1 Ducat - George II Harz Ausbeute

The "Ausbeute" designation marks this as a mine-yield ducat — struck specifically from silver and gold extracted from the Harz Mountain mines, a practice the Hanoverian court used to publicize the productivity of its mining operations. By 1730, the Harz mines had been a contested economic resource for generations, with Brunswick and other territorial powers repeatedly disputing extraction rights and smelting revenues.

George II was in the second year of his British reign when this was struck, still consolidating his position against Jacobite sentiment. The Hanoverian electorate's mining income was no small matter to him — it funded continental ambitions independent of parliamentary appropriation.