1 Thaler - Christoph Bernhard of Galen

Christoph Bernhard von Galen — known to contemporaries as "Bombing Bernd" for his enthusiastic deployment of artillery — was one of the more militarily aggressive prince-bishops of the seventeenth century. This thaler was struck just two years after he consolidated control over Münster following the city's violent suppression of its own civic government, a campaign he prosecuted with the same methodical brutality he later turned on the Dutch. His 1665–1666 war against the Republic of the United Provinces, fought partly in alliance with England, made him briefly notorious across northern Europe.

Dav. #5603 is well-documented within the series; the bishop issued thalers across much of his episcopate, using them as instruments of political projection as much as monetary instruments.