20 Euros Salt Trading

Austria's salt trade shaped the Alpine economy for centuries, with Hallstatt and Hallein functioning as extraction centers so economically dominant that the Celtic word for salt — hal — became embedded in the region's place names. The Habsburg administration later monopolized the trade, using salt revenues to finance wars and court expenditure well into the nineteenth century.

This is the eleventh issue in the Austrian Mint's "Magic of Gold and Silver" series, which rotates through commodities central to Austrian and Central European economic history.