1 Guldiner - Maximilian I Hall

The Guldiner struck at Hall in the Inn Valley is among the earliest large silver coins in European history — Maximilian's mints at Hall began producing these heavy pieces in the 1480s as a direct response to the enormous silver output of the Tyrolean mines at Schwaz, then among the most productive in the known world. The Schwaz mines were generating such volumes of refined silver that existing coin denominations were simply inadequate for large commercial transactions.

Maximilian used the revenue aggressively, financing his Italian campaigns and Habsburg dynastic marriages partly on Tyrolean silver. The Hall Guldiner became a direct ancestor of the Thaler series that would dominate European trade coinage for the next three centuries.