Denier Tournois - John II Orsini

John II Orsini seized the Despotate of Epirus through the murder of his brother Nicholas in 1323, then ruled until his own wife — Anna Palaiologina — poisoned him in 1335. His coinage consciously mimicked the French denier tournois, a currency that had flooded into Greece via the Latin principalities and become the dominant small change across the Frankish-controlled Peloponnese and the Ionian coast. Adopting that format was a pragmatic political signal: Orsini was positioning himself within the western feudal order while simultaneously negotiating with Byzantium.

Metcalf 1138 is among the better-documented types from this mint, though attribution to specific regnal years within his reign remains difficult.