1/4 Thaler - Ferdinand II of Fürstenberg

Ferdinand II von Fürstenberg served as Prince-Bishop of Paderborn from 1661 until his death in 1683, and this issue dates to just his second year in office. He was simultaneously a serious baroque scholar and poet — his Monumenta Paderbornensia of 1672 remains a foundational text in Westphalian ecclesiastical history. The Bishopric's coinage in this period operated under the complex monetary framework of the Holy Roman Empire, where ecclesiastical princes retained the right of mintage as a direct expression of their territorial sovereignty.

KM#106 is sparsely documented in surviving examples, which is unsurprising given Paderborn's modest mint output relative to the larger secular territories of the Empire.