Sale: Triton IX, Lot: 1936. Estimate $1500.  Closing Date: Monday, 9 January 2006.  Sold For $2800. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

ITALY, Papal States. Clement X (Emelio Altieri). 1670-1676. AR Piastra (31.63 g, 12h). Dated 1673, RY 4. Girolamo Lucenti, sculptor. CLEMENS X • PONT • MAX • AN • IIII •, bust right wearing cap and stole; EQ • HIER • LVCENTI and MDCLXXIII below / BEATO PIO V, St. Pius V kneeling before an altar, being visited by Archangel Michael bearing a banner with a device of the battle of Lepanto; two stars and Raggi arms in exergue. Muntoni II p. 244, 11; CNI XVI p. 420, 18; Berman 2002; KM 355; Davenport 4076. EF, light toning, slight wave to flan. ($1500)

Ex Renaissance Auctions II (6 December 2000), lot 428.

The beatification (or, as the KM catalogue put it, the "Beautification") of Pius V took place in 1673, and he became a saint of the Catholic church in 1712. Antonio Ghisleri had acquired a reputation for probity and sternness, holding the post of Grand Inquisitor before his election to the Papacy as Pius V in 1566. He strengthened the Inquisition, established the Congregation of the Index, tamped down on the rampant sale of indulgences and widespread nepotism in the church, and expelled the Jews from the States of the Church. This piastra, however, places greater emphasis on his role in urging the naval alliance between Venice and the Hapsburg kingdoms, which destroyed the Turkish fleet at Lepanto in 1571 and preserved the Mediterranean for the western powers.