Lucerne's civic coinage of the early seventeenth century was produced under the authority of the city council at a time when the Swiss Confederation's member cantons were actively asserting their monetary independence through locally controlled silver issues. The Dicken denomination — roughly equivalent to a Batzen-based reckoning common to the period — served inter-cantonal trade through the central Swiss passes, where Lucerne's position on the Reuss made it a commercial pivot point.
The five-year span of this type coincides with the tail end of the Price Revolution's pressure on silver coinage across Europe, a period when Swiss city-states were adjusting their monetary output to compensate for Kipper und Wipperzeit debasement flooding in from the German states to the north.
Lucerne's civic coinage of the early seventeenth century was produced under the authority of the city council at a time when the Swiss Confederation's member cantons were actively asserting their monetary independence through locally controlled silver issues. The Dicken denomination — roughly equivalent to a Batzen-based reckoning common to the period — served inter-cantonal trade through the central Swiss passes, where Lucerne's position on the Reuss made it a commercial pivot point.
The five-year span of this type coincides with the tail end of the Price Revolution's pressure on silver coinage across Europe, a period when Swiss city-states were adjusting their monetary output to compensate for Kipper und Wipperzeit debasement flooding in from the German states to the north.