1/2 Gulden - William I

Württemberg's half gulden occupied an awkward position in the German monetary patchwork of the 1850s and early 1860s. The kingdom had joined the Dresden Convention of 1838, which established the South German gulden standard, but pressure from Prussia's thaler-based system was already threatening to render the smaller silver denominations obsolete. This coin was struck in the final years before the Vienna Monetary Treaty of 1857 fully reorganized the relationship between thaler and gulden coinage across the German states.

William I died in 1864, the same year this type ceased production — replaced almost immediately by issues under his son Charles.