Marriage of Leopold V and Claudia de Medici

Sale: CNG 78, Lot: 2006. Estimate $1000.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 14 May 2008.  Sold For $1100. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

AUSTRIA, Holy Roman Empire. Leopold V. Archduke, 1619-1632. AR Double Taler (57.07 g, 12h). Hall mint. Undated issue (1626). Conjoined, crowned, and collared busts of Archduke Leopold V and Claudia de Medici right / Crowned eagle facing, wings spread, head left, laurel wreath above. Moser & Tursky 463; Davenport 3332. EF, toned, minor adjustment marks.

Claudia, from the influential Medici family, moved to Austria and married Archduke Leopold V in 1626. The two sovereigns founded a sideline of the Habsburg dynasty that ruled over the prosperous Alpine duchy of Further Austria. Their base was at Innsbruck, capital of the silver-rich county of Tirol, not far from the Hall mint where this coin was produced. Leopold and Claudia’s two sons, Ferdinand Karl and Sigismund Franz, ruled the duchy until 1665, when Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I incorporated it into his own holdings after the death of Sigismund.