1/2 Thaler - Franz I

Franz I spent his final years on the throne governing an empire still organized around the administrative reforms he'd imposed after abolishing the Holy Roman Empire in 1806 — a title he surrendered before Napoleon could strip it from him. The half thaler denomination occupied an awkward position in Austrian silver coinage of the period, large enough to be a significant transaction piece but consistently overshadowed in collector attention by the convention thaler.

The .833 fineness was fixed by the Münzvertrag monetary conventions binding the German states, not a unilateral Austrian decision.