1 Thaler

Frankfurt struck these thalers during a period of acute financial strain brought on by the Nine Years' War, when Louis XIV's campaigns were draining silver reserves across the Holy Roman Empire. The city, nominally independent but perpetually under pressure from neighboring territorial princes and imperial creditors alike, relied on its position as a major trade and fair city to sustain minting activity that larger polities had curtailed.

The two-year span of this issue — 1695 and 1696 — likely reflects a single authorization of bullion rather than continuous production. Davenport's CCT listing confirms the type but offers no mintage figures, which is typical for Frankfurt civic issues of this decade.