2 Thalers / 3½ Gulden - Leopold Frederick

Leopold Frederick ruled Anhalt-Dessau for an extraordinary 73 years, from 1807 until his death in 1871 — one of the longest reigns of any German prince in the nineteenth century. The dual denomination stamped on this coin, 2 Thalers and 3½ Gulden simultaneously, was a direct product of the Dresden Coinage Convention of 1838, which attempted to reconcile the Thaler-based monetary system of northern German states with the Gulden system dominant in the south. Anhalt-Dessau, geographically and politically caught between both spheres, issued this double-valuation piece to facilitate trade in either direction.