Sale: CNG 79, Lot: 1438. Estimate $100.  Closing Date: Wednesday, 17 September 2008.  Sold For $85. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

BULGARIA, Second Empire. Ivan Šišman. 1371–1395. AR Half Groshi. All coins: Half-length facing bust of the Theotokos, orans, facing bust of Holy Infant on breast; [M Θ across field] / Half-length facing bust of Ivan Šišman, holding cross-tipped scepter; imperial monogram in left field, [imperial monograms] in right field. Raduchev & Zhekov Type 1.15.7-8; Youroukova & Penchev 124-5. Average VF. LOT SOLD AS IS, NO RETURNS. Six (6) coins in lot.

Following the Christian defeat at the Battle of Kosovo in 1389, the Ottomans once again turned to Ivan Šišman. In 1393 the new sultan, Bayezid I, invaded Bulgaria and beseiged the capital, Tarnovo. After a three-month siege, the city fell on 17 July 1393, a point sometimes taken as the end of the Second Bulgarian Empire, although both Ivan Šišman and Ivan Sratsimir survived. Ivan Šišman continued to rule in Nikopol as an Ottoman vassal, hoping for aid from the Hungarians, until he was beheaded there on the orders of Bayezid I on 3 June 1395. The remainder of Ivan Šišman’s territory was annexed into the Ottoman Empire, although Šišman’s son Konstantin II continued to rule at Vidin until 1422.