Coin right of the County of Hanau
The minting right of the County of Hanau made it possible for the Lords and Counts of Hanau to mint coins since 1368.
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prehistory
The former men - since 1429: Count - Hanau had since 1368 a - albeit at Babenhausen limited - mint money through a by Emperor Charles IV. Lent privilege . In fact, however, they did not make use of this right until 1588. On May 3, 1587 put Count Philipp V. of Hanau-Lichtenberg the privilege of the Münzaprobationstag in Worms before, which stated that the award in law still exists and Count Philipp V. was entitled, coins shape to make. The fact that the Hanau counts began to mint their own coins so late is certainly due on the one hand to the fact that their two parts of the country were so relatively close to the strong economic centers of Frankfurt am Main ( County of Hanau-Munzenberg ) and Strasbourg ( County of Hanau-Lichtenberg ), so there was always enough cash in circulation. On the other hand, at the end of the 16th century, with the rulers' increasing need for money and the emergence of early mercantilism, the knowledge that mints could be attractive sources of income had spread.
Hanau mints
County of Hanau-Lichtenberg
Count Philipp V set up his first mint in 1587 in Wörth an der Sauer . Count Johann Reinhard I added a second one in Babenhausen, which worked until 1630, to this first mint in 1608, and a third one in Willstätt in 1620 . The latter in particular stood out as a hedge coin , a mint that brought inferior coins into circulation. The latter had 110 quintals of silver minted in coins in 1621/22 and generated a " treasure trove " of more than 70,000 guilders . In 1623 the count had to stop the fraud. In 1659, Count Friedrich Casimir set up a mint for his Hanau-Lichtenberg part of the country, which minted coins in Buchsweiler until 1672 when the company was relocated to Hanau .
County of Hanau-Munzenberg
In the county of Hanau-Münzenberg, Count Philipp Ludwig II , who was also highly active in other areas of the economy, set up the first mint on the basis of a right received as a fief from Emperor Rudolf II and began to mint coins. 1626–1638 the Thirty Years War interrupted production. In 1639 this should be resumed. Due to the change of rule in the county of Hanau-Münzenberg, which followed in rapid succession during this period , production did not start again until 1647, but was then abandoned in 1658 in favor of the Mint in Buchsweiler. Conversely, the entire company was relocated to Hanau in 1672. From 1684 onwards, production fell sharply and only a few coins were minted.
The mint changed its location several times within Hanau. At first it was housed in the area of the later Old St. John's Church . Because it had to give way to the church there, it moved from 1672–1681 to the so-called Neue Münze in Erbsengasse. This building then became the Lutheran Orphanage. From 1681–1722 the mint was located on what is now the corner plot of Marktstrasse / Freiheitsplatz , from where it was moved to the newly built Frankfurter Tor .
Even after the Landgraves of Hessen-Kassel inherited the County of Hanau-Münzenberg in 1736, they continued to mint coins. It was not abandoned until the final phase of the Holy Roman Empire in 1802.
Hanau coins
Apart from the time of the Thirty Years' War, the Hanau coins were of very high quality. This also meant that they were often melted down again elsewhere in order to produce inferior money. This is one of the reasons why relatively few pieces have survived.
For the mint in Hanau, primarily small coins are initially documented: three-parters , three-cruisers , albus and pennies . Occasionally, however, high denominations were already being made back then: thalers and ducats .
From 1672, higher denominations were increasingly minted. With the silver mines in the Bieber office , which from 1684 belonged entirely to the County of Hanau, a reliable source for the minting of silver coins was available.
literature
- AE Ahrens: On the Hanau coinage . In: Frankfurter Münzzeitung. Vol. 10, No. 119, 1910, pp. 161f.
- Frank Fuchs: Coins of Lower Alsace. In: The coin. Vol. 12, Jan. 1981, pp. 36-39.
- Madelaine Lang: Le Monnayage des Comtes de Hanau-Lichtenberg . In: Société d'Histoire et d'Archaeologie de Saverne et Environs (ed.): Cinquième centenaire de la création du Comté de Hanau-Lichtenberg 1480 - 1980 = Pays d'Alsace 111/112 (2, 3/1980), p 73-85.
- Fried Lübbecke : Hanau. City and county. Cologne, 1951, p. 279ff.
- NN: A Graeflich-Hanauischer-Vormundschafflcher Thaler, the Catarina Belgicae, from A. 1625 . In: The weekly historical coin amusement 35th piece. 1732, pp. 273-280.
- NN: The last of the Counts of Hanau, Philipp Reinhard and Johann Reinhard's beautiful brotherly unity commemorative coin from 1699 . In: The weekly historical Müntz amusement 19th piece, 1750, pp. 145–152.
- Hans Nussbaum: Babenhäuser gold guilders 1612 by Johann Reinhard I of Hanau-Lichtenberg . In: Berliner Münzblätter. XLIX, 1929, No. 318, pp. 473-474.
- Fritz Spruth: Die Bieberer Bergbautaler: A catalog of all Bieber coins from 1754 to 1802, combined with a contribution to the monetary history of the County of Hanau and the Landgraviate of Hessen-Kassel as well as a description of the mining history of Bieber = publication of the Society for International Monetary History No. 7. 1979.
- Reinhard Suchier : The Camp'sche coin collection of the high school in Hanau. In: Program of the Royal High School in Hanau . 1869, 1870.
- Reinhard Suchier: The coins of the Counts of Hanau . Hanau 1897; ND 1994.
- Reinhard Suchier: The Hanau tipper groschen . In: Frankfurter Münzzeitung Vol. 4, No. 43/44, 1904, pp. 101–109.
- Reinhard Suchier: A Hanauer Guldenstempelung from 1690. In: Frankfurter Münzzeitung. Vol. 5, No. 55/56, 1905, pp. 292-296.