3 Ducats - Sigismund II Augustus Wilno mint

Sigismund II Augustus issued multiple-ducat gold pieces not as circulating currency but as presentation gifts — diplomatic tools handed to foreign envoys, favored courtiers, and military commanders. The Wilno mint, operating under royal privilege in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, produced these in small, irregular quantities with no fixed annual schedule, which is precisely why survivors are so scarce. The 1563 date places this piece in the middle of the Livonian War, when Sigismund was simultaneously fighting Ivan the Terrible and negotiating the political union that would formally merge Poland and Lithuania five years later at Lublin.

Kop. 3328 is among the rarer recorded die combinations for this type.