1 Duit

The VOC duit occupies an odd corner of colonial monetary history — issued not by a sovereign state but by a chartered trading corporation that, by the late 1780s, was functionally bankrupt. The Company's finances had been collapsing for decades under the weight of corruption, smuggling losses, and the costs of defending its Indonesian possessions. Lead was the cheapest option for small-denomination coinage destined for local markets where copper VOC duits had long been clipped and counterfeited.

The VOC itself was dissolved by the Dutch government in 1799, just years after these pieces were struck.