2 Ducats - Clement VII

Giulio de' Medici was elected Clement VII in November 1523, inheriting a papacy already destabilized by the Lutheran schism and the competing ambitions of Francis I and Charles V. These ducats were struck during the brief window before his catastrophically misjudged alliance-switching between the two powers culminated in the Sack of Rome in May 1527 — an event that effectively ended pontifical minting in the city for years. The Roman mint operated under severe political pressure throughout this period.

The Berman 825 attribution places this squarely among the rarer multiple-ducat issues of the reign, with surviving examples predominantly found in institutional collections rather than the trade.