1/2 Batzen

Aargau had only existed as a Swiss canton since 1803, when the Act of Mediation imposed by Napoleon reorganized the Helvetic Republic into a Confederation of cantons. This coin is among the earliest issues from that newly constituted authority, struck just four years after Aargau gained the right to mint its own coinage — a right it exercised only briefly before Swiss monetary consolidation eroded cantonal minting autonomy through the mid-nineteenth century.