See full images - free registration
Continue with Google - no registration! or register with email

Why register? Just to keep bots out of our catalog. Your email stays private - we will never share it or send you anything uninvited. We guarantee you that!

80 Soldi - Scipione Gonzaga

Issuer Bozzolo
Year 1613
Type Log in to see details
Value Log in to see details
Currency Log in to see details
Composition Log in to see details
Weight Log in to see details
Diameter Log in to see details
Thickness Log in to see details
Shape Log in to see details
Technique Log in to see details
Orientation Medal alignment ↑↑
Engraver(s) Log in to see details
In circulation to Log in to see details
Reference(s) Log in to see details
Obverse description Armored bust of Scipione Gonzaga facing right, wearing elaborately decorated plate armor with prominent pauldrons and gorget, his hair curled and flowing. A circular legend in Latin surrounds the effigy, reading partially SCIPON and referencing his titles, with the denomination numeral 80 inscribed in the lower field below the bust. The portrait is rendered in a vigorous late-Renaissance style characteristic of early seventeenth-century Italian hammered coinage.
Obverse script Log in to see details
Obverse lettering Log in to see details
Reverse description Log in to see details
Reverse script Log in to see details
Reverse lettering Log in to see details
Edge Plain
Mint Log in to see details
Mintage Log in to see details
Additional information

Bozzolo was among the smallest and most precarious of the Gonzaga cadet lordships — a pocket territory wedged between Mantua and Cremona, perpetually dependent on the goodwill of larger neighbors. Scipione Gonzaga ruled it from 1613 until 1670, a remarkably long tenure for so marginal a domain. The 80 Soldi denomination itself was an awkward unit, pitched between standard divisional coins and the heavier specie preferred for serious commerce, which likely explains why surviving examples are rarely found with honest circulation wear.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE