Groot - Dirk van Horne/Perwez Cranenborg

The groot was Guelders' answer to the Flemish and Brabantine silver coinages flooding the lower Rhine trade routes in the mid-fourteenth century. Reinald II and his successor Reinald III both struck extensively to fund ongoing conflicts with the bishop of Utrecht and to maintain the duchy's fragile position between the great territorial powers pressing in from every side. The vdCh 3#22.2 variety is associated with the moneyers Dirk van Horne and Perwez Cranenborg, whose names appear in ducal mint accounts.