`1 Tallero del leone` - Albéric Ier

Alberico I Cybo-Malaspina ruled Massa from 1554 until his death in 1623, navigating the duchy through Spanish imperial dominance over northern Italy with considerable political agility. The leone tallero — named for the lion featured in the Cybo arms — was struck to the weight standard of the imperial thaler, a deliberate choice that allowed it to circulate beyond local territory in the broader Mediterranean and northern Italian trade networks.

1596 falls within a productive phase of Alberico's mint activity at Massa. The Cybo-Malaspina coinage of this period is poorly documented in surviving mint records, making precise die studies difficult.