Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
) or penny was a medieval coin which takes its name from the Frankish coin first issued in the late seventh century; [1] in English it is sometimes referred to as a silver penny. Its appearance represents the end of gold coinage, which, at the start of Frankish rule, had either been Roman (Byzantine) or "pseudo-imperial" (minted by the Franks ...
Frankish gold Tremissis with Christian cross, issued by minter Madelinus , Dorestad, Netherlands, mid-600s. The tremissis or tremis (Greek: τριμίσιον, trimision) was a small pure gold coin of Late Antiquity. Its name, meaning "a third of a unit", formed by analogy with semissis (half of a unit), indicated its value relative to the solidus.
In heraldry, a roundel of a gold colour is referred to as a bezant, in reference to the coin.Like many heraldic charges, the bezant originated during the crusading era, when Western European knights first came into contact with Byzantine gold coins, and were perhaps struck with their fine quality and purity.
The Merovingian dynasty (/ ˌ m ɛ r ə ˈ v ɪ n dʒ i ə n /) was the ruling family of the Franks from around the middle of the 5th century until Pepin the Short in 751. [1] They first appear as "Kings of the Franks" in the Roman army of northern Gaul. By 509 they had united all the Franks and northern Gallo-Romans under their rule.
Gold, silver and bronze or copper were the principal coinage metals of the ancient world, the medieval period and into the late modern period when the diversity of coinage metals increased. Coins are often made from more than one metal, either using alloys, coatings ( cladding / plating ) or bimetallic configurations.
Solidus of Constantius II from Antioch, 347–355. A holed coin such as this was likely worn as a jewelry piece by a prominent or wealthy Roman. The solidus was initially introduced by Diocletian in small issues and later reintroduced for mass circulation by Constantine the Great in c. AD 312 and was composed of relatively solid gold.
Gold coins typically represented larger nominal sums, but they also introduced a bimetallic system of currency which depended on the values of two precious metals. The French "franc", introduced in 1360, was the first coin anywhere to represent exactly 1 pfund or "pound". The gold "sovereign", first minted in 1489, was the first English £1 coin.
The earliest coinage is from Gaul, where the Visigoths settled at the beginning of the fifth century, and was followed by coinage from Hispania in the beginning of the sixth century, which became the centre of Visigothic rule after they lost the majority of their territory in Gaul to the Franks. The first coins, commonly known as the pseudo ...