1 Sesino - Duke Francesco Farnese

Francesco Farnese became Duke of Parma in 1694 and spent much of his reign navigating the pressures of the War of the Spanish Succession, which left the duchy economically squeezed and politically exposed. Small copper issues like this sesino were the workhorse of local market transactions at a time when silver was being hoarded or melted. The Farnese line would die out entirely with Francesco's brother Antonio in 1731, after which Parma passed to the Bourbons under the Treaty of Vienna.