins were

routinely melted down and recast.

Medieval kings were in a continual

struggle against people who clipped and

pared coins, since commerce depended

on people’s trust in the value of a coin.

An old coin had no antique value; new

coins were more likely to be full weight.

(Martin McCarthy)

Coins

177

coins were circulated in the empire: gold, silver, and copper. All had images

of Jesus, saints, or emperors.

The Crusader kingdoms were part of the Byzantine Empire’s decline,

since they took away territory and trade. The Crusader kingdoms of Anti-

och and Edessa struck their own coins during the 12th century, at the be-

ginning of their tenure as independent kingdoms. These coins were copper

and showed images of saints; one showed Saint George slaying a dragon.

They used Latin letters but sometimes mixed in Greek letters since these

were better understood in that region.

Muslim Spanish coins were different from Christian coins. Muslims pro-

hibited the reproduction of an image of a person’s face, so their coins never

had royal portraits. After Abd Al-Rahman took the title caliph, breaking away

from the new dynasty in Baghdad, he designed new silver and gold coins

that did not change between 929 and 1031. From then until the capture

of Seville by northern Christian kings in 1212, the Almohad dynasty struck

coins of a distinctive nature; unlike other coins, they were square. Each

Christian kingdom of Spain struck its own coins, but, throughout the Mid-

dle Ages, the kingdoms were gradually united by marriages, and the num-

ber of coins gradually reduced. When Isabella of Castile married Ferdinand

of Aragon at the end of the 15th century, the Christian kingdoms were all

united, and the new coin with its double proﬁ le of the joint sovereigns sym-

bolized the newly resurgent Christian Spain.

The barbarian frontiers of medieval Europe were Scandinavia and Russia.

Russia’s ruling dynasty had come from Scandinavian Vikings who settled

in Kiev, and the regions frequently traded. The Vikings did not understand

the concept of coins at ﬁ rst; they treated coins as trinkets and were just as

likely to pay for goods with gold rings and other treasures. Their usual use

of silver and gold, whether in coins, lumps, or rings, was to hoard it in case

they needed to pay a ransom. Gradually, trade with the rest of Europe nor-

malized their use of foreign coins, and they also cut small irregular pieces

of silver to use in trade. After some of the Danish Vikings settled in north-

ern England, they began striking coins. Denmark was striking coins by the

mid-11th century, and its coins became the usual currency of Scandinavia.

Finland did not begin to use coins until it became part of Sweden in the

late Middle Ages.

In Russia, the prince of Kiev began minting coins after accepting Byzan-

tine Christianity, but they were not much used through most of the Middle

Ages. Russians to the north either used small amounts of foreign currency

(German or English) or bartered with silver ingots or other fragments of

precious metal. Silver ingots were called grivnas and were shaped as hexag-

onal bars in Kiev. Northern grivnas, made in Novgorod, were thinner and

sometimes curved. The Tartar conquest brought an inﬂ ux of Islamic coins,

and German settlement of the Baltic region toward Slavic lands (modern

Compass and Navigation

178

Lithuania) introduced German coins. True Russian coins were not struck

until the late 14th century. Prince Dmitri Donskoi of Moscow issued the

ruble and a coin that was 1/200 of the ruble, called a denga. The Russian

word for money is still dengi, although the denga itself did not last much

past the close of the Middle Ages and was replaced by the kopeck.

See also: Alphabet, Banks, Gold and Silver, Seals, Weights and Measures.