1 Tari - Ferdinando II

Ferdinando II — Fernando II of Aragon to the Spanish — ruled Sicily not as a distant abstraction but as its direct sovereign following the island's absorption into the Crown of Aragon in 1282. The tari itself predates Aragonese rule by centuries, originating as an Arab gold coin introduced during the Emirate of Sicily; by Ferdinando's reign it had long since migrated to silver and become the backbone of Sicilian small commerce. These years also saw Ferdinando consolidating control over southern Italy following the defeat of the French in the Italian Wars, with the Regno di Napoli and Sicily increasingly administered as a single fiscal unit.