1/2 Zecchino - Alvise Mocenigo IV

Alvise Mocenigo IV served as Doge from 1763 until his death in 1778, presiding over a republic that had long since ceded its commercial dominance in the eastern Mediterranean. The half-zecchino was a denomination Venice used sparingly — the full zecchino had circulated as a trusted trade coin across the Levant for centuries, but fractional gold served a narrower domestic function and was produced in far smaller quantities.

The Venetian mint, the Zecca, maintained extraordinary gold fineness standards that had remained essentially unchanged since the thirteenth century — a monetary conservatism that outlasted the republic itself by reputation if not by practice.