Hermann Werner von Metternich ruled Paderborn from 1683 until his death in 1704, a tenure defined largely by the aftermath of French devastation in the region during the Nine Years' War. Louis XIV's forces ravaged Westphalia through the early 1690s, and a thaler issued in 1693 from a small ecclesiastical mint was as much a statement of institutional survival as it was circulating currency. The Bishopric's finances were badly strained throughout this period.
Davenport 5712 is among the scarcer ecclesiastical thalers of the Westphalian series — the Paderborn mint operated intermittently, and output in any given year was limited by both resources and political instability.
Hermann Werner von Metternich ruled Paderborn from 1683 until his death in 1704, a tenure defined largely by the aftermath of French devastation in the region during the Nine Years' War. Louis XIV's forces ravaged Westphalia through the early 1690s, and a thaler issued in 1693 from a small ecclesiastical mint was as much a statement of institutional survival as it was circulating currency. The Bishopric's finances were badly strained throughout this period.
Davenport 5712 is among the scarcer ecclesiastical thalers of the Westphalian series — the Paderborn mint operated intermittently, and output in any given year was limited by both resources and political instability.