Denier - William IV

The counts of Forcalquier maintained a stubborn political independence from their more powerful neighbors in Provence throughout the twelfth century, and their coinage reflects exactly that posture — a deliberate assertion of comital authority through an autonomous monetary output. William IV ruled during the period when Forcalquier's rivalry with the House of Barcelona over the Provençal succession was at its most acute, culminating in the 1193 treaty that would eventually absorb the county into Provence upon the male line's extinction in 1209.

That terminal date is the coin's most telling biographical detail: this denier was struck during a dynasty's final decades.