Hardi 2ème émission - Bordeaux - Charles VIII dit 'l'Affable'

Charles VIII inherited the French throne at thirteen and spent much of his reign consumed by the Italian campaigns of 1494–1498, a venture that drained the treasury and demanded continuous small-denomination coinage to pay troops and suppliers in the field. The Bordeaux mint — operating under the dolphin mintmark — was among the provincial workshops pressed into sustained production of billon petty coinage precisely because the Italian adventure made liquidity in the southwestern provinces a logistical priority.

Duplessy 598 is the second emission of the hardi, distinguished from the first by subtle die characteristics that specialists use to sequence the type's production chronology.