Guglielmo IX ruled Montferrat during a period when the marquisate was being squeezed between the expansionist ambitions of France, Milan, and Savoy — a precarious position that shaped his coinage policy. The scudo d'oro format was adopted across northern Italian states largely to facilitate trade with French merchants, whose own écu d'or set the practical standard for cross-border transactions in the late fifteenth century.
Montferrat's gold output from this period is genuinely scarce. The marquisate lacked the fiscal depth of its neighbors, and surviving examples in any grade are infrequently encountered at auction.
Guglielmo IX ruled Montferrat during a period when the marquisate was being squeezed between the expansionist ambitions of France, Milan, and Savoy — a precarious position that shaped his coinage policy. The scudo d'oro format was adopted across northern Italian states largely to facilitate trade with French merchants, whose own écu d'or set the practical standard for cross-border transactions in the late fifteenth century.
Montferrat's gold output from this period is genuinely scarce. The marquisate lacked the fiscal depth of its neighbors, and surviving examples in any grade are infrequently encountered at auction.