Clement XI issued this piastra in 1704, the third year of the War of the Spanish Succession — a conflict in which the Pope found himself in an impossible position. His formal recognition of Philip V of Anjou as King of Spain in 1700 had alienated the Habsburg Emperor Joseph I, who subsequently occupied several Papal territories and forced humiliating concessions from Rome by 1709. The coins of this middle period carry none of that coming storm visibly, but they were struck under a pontificate already politically compromised.
The Munt#43 reference places this within Muntoni's corpus of Clement XI silver, a reign unusually well-documented for die variety work.
Clement XI issued this piastra in 1704, the third year of the War of the Spanish Succession — a conflict in which the Pope found himself in an impossible position. His formal recognition of Philip V of Anjou as King of Spain in 1700 had alienated the Habsburg Emperor Joseph I, who subsequently occupied several Papal territories and forced humiliating concessions from Rome by 1709. The coins of this middle period carry none of that coming storm visibly, but they were struck under a pontificate already politically compromised.
The Munt#43 reference places this within Muntoni's corpus of Clement XI silver, a reign unusually well-documented for die variety work.