Gold Florin anonymous

Aquitaine's gold florins of this period were struck under English authority — Edward III held the duchy as a vassal of the French crown, a legal fiction that contributed directly to the outbreak of the Hundred Years' War in 1337. Production of gold coinage in Bordeaux during the 1340s served the practical demands of English military financing in southwestern France, where Gascon loyalty was purchased as much as commanded.

The Florentine florin prototype was adopted across European feudal mints in this decade with remarkable speed, its weight standard trusted by merchants and soldiers alike. Aquitaine's anonymous issues are distinguished in Elias's typology precisely by the absence of a named authority — a deliberate choice, or simply administrative habit, remains debated.