1 Pfennig - Frederick Ulrich

Frederick Ulrich's reign over Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel was a slow administrative collapse — he died in 1634 without an heir, extinguishing his line entirely and triggering a succession reshuffling among the Guelf branches. The 1624 date places this piece squarely in the early devastation of the Thirty Years' War, when the Lower Saxon Circle found itself directly in the path of Tilly's Catholic League forces. Small silver fractions like this circulated under severe monetary stress, as territorial mints across the German states debased and overproduced coinage during the Kipper- und Wipperzeit of the early 1620s — a currency crisis so acute it destabilized grain markets across the region.