Gold Guilder - Robert of Lenoncourt

Robert of Lenoncourt held the see of Metz during one of its most politically volatile moments: the French occupation of 1552, when Henri II seized the Three Bishoprics — Metz, Toul, and Verdun — from the Holy Roman Empire under the Treaty of Chambord. The bishopric retained nominal authority to strike coinage even under French military control, making these gold guilders an artifact of a jurisdiction that was, functionally, in constitutional suspension. Charles V's failed siege of Metz that winter effectively ended any realistic prospect of Imperial recovery.

Lenoncourt died in 1555, and the brief window of this issue reflects the administrative chaos of the transition rather than any deliberate monetary policy.