Denier Bracteate - Frederick I Altenburg

Frederick Barbarossa held the imperial diet at Altenburg in 1165, making it one of his preferred Saxon residences and almost certainly the administrative justification for a local mint striking in his name. Bracteates from this mint are among the thinner, more fragile examples of the type — single-sided striking on foil-thin blanks left them acutely vulnerable to folding and cracking in the purse, which accounts for the rarity of undamaged survivors today.