Light Denier - Henry XII the Lion

Henry the Lion received the Duchy of Bavaria in 1156 when Frederick Barbarossa resolved the dispute between Henry and the Babenbergs by creating a new duchy — Austria — for Heinrich Jasomirgott, thereby leaving Bavaria intact for his Welf cousin. The arrangement made Henry simultaneously Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, one of the most powerful territorial concentrations in the medieval empire. These light deniers belong to that period of consolidated authority before Henry's catastrophic falling-out with Barbarossa and his subsequent exile in 1180, when the duchy was dissolved and his minting rights extinguished.