1 Körtling - Frederick of Wirsberg

Frederick of Wirsberg ruled Würzburg from 1558 until his death in 1573, and his episcopate coincided with the intensifying pressures of the Counter-Reformation in Franconia. The Körtling — a small regional silver denomination circulating across the bishoprics and imperial cities of the German southwest — was by the 1570s already losing ground to the advancing standardization pushed by the 1559 imperial coinage ordinance. That Wirsberg was still issuing them in 1571–72 reflects the stubborn monetary autonomy ecclesiastical princes retained well past the point when secular rulers had largely fallen into line.