Zecca : the mint of Venice in the Middle Ages / Alan M. Stahl.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Stahl, Alan M., 1947-

Contributor:

American Numismatic Society.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Zecca di Venezia.

Mints--Italy--Venice--History--To 1500.

Mints.

Coins, Italian--Italy--Venice--History--To 1500.

Coins, Italian.

History.

Italy--Venice.

Physical Description:

xv, 497 pages : illustrations, maps ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press ; New York : In association with the American Numismatic Society, [2000]

Summary:

Within a few months of assuming the position of curator of medieval coins at the American Numismatic Society in 1980, Alan M. Stahl was presented with a plastic bag containing a hoard of 5,000 recently discovered coins, most of which turned out to be from medieval Venice. The course of study of that hoard (and a later one containing more than 14,000 coins) led him to the Venetian archives, where he examined thousands of unpublished manuscripts. To provide an even more accurate account of how the Zecca mint operated in Venice in the thirteenth through fifteenth centuries, Stahl commissioned scientific analyses of the coins using a variety of modern techniques, uncovering information about their content and how they had been manufactured. The resulting book, Zecca: The Mint of Venice in the Middle Ages, is the first to examine the workings of a premodern mint using extensive research in original documents as well as detailed study of the coins themselves. The first of the book's three sections traces the coinage of Venice from its origins in the ninth century as a minor, and unofficial, regional Italian coinage to its position at the dawn of the Renaissance as the dominant currency of Mediterranean trade. The second section, entitled "The Mint in the Life of Medieval Venice," illustrates the mechanisms of the control of bullion and the strategies for mint profit and explores the mint's role in Venetian trade and the emergence of a bureaucratized government. The third section, "Within the Mint," examines the physical operations that transformed raw bullion into coins and identifies the personnel of the mint, situating the holders of each position in the context of their social and professional backgrounds. Illustrated with photos of Venetian coinage from the world's major collections, Zecca also includes a listing of all holders of offices related to the medieval Venetian mint and summaries of all major finds of medieval Venetian coins.

Contents:

Part I. The Venetian Mint and Coinage to 1423

1. The Age of the Penny, 800-1200 3

The Venetian Mint through the Eleventh Century 3

The Sale of the Mint Land in 1112: A Closing of the Mint? 8

The Ducal Penny 13

2. The Age of the Grosso, c. 1200-1285 16

The Introduction of the Grosso 16

The Age of the Grosso: The Thirteenth Century up to 1284 22

The Reintroduction of the Venetian Penny 24

3. The Age of the Ducat, 1285-1330 28

The Introduction and Establishment of the Ducat 28

The Reorganization of Minting 33

The Early Fourteenth Century: A Period of Uneasy Trimetallism 34

4. The Age of the Soldino, 1330-1379 41

The Great Currency Mutation: Reform of the Moneta and the Institution of the Quinto 41

The Glut of Gold 47

Another Try at the Mezzanino 51

The Plague Years 55

Further Debasements: The New Soldino and the Tornesello 60

From Midcentury to the Peace of Turin (1381) 63

5. The Age of Crisis and Reform, 1379-1423 69

The Reintroduction of the Grosso 69

The Postwar Years 70

Crises of Clipping and Culling 75

Prospects for the New Century 78

New Colonial Coinages 81

The Reform of the Gold Mint 86

The Reform of the Silver Mint 91

Part II. The Zecca in the Life of Medieval Venice

6. The Setting of Mint Policy 99

The Legislative Bodies of Medieval Venice and Their Records 102

Medieval Legislation Governing the Mint and Bullion 105

Politics and Monetary Policy 112

7. Government Control of the Bullion Market 126

The Sources of Silver and Gold 127

Silver Speculation within Venice 131

The Fondaco dei Tedeschi and the Bullion Trade 133

The Silver Brokers 134

The Control of the Gold and Silver Markets in the Thirteenth Century 136

The Early Fourteenth Century 139

The Creation of the Silver Office at the Rialto 145

The Gold Estimators and the Market for Gold in the Fourteenth Century 147

The Silver Market after 1340 152

Silver Officials versus Moneychangers: The de Bora Affair 154

The Sale of Silver, 1366-1423 157

The Silver Officials and Coinage Circulation 161

8. The Economics of the Zecca 168

The Economics of the Minting of Silver 168

The Economics of the Minting of Gold 190

Minting Strategies of Medieval Venice 196

9. The Circulation of Venetian Coinages 201

The Venetian Penny, the Denaro Piccolo 202

The Grosso 207

The Ducat 212

The Soldino and Mezzanino 217

The Tornesello 223

10. Cullers, Clippers, and Counterfeiters 226

Part III. Within the Mint

11. The Mintmasters 245

The Responsibilities of the Mintmasters 245

The Quindena 246

The Acquisition of Bullion 249

The Supervision of Manufacture 251

The Distribution of Newly Minted Coins 254

A Case of Innovative Initiative by a Mintmaster 256

Controls and Checks on the Masters within the Mint 257

The Accounts of the Mintmasters 258

The Number and Election of Masters 261

The Remuneration of the Mintmasters 264

Ill-gotten Gains 269

The Social and Economic Background of Mintmasters 273

The Careers of Mintmasters 277

12. The Mint Building and Staff 281

The Mint Building 281

The Permanent Staff 286

13. Coin Design and Die Engraving 302

The Legends on the Coins 302

The Images and Style of the Coins 304

The Technology of Die Engraving 313

The Engravers of the Medieval Zecca 315

14. From Bullion to Coin 320

The Refining of Bullion 321

From Ingot to Blank 336

Striking the Coins: The Moneyers 344

15. The Standards of Medieval Venetian Coins 354

The Alloys of Venetian Gold and Silver 354

Control of Weight Standards 361

The Standards of the First Soldino and Mezzanino Issues 364

16. The Volume of Production at the Venetian Zecca 369

Quantity of Production: Overview 369

Documentary Sources for Production Numbers 372

Numismatic Indices for Production at the Zecca 385

Inferences from Find Statistics 390

Excavation Finds 391

Hoard Finds 396

The Zecca at the Death of Doge Mocenigo 406

Appendix A. Offices Relating to Bullion and the Zecca 407

Appendix B. Finds of Medieval Venetian Coins 425.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [465]-480) and index.

ISBN:

080186383X

OCLC:

44013755