circumcision (numismatics)

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Circumcised Giulio of Pope Julius II.

Circumcision is actually a reduction in the weight of thin, mostly medieval coins made of precious metals, which was done by cutting off the edge of the coin with scissors for fraudulent purposes. In a broader sense, this also includes filing the edge of coins and drilling out coins for illegal precious metal extraction.

explanation

Coins were falsified up to modern times by trimming and filing the edge of coins and by drilling out precious metal .

clipping

Freiberg ’s city ​​law stipulates how “tin coins”, the bracteates , should be dealt with in the bracteate period. This also applies to other territories.

Trimmed bracteate by Ulrich von Wettin

The mint officials did not have to check the individual weight of the pennies (bracteates). They only had to weigh whether more or less than 244 to 246 coins went to the weight mark . The weight mark in the Meissen mark , for example, was the Prague mark silver at 253 g. This check of the total weight of a certain number of coins instead of checking the weight of the individual piece in medieval coinage was known as al marco (Italian after the mark). However, the weight differences of the individual pieces when weighing "al marco" were large and only corresponded to the legal coin standard on average . Given the uneven weight of the individual pennies, it was obvious to bring overweight people down to the average weight simply by cutting off the edge with scissors. A medieval term for selecting coins that were weighed out of the mass of pieces because of their heavier weight is saigern . The scales for this were called Saiger scales (fine scales). Only authorized changers and mint masters were allowed to use these scales. Everyone else was forbidden to own a Saiger scale.

“You couldn't ban the possession of scissors; possession of a Saiger balance to separate out the heavier pennies, on the other hand, was considered a capital crime. Whoever is found with a scale and circumcised pennies: he will be convicted with the judge and a sworn witness, but keep your hands in the right place if the mint master does not show mercy. If one understands the handful deed of cutting the pennies with the scissors , iz get the hand .”

The cutting of coins and also the saigern, with which the heavier pennies could be separated from the lighter pennies, were considered capital crimes. According to the Freiberg law quoted here, the penalty for this was cutting off the right hand. The coin counterfeiters were punished even more cruelly than the criminals convicted of circumcision . For those convicted of forgers, death in the fire or in a boiling cauldron was the lawful punishment well into modern times. (See also Hustaler#Medalists ).

Trimmed horn groschen from 1466 with mmz. Cross, from the Freiberg mint

Even in the late medieval penny era , trimming the edge of coins was by no means uncommon and could not be prevented despite heavy penalties. The Bitterfeld coin find contained 40½  Prague groschen , all but one of which had been circumcised. Groschen were found in Cösitz , of which 117 out of 169 were circumcised.

Trimming and filing the edge of a coin was not uncommon even in modern times. The inventions of edge writing and knurling served as protection against depreciation . The first marginal inscriptions and decorations on the outer face of the coin were not embossed, but raised. They were already present on the coin blanks before they were minted.

According to Kundmann, the Cromwell thaler is the first coin with writing on the edge.

According to Johann Christian Kundmann , the 1658 Cromwell thaler of the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell is the first coin with marginal writing :

"But the […] marginal writing on this thaler also has something special, and one generally ascribes this invention to the Cromwel, which serves both to decorate and to preserve the coin [...]."

Conservation ( Latin conservare 'to receive', 'to preserve') is to be understood here as protection against circumcision.

The inscription on the edge of the Cromwell Valley reads HAS NISI PERITVRVS MIHI ADIMAT NEM(O); Translated: Destruction to him who circumcises me. The warning about the curtailment of the coin thus passed from hand to hand in payment transactions.

File, drill out

Filing the edge of a coin for fraudulent purposes was also called circumcision. Using the example of the aforementioned Cromwell thaler with the first marginal writing to protect against circumcision, circumcision means filing the edge of the coin. With the relatively large thickness of a thaler or a crown , cutting off the edge of the coin with scissors is usually hardly an option.

Coins falsified by being drilled out are also mentioned in the coin dictionaries under “circumcision”. Such coins were often not recognizable because the bores filled with base metal were covered or sealed with the correct coin metal .

trivia

The term money cutting is probably due to the largely medieval circumcision of coins made of precious metals. Despite cruel punishment, the great evil could not be eradicated, which may be the reason why the expression in a figurative sense in the form of money-cutting for usury has survived to this day.

literature

  • Helmut Kahnt: The big coin dictionary from A to Z. , Regenstauf 2005, p. 49: Circumcision
  • Gerhard Krug: The Meissen-Saxon pennies 1338-1500 , German Science Publishers, Berlin 1974, p.
  • Walther Haupt : Saxon numismatics. German publisher of science, Berlin 1974
  • Heinz Fengler, Gerd Gierow, Willy Unger: Transpress Encyclopedia Numismatics , Berlin 1976 p. 40: circumcision

itemizations

  1. ↑ Helmut Kahnt: The big coin dictionary from A to Z. (2005), p. 49: Circumcision
  2. ↑ Heinz Fengler, Gerd Gierow, Willy Unger: transpress Lexicon Numismatics (1976) p. 40: Circumcision.
  3. ↑ Walther Haupt: Saxon coinage (1974), p. 23: Freiberg city law, regional pfennig.
  4. ↑ Walther Haupt: Saxon Coinage (1974), p. 24/27
  5. ↑ Helmut Kahnt: The big coin dictionary from A to Z (2005), p. 438: Seigern, Saigern.
  6. ↑ Helmut Kahnt: The large coin dictionary from A to Z (2005), p. 21: al marco
  7. ↑ Walther Haupt: Saxon Coinage (1974), p. 27: The legal situation.
  8. ↑ Walther Haupt: Saxon Coinage (1974), p. 28: Death in the boiling cauldron.
  9. ↑ Gerhard Krug: The Meissen-Saxon Groschen 1338-1500 (1974), p. 24: sheets for coin enthusiasts (1907 and 1908).
  10. ↑ Heinz Fengler, Gerd Gierow, Willy Unger: transpress Lexikon Numismatik (1976), p. 40.
  11. ↑ D. Johann Christian Kundmann: Nummi singulares or ... (1734), p. 33/35.
  12. ↑ Carl Christoph Schmieder: Hand dictionary of the entire numismatics. (1811), p. 104.
  13. ↑ Heinz Fengler, Gerd Gierow, Willy Unger: transpress Lexicon Numismatics (1976), p. 40: The filing and boring.
  14. ↑ Duden | money cutting | Spelling, Meaning, Definition, Origin. Retrieved January 15, 2022 .
  15. ↑ Purse tailoring and money cutting | Briefly explained – corrections.de. Retrieved January 15, 2022 .