Gulden - William V of Bavaria

Holland's guilder coinage of this period was issued under William V, who ruled the county from 1354 until madness — documented and eventually declared legally — forced his removal from power in 1358. His brother Albert of Bavaria assumed regency and governed for decades, yet coins continued to be struck in William's name long after he had been confined. This piece dates from precisely that administrative fiction: William nominally count, Albert actually ruling, the mint perpetuating a legal identity that had no living political reality behind it.