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5 Sous - Philip IV Balaguer
| Issuer | Municipality of Balaguer (Province of Lleida) |
|---|---|
| Year | 1641 |
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| Value | 5 Sous |
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| Composition | Log in to see details |
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| Obverse description | Central field displays the crowned coat of arms of Catalonia, with the numeral value flanking the shield on either side. The design is enclosed within two concentric beaded circles, with a Latin legend running around the periphery between the circles. The overall style is characteristic of mid-17th-century Iberian hammered emergency coinage, with irregular flan and somewhat uneven strike. |
|---|---|
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| Edge | Plain |
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| Additional information |
Balaguer's 1641 emission sits at the intersection of two overlapping crises: the Catalan Revolt — the Guerra dels Segadors — which had formally begun the previous year when Catalonia repudiated Castilian authority and placed itself under French protection, and the chronic small-denomination shortage that plagued Iberian municipal mints throughout the Thirty Years' War period. Local authorities struck their own silver partly out of necessity, partly as an assertion of municipal prerogative at a moment when Barcelona itself was challenging Madrid.
The Cal#86 reference places this among the better-documented Catalan municipal issues, though surviving examples in collectible condition are genuinely scarce given the violence that swept the region through the 1640s.