Bern struck this type during the Mediation period and into the early Restoration, a stretch when Swiss cantonal authority had been partially restored after Napoleon's Act of Mediation of 1803 dismantled the Helvetic Republic. The Batzen itself was a genuinely pan-Swiss unit at this moment — the Federal Concordat of 1803 had attempted to rationalize coinage across cantons, and Bern's issues were among the more widely accepted in the western Confederation.
The .676 fineness reflects the compromised silver standards common to cantonal issues of this transition period, before the more rigorous Federal Coinage Act of 1850 finally ended the jurisdictional patchwork.
Bern struck this type during the Mediation period and into the early Restoration, a stretch when Swiss cantonal authority had been partially restored after Napoleon's Act of Mediation of 1803 dismantled the Helvetic Republic. The Batzen itself was a genuinely pan-Swiss unit at this moment — the Federal Concordat of 1803 had attempted to rationalize coinage across cantons, and Bern's issues were among the more widely accepted in the western Confederation.
The .676 fineness reflects the compromised silver standards common to cantonal issues of this transition period, before the more rigorous Federal Coinage Act of 1850 finally ended the jurisdictional patchwork.