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Denier Bracteate - Adelhog of Dorstadt
| Issuer | Bishopric of Hildesheim |
|---|---|
| Year | 1170-1190 |
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| Currency | Denier |
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| Obverse description | Frontal enthroned effigy of Bishop Adelhog, vested in pontifical robes rendered with stylized V-shaped drapery folds characteristic of Romanesque bracteate art, seated facing between two architectural towers. In his left hand he raises a crozier with a voluted head, while his right hand holds a book (the Gospels). The bishop wears a mitre and a pectoral ornament is indicated at his chest. The composition is enclosed within a plain inner circle, surrounded by a beaded outer border, with traces of a Latin legend in the outer field. |
|---|---|
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| Reverse description | Blank, as is characteristic of bracteate coinage, which is struck on a single thin flan producing only an incuse mirror image on the reverse. |
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| Additional information |
Adelhog served as Bishop of Hildesheim from 1171 to 1190, a tenure defined largely by his consolidation of episcopal authority in the face of competing Saxon noble interests following Henry the Lion's dominance of the region. Bracteates of this type were struck at Dorstadt, a mint town on the Oker river whose episcopal minting rights Hildesheim had held since the Ottonian period — rights that carried real political weight in a territory where coinage and lordship were inseparable instruments.
Dorstadt itself declined sharply as a settlement through the thirteenth century, which makes its mint output from this window unusually well-defined chronologically.