Sixteen Different Charlemagnes

Triton XVIII, Lot: 1371. Estimate $3000. Sold for $2750. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

CAROLINGIANS. Charlemagne (Charles the Great). As Charles I, King of the Franks, 768-814. AR Denier (18mm, 1.21 g, 11h). Class 2. “Ardis” (Uncertain Provençal) mint. Struck 771-793/4. C(AR)o/•/LVS in two lines / AR/DIS in two lines; (triple pellets)+(triple pellets) between. Cf. Coupland, Charlemagne, p. 216; cf. Depeyrot 56 (Arles); cf. M&G 238 (Indeterminate Mints); cf. MEC I, 722 (Arles?). Good VF, traces of find patina. Very rare.

From the Joseph R. Lasser Collection for the benefit of The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, purchased from James F. Elmen, 22 July 2009.

In 755 under Pepin I, the Carolingian currency system was reformed. In addition to reducing the number of mints that had existed previously under the Merovingians, this reform strengthened royal authority over the minting of coins and, most especially, established uniformities of weight, fineness, and design. It also established a set relationship between the Carolingian silver denier, which had become the main denomination, and the fictional denominations of account - the shilling and the gold solidus - that were employed to handle larger sums. Under Charlemagne, this reform was implemented fully and expanded to meet the needs of his ever-increasing empire. Initially, Charlemagne's deniers followed the weight and general type of Pepin I. As new sources of silver were discovered, and as Charlemagne acquired more power and territory, he issued new, heavier deniers of differing types, some of which types continued under his successors. One of these was the cross pattee / monogram type. Under each successive ruler, the type would be continued with only the monogram being changed to fit the name of the new ruler. Under Charlemagne's successor, Louis I 'le Pieux', a new type, the XPISTIANA RELIGIO, was introduced and featured a temple facade on the reverse A third type was that with the obverse legend, which originally had the name of the emperor, now replaced with the phrase GRATIA D-I REX, along with the monogram on the obverse, and a cross pattee with the mint name on the reverse. These last two types became so popular that early feudal issuers copied them for their own coinage, long after the Carolingian rulers themselves were gone. Known as immobilized types, the Carolingian denier (and its fraction, the obole) continued as a denominational type throughout western Europe in the form of the denar, denaro, and even the English penny (notated as d. in accounting) for most of the Middle Ages until the introduction of the larger gros in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.