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Coinage in Hall


Already in the final phase of the Meran mint and in the first years of the Hall mint, experiments had been done on the coining of gold. Nevertheless, since relevant gold resources weren’t available, it soon became obvious that gold coinage wouldn’t turn out to be profitable in the long run. The absence of gold resources on the one hand and the abundance of silver, on the other hand, led the Tyrolean coin in another direction. The main focus had to be the coinage of silver money. Up to about 1480 vierer and kreutzers were struck in Hall and, along with them, the unprofitable gold florin, which equaled in value at that time about 60 kreutzers. There was a big gap between the small silver-nominal and the gold florins, which was covered by no nominal at all.

So the obvious thing to do would be to fill in this gap by new, bigger silver coins, since a technical problem suggested the same procedure: if the big amounts of the newly found silver had merely been minted to vierer or kreutzers, huge expenditures in manpower would have been necessary.In addition, payments of bigger sums with coins so small in value would have been rather complicated.

In 1482 a full-scale coin reform was started, presenting two important conditions: In 1482 the conservative former coin master Hermann Grünhofer had been replaced by the more advanced coin master Bernhard Beheim the elder; and then Tyrol had a top-standard financierwith Anton vom Ross who - coming from Upper Italy - new a lot about the far more advanced system of coinage there.

The first step of the coin reform was the striking of a coin to the value of 12 kreutzers which corresponded to the rate valid for the moment, "pound Berner" (=240 Berner).Apart from the first series of the Pfunder, which still show the archduke's hat on the front and in their appearance are actually only enlarged kreutzers, all other Pfunder show the portrait of the archduke, the way this was usual at that time with Upper Italian coins, for instance, the Lira Tron of Venice or the Milan Testone.

Along with the Pfunder, a semi-version of the Pfundner was issued in Hall to the value of 6 kreutzers (120 Berner).
These Sechser rapidly became the most popular silver coin in commerce. Again with this Sechser, stylistic influence of Upper Italian coins can’t be denied. It shows the sovereign’s image on the obverse, only the reverse reminds somewhat of the gold florins.The nominal’s popularity made sure that this coin type was minted in Tyrol - with interruptions – until the beginning 17th century.

Two years after beginning to mint Sechser and Pfundner, the issue of a coin to the value of half a rating guilder, i.e. of 30 kreutzers (600 Berner) followed. Also the creation of this new coin involved Upper Italian guidance.